Dear Friends,

It has been a while since I have posted.  I'm not very good at having anything worth writing from week to week.  I hope you might enjoy a brief reflection on the boring haps and mishaps of my current life.

I am still studying for my fifth (and hopefully final) year at Indiana Wesleyan University.  I am still struggling to learn how to live life well, and most weeks I only hope to come away with some sense of survival.  I am attempting to try my best at school, despite my frequent failures (small and large), in hopes of improving my overall skill at these beloved academics.  I think I am too comfortable.  If I am to succeed, I will be stretched by the work school requires of me.  Maybe I have been taking life too easy?

I have lost quite a bit of confidence as pertains to my future in ministry.  I suspect this has to do with my lack of present involvement in ministry.  I seem to have lost a vision for God's call on my life.  This I must recover, by God's grace.  

I am also trying to open myself up to the fullness of grace the Lord has to offer us.  Though I often fail, I desperately desire to experience and share God's immeasurable love.  I want a deeper, joy-filled life, animated by the Holy Spirit, full of grace and good fruit.  So I suppose I need a lesson in abiding in Christ.  Perhaps I ought to focus on serving others, so as to take the attention off my own growth.

I also work about 15 hrs. per week at Steak n Shake.

That's it -- my life, for now.

Lord, have mercy.  

at the hands of soldiers

Jesus my savior was patient, suffered and died at the hands of soldiers doing their duty. And he forgave them and prayed for them.

Terrorism

Last night ABC news published a story about Europeans training with al-Qaeda. This raised particular concern because it posed a new kind of terrorist threat: caucasian terrorists. The new concern, of course, is that it will be more difficult to detect terrorists in airports among the throngs of people, as they will no longer be able to "racially profile" who is more likely to be a terrorist. If my understanding of "this new kind of threat" is wrong, please forgive me. My understanding of the nuts and bolts of "this new threat" illustrated several points for me, and raised several serious issues in my mind.

- If racial profiling is wrong, nevertheless this has been one of our tactics all along in attempting to detect airline terrorists. Otherwise white terrorists would pose no new threat. They would just be other violently-intentioned humans whom we cannot easily detect. However, if we have been expecting terrorists to be from the Middle-east, this means we have been prejudiced against persons of this origin.

- Prejudice against persons of Middle-eastern origin has led to a general and national fear of and racism against them. This can be detected in unintelligent conversations where you hear something like, "People from that ancient culture are prone to violence, and they don't understand how to settle a conflict." We label them as barbaric and think we are superior to them, more 'cultured.' This notion is preposterous. What hypocrites we are! Who would label them barbaric when our response to the September 11th tragedy has been just the same if not worse in its reasoning, execution and outcome? What is not terrible about the war in Afghanistan and Iraq? Is our war any better just because we don't call it jihad? Is our war not terrorism because we have called it "shock and awe"? Lord, have mercy on us for our sins! We irresponsibly let September 11th incite us to fear, anger, and then violent retaliation, instead of grief over the violence as well as the deaths, and to prayer. God, Iraq and Afghanistan, please forgive us for the wars we have made.

When I heard about this story, I was grieved that Europeans were joining al-Qaeda. This led me to ask, 'Why am I not grieved by the fact that a few Muslims comprise their ranks? Why does the majority number of al-Qaeda not grieve me just as much as Europeans joining them?' Because I have been racist. I have presumed that 'we can expect extreme behavior from those people.' I beg all people from the Middle-east, and all Muslims to forgive me for such thoughts. +We ought to be grieved when anyone trains for war or violence against their fellow humans.+

Pithy thought by yours truly #3

"When all you see is made by man,
it is hard to believe in God."

Of Worry

"Cease from an inordinate desire of knowing,
for therein is found much distraction and deceit."
-Thomas a Kempis

+++

I have to laugh

at you, worry;--

who are you

but a demon

I have listened to?

Of things unfinished,

undone,

unbegun;

Of incompletes,

thoughts just conceived;

Of inconceivables

and things unseen;

Unknown,

unshown,

unowned;

Not been

nor shall ever

be for me.



I hate you both:

not mine this time, and

no peace in pining.



And so I hope.

+++

"May those who say to me, 'Aha! Aha!'
turn back because of their shame."
-Psalm 70:3

" . . . but my ears you have opened;" Psalm 40:6

Shhh . . .

. . . listen.

Shut the mouth,
open the ear,
be attentive,
and believe.

Trust.

Then love
and obey.


Deuteronomy 6:4
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.

Psalm 141:3
Set a guard over my mouth, O LORD;
keep watch over the door of my lips.

Proverbs 10:19
When words are many, sin is not absent,
but he who holds his tongue is wise.

Proverbs 18:13
He who answers before listening—
that is his folly and his shame.

Proverbs 19:20
Listen to advice and accept instruction,
and in the end you will be wise.

Proverbs 19:27
Stop listening to instruction, my son,
and you will stray from the words of knowledge.

Psalm 95:7b-11
Today, if you hear his voice,

do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,
as you did that day at Massah in the desert,

where your fathers tested and tried me,
though they had seen what I did.

For forty years I was angry with that generation;
I said, "They are a people whose hearts go astray,
and they have not known my ways."

So I declared on oath in my anger,
"They shall never enter my rest."

Matthew 12:33-37
"Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him. But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned."

James 1:19-27
My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.

If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

+New International Version (NIV)
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society+

Just a Taste

I've been reading some great poetry by my friend Austin Givens, from his new book I Cry Enough for My Father and other poems. Here's a sample:

On How To Be Human

"I" being the

host tree,

"You" the

ruthless banyan

and soon "I" become "We."

and "You" much bigger then "me."

--------------------------

Read more, buy, download Austin's book here.