The High Road?

I read through Matthew last week as part of a new commitment I volunteered far, and one verse in particular caught my attention: Matthew 5:47 which I'll paraphrase to
say, "If you greet only your friend, what do you do more than an
unbeliever?"

I spent a recent morning past, and most of the same afternoon hours, climbing a mountain with a visiting friend. While I tried my best to time it so I'd be back for a meeting, I thought it more prudent not to rush the experience and as a result, I was late in getting to where I was going. But it was one of the few times I could admit that it was worth it. Here's why:

This friend of mine I've known since high school. He isn't a
Christian, yet he's one of the people I can trust in my life with
anything, any topic of discussion, and he's always willing to
challenge and explore an issue. We were talking about talking, and
writing, and communication, and the importance of honesty in
relationships, all over some hours of hiking so I'm editing a lot, but
at some point we touched upon the terminology of "introvert and
extrovert" each of us being somewhat representative of the two
extremes.

This friend of mine meets new people wherever he goes. He's the first
to enter into new activities and experiences, he welcomes strangers
and readily includes any and everyone at all times in all things
finding every aspect of human interaction invigorating, whereas, in
stark contrast, I find that without conscious effort I can let days
pass without any interpersonal communication of any type transpiring
between myself and another human being outside of the confines of the
internet, and when in the company of more than one or two I'm happy to
be silent unless called upon, and happier still to leave if the
encounter has proved particularly exhausting, as such circumstances
often are for me though I have the capacity to hide it well.

I've often used "introversion" as an easy excuse for my unwillingness
to reach out, say hello, meet new people, etc. Then, at my friend's
persistent questioning, I began to explore exceptions to that
convenient rule: in teaching children - it's hard to remain
introverted, so I engage in "edutainment" which isn't too much of a
stretch considering I went to a dramatic arts high school (with said
friend) and have been a part of a number of dramatic endeavors over
the years - also, in personal training, which was my livelihood before
teaching while pursuing acting, and I was an encourager then, and as
animated an individual for my clients as each relationship
necessitated. This revelation led to the confession that to some
degree, introversion and extroversion are choices, or formed habits,
each with their own place in the teachings of Jesus.

The problem I have to face is, in learning this, how responsible have I become? In sharing it with you, how far do you now go? Any thoughts? You needn't tell me, but I hope there are.

- TPK

On Having Shallow Roots

I started going to a new Church about a month ago and completed the requisite Membership Classes today.

The Church is called "Jubilee" and the founding pastor is a young man, in his mid thirties. His vision for the church is that it would be a hub for international missions. The church is independent, non-denominational, and has a steady influx of foreigners passing through its doors.

Last week there was a guest speaker there who shared a picture with the congregation. The picture began with a hand coming down from heaven, hovering over North America, grabbing a giant tree around the trunk, and trying to loose the tree from it's hold in the earth, but to no avail. The roots clung tight to the earth, going too deep to release the tree. The hand moved, came to East Asia, found another tree and pulled. This tree came out half-way, but still a single root tapped too deep to unearth and free the tree. Finally the hand from heaven came to another tree, this one had shallow roots, but they were wide, stretching all around the world. When the hand grasped the tree and pulled it was easily uprooted. The hand shook the tree to loose the dirt still clinging to the roots, turned it upside-down and transplanted it into heaven where the tree flourished, bearing beautiful fruit, that fell in abundance all over the world below.

For some time now I've struggled with the idea of not having a home. I moved from my country of birth to a country of residence when I was twenty, and failing in setting roots there, I've spent the last few years in a transient search for a place to call home, from country to city to a four month stint in Africa, and now a year in the far east, feeling ever more the sojourner, resident of the world, and ever less a citizen of any one country, and trying to identify more and more with my identity of an heir to a kingdom not of this world, and at long last I've found some freedom in the image of a tree... for the second time, though the first tree was barren, having two branches, holding up the life given up for mine that I might die and live anew by the abundant grace of God. And now this new tree, representative not of one, but of many, who have forsaken their ties to the world, having been shaken free, not without cost, and transplanted into a new kingdom, to bear fruit together, and bear witness of another tree, the first, by which all are saved.

It's an amazing image to take hold of. My prayer is that such may come to pass. There's still some filth to shake free, but I feel unhindered by my earthly ties, and all the more ready to find a home, but not one of a handful of dirt, one of grace and love and mercy, that I might grow and produce the fruit we're all made to bear.

- TPS

Blogging the Bible: Numbers

Numbers has lots of numbers. It start with various censuses of the people, but in my thinking, this book is sort of depicts the overall quantitative exactitude of God. Numbers goes into extensive details about the modes, means and measures God required of the children of Israel in the matters of various offerings, rituals of cleanliness, and additional laws.

This book reminds me a little of the watchmaker, the calculating creator of the universe, who had a plan from the beginning: to love people, and for people to love and worship Him through their freewill choice, but in the only manner acceptable to such a God: in perfect holiness.

There are some narrative elements in the middle of the book, including Aaron and Miriam's dissension, a few rebellions and complaints, and the initial refusal to enter into the promised land, the prophesies of Balaam, and a few battles, deaths, and consequential errors, among them the forty years of wandering that are the setting of the last two books of the Pentateuch.

There is plenty of meat (mostly quail) and manna in the pages, but they're laden with the numbers the title speaks of, and while it remains God's Word, and as such I cannot speak against it, I was glad to reach the other side. I prefer the arts to the maths and sciences, but try to understand the importance of all in turn.

A Letter to Ann Coulter

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ucac/liberaltalibanissuesfatwaagainstmisscalifornia

Dear Ann,

I think Miss California's stand for her views, that some think cost her a crown, but I firmly believe procured her a much greater one, is laudable, and the subsequent tumult in the media is despicable, and your standing up to fight on her behalf, wielding your political rhetoric with such poise and promise, is a wonderful thing, but it's a little akin to a skilled mercenary joining a civil war to acquire the potential wealth of the victors, rather than support their cause.
Miss Carrie Prejean may very well be Christian, and may very well be Republican, but the continued linking of the two remains a blight, not a shining light, on the former (Christianity) as the latter (Republicans) are pretty far off the mark when in comes to representing a full spectrum of Biblical values. I feel it's been said before, but must be reiterated again and again because of the adamant voices of some who keep wanting to unite these ideologies for personal gain: Libralism is not the opposite of Christianity. After all, Jesus came to liberate all humanity. We are liberated because of God's grace. We are commissioned to liberally share that liberating grace with the world. If anything, the word liberal bears a far more stiking similarity to the Good News; one of the things we should be liberated from is the mistaken belief that we can do anything outside of that grace to improve our standing, corporately or individually, with God. So I'm sorry to say that whatever political affiliation you register with doesn't matter much.
Taking the message of grace and covering it with such vitriol is like taking the wedding feast of the lamb and smothering it with a steaming pile of... kimchee (first illustration that came to mind); some will devour it, love it even, but it's certainly not a meal for every tribe and tongue as the preparer of the feast intends it to be.
I think you're a valuable voice to publicly balance the opposition to so much that I too oppose, and as I appreciate Miss Prejean's example, I laud your own efforts insofar as they extend towards a similar end, but I think you touched upon the power and the true beauty of the subject matter at hand in citing the grace and humility with which such a message is shared. As beautiful as an individual may be, the message is greater by far, and it is the message, not her own, that won Miss Prejean her crown.

- TPS

Selected Correspondence II: I thought that I would be better at this.

I thought that I would be better at this.

I never thought forgiveness was difficult. I’m coming to see that that is because I’ve never really been hurt before, at least, not in any way like this.

I realized that I was merely a casualty of my parents’ divorce, and so forgiveness came in understanding that the offense wasn’t ever really against me. Likewise, in their subsequent remarriages, my parents’ spouses were no offense to me, but rather were filling spaces in my respective parent’s life which in turn affects my own, but less when put in perspective.

I thought I was a forgiving person because I got over the things that hurt and through the past few years of struggling to love someone I always had an underlying hope and faith that love, however flawed and human I made it manifest, would nonetheless prevail. Thus when we’d argue (or fight as she so termed such conflicts) I could always love her a moment later. When she needed a break I gave her one, understanding it to be just that, and as it turned out to be something more, when she started seeing other people, a mere hour in her company was yet enough for me to assuage most doubts because I could see that she still loved me, and forgiveness came inevitably after any vestige of hope returned. Of course as the years went by in frustration the hour sometimes took some days to get there, still, we danced a month before her wedding and I thought for sure we were in love.

Now I’m alone in this city, and despite the warmth of late I’ve been cold since the 13th, wrapped up in my own insecurities, and every night I can’t escape the thought that all of these past three months have been a nightmare and I’ll soon awake to love again, but not a different person, it’s still her, and it’s hope in vain this time and so no forgiveness has yet followed me here and I don’t know where to find it. All it does is hurt from one day to the next. I have managed to keep it numb most times, in public, but alone I feel it. Around her family, our friends, driving towards the places I used to see her and think about her, and there is nowhere in my life that isn’t so, because she’s still in my thoughts every day, though they’re not so loving anymore. It hurts. It keeps me from anyone who might ease the pain, or share what small successes or failures I’ve endured in life for want of having to love again into a void where all my love is spent and my investment is lost and married, and I can see no future past another unrelenting day tomorrow full of silent torture and my inability to forgive a pain too great to forget.

Forgive me.
Help me to forgive.



(I'm not sure I've progressed much further than the sentiment here expressed, despite the fact that these experiences are years old. It is this broken relationship that haunts, stifles, and informs my present far more than it should. Again, I would it were another. Nonetheless, the conclusion is one I could still use more often than not, be it for this same relational scar, or fresher wounds I bear. Forgiveness isn't easy.)

- TPK

Selected Correspondence I: I Miss You...

I miss you.

I didn’t breathe deep enough when I saw you last, and now I’m in too deep, and it hurts, and I want to breathe but if I do I’ll drown because there’s no air left to breathe this far down. You are the first question I’m asked and I have no response but to miss you more. I can’t escape my thoughts of you because they’re everywhere…
Driving I can’t help but wish you were there to keep me from tormenting myself. Then I think, better me than you, yourself, because there’s a chance you’ll still speak with me when the trip is done. It just seems like wasted time when I’m alone, looking at the vacant seat beside me. I remember the time I had your company and over the phone it just isn’t the same. I prefer to get lost in your eyes than in the small town intersections up North.
I missed you at the hotel; I couldn’t enjoy the hot tub because I kept wondering if you would. All the rooms had two beds so I’m sure you’d have been accommodated.
I went to church today and thought it better you weren’t there and forced into introductions and smiles and hugs I couldn’t be too sure of as far as motives were concerned.
I missed you at the mall when I managed to return your sweater because my decision making skills buckled under the pressure of what to get you. You said black; I hope you like at least one of my attempts. I met a friend there too. We caught up and she had quite a story to tell, and she made me appreciate and miss you all the more.
I miss you at night. Tea just isn’t the same. And I’m not as comfortable and consequently quick to sleep without your influence at hand. I miss your dog too, and thus miss you. He’s not like other dogs. Sherlock isn’t Matty, but isn’t Woof either. Give Woof some lovin’ from me.
I wish you sat across from me so my eyes could settle on you, and rest, and stop searching for you everywhere only to be continuously disappointed when the car is not so banged up, or the hair is too short, or too long, or anything yours is not except enough to wish for a second that maybe you’re not as far away as I know you are. No one else is you, and I miss you.
I miss you when people ask me about me because I don’t know what to tell them about my friend, with benefits, who is such a huge part of that answer but doesn’t fit into the work and school song and dance that makes things easy to sum up. I can’t sum you up. Not in any more than three words.
I miss you when I plan my days and can’t reserve the time to look forward to the best part of it.
I miss your smile and your laugh. I miss your eyes. I miss your ears. I miss your voice. I miss your hands and feet. I miss you like you’re not just up the road, or across town, or getting off work soon, or getting ready for bed but yeah you’ll be up for a while if I want to stop by when I’m done, and you’re not on the phone or brushing your teeth or taking a shower or running around or out, or you are all those things and I’m just not there to miss you like I do then because I’m here missing you like I do now.
I miss all I know and I know all I miss, but I’m used to it. I’ve missed you every minute we’re apart whether or not I knew it, and I’ll miss you again, in part or in whole, because there’s much I have yet to miss.
I miss you when I’m writing because I’m not happy with the product. I can’t tell you how much I’ll really miss you until I can be with you again and stop missing you.



(Now if only I could apply this old letter to my savior, and not a broken romance...)

- TPK

Blogging the Bible: Leviticus

The Law. The Pentateuch has to be the part of the Bible I struggle with the most, and of those first five books, this one is the major cause. The Levitical Law is often hard to reconcile to Christianity until you see it for what it is: a characterization of God, of Jesus, of the standard of perfection that Jesus maintained as he lived on earth, filling in much of the questions about his character, his early years, and the life he lived up to turning thirty and beginning his ministry. That's my take, anyhow. Which certainly helps me to appreciate my savior a little more because seriously, it's an incredibly strict behavioral standard. Thankfully, Jesus lived it and gave us a more consice, but at times no less difficult standard to live:

"Love the Lord your God... love your neighbor as yourself." Mat: 22:37-40

"These things I command you, that you love one another." John: 15:17

Still, I prefer to focus on love than rituals for cleanliness concerning molds.