Saddened

Loosing the ability to be a friend is never easy. But sometimes life conspires and it becomes unavoidable. Perhaps one day there will be reconciliation. But until then, by being quiet, civility may, at least, be maintained.

Mind hook

Several lines of thought keep streaming from my head. What is the assumption I am swallowing that is tying me to these lines of thought. What is the bate on this mind hook that I swallowed.

No one will stand with me unless I have the perfect & rehearsed line of logic. (when has perfect logic ever adequately quelled a biased weakly-supported, demonizing charge.)

God won't step into their lives and use this situation (unlike how he has used it in my life.)

That these people are not exactly where God wants them. (what did pastor Dan always say? 'God will fix a fix to fix you. And if you fix the fix God gave to fix you, he will fix another fix to fix you.'

That I need to deal with them the way they dealt with my friend and pastor. (that would be mean-spirited, judgmental, harsh, agenda motivated, demigoding, unforgiving, street-justice wanting, non-humble, non-empathetic, un-respectful, bitter, and crucifying-cruel.) AND it is also my job to hold the mirror up to their face. (Would they even look?)

That any of this is more worthy of my thoughts than the moment I am in.

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Musings as I lay looking into the sky

There is a time for everything.

Are you putting your trust in flimsy, time-limited, foolish-hearted, agenda-motivated, fragel, pride-and-greed-filled, essentially and pervasively flawed men/woman. Is that why you are surprised when they let you down? Is it being surprised smart?

What did you have to swallow to get hooked on that line of thought?

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Is it self Confidence we need?

I wonder about those words, Self confidence. Is that really what we need? Confidence that I can do it. But what if what you are doing is wrong? A man could jump off a building, confident he could fly.... How is that going to work out? Hitler was confident... The people who crucified Christ were confident..The men who are attacking my pastor are confident. hmmmm. Maybe we should be careful what we put our confidence in. Are we worthy of our un-checked confidence? How do we judge what is worthy? Are our judgments sound, or are we compromised my our own Machiavellian drive to our goal?

Okay, what now.

Where, God, does this mistrust come from. Why, God, do I doubt. I do feel betrayed by promises of a life of ease. But you never made those promises. You never guaranteed anything that I am upset about. What have I not forgiven you for.
- the sickness that distroyed Shalom's body and mind.
- the grief and rejection I felt at the hands of my school mates.
-The betrayal within my family that lead to my parents separation.
- The student loans that did not come through to pay for the semester that I had to pay for so I could finish college with the scholarship I had earned.
- the deception of a christian Amway that wasted the time and money and credit I had left.
- my short failed marrage
- my back that disabled me
- my brother' the desparate dive into depression that lead to his death
- my son's autism
- the multiple failed relationships since.
- the un-timely fall that took my sisters life.
- my own inability to maintain my income ever since.
Lord, I have not felt protected or rescued from any of these life altering events. If you want me to forgive and trust and live, help me to see the truth of these events and show me how to forgive your part in them. Help me to trust you again. Help me to leave the bitterness for these events behind. I ask this in the name of your Son

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Adam and I took a ride to visit Grandma and the Graves of my brother and sister. It was a nice ride 

We stopped by and helped Grandma stack some wood. We found her up a ladder painting her house. She is amazing. And the house is looking Great. Thankyou's go to Mike Luppa who is helping her paint and setting up the ladders

Running

So here I am, sitting at the point of failure. Always with a choice. Do I put faith in God, and go out with confidence that he will bless the work of my hands, that he will protect me and save me from the pending financial disaster. Or will I sit in-active, trusting that the pending doom is inescapable. It truly does come down to those two things.
I believe Lord, help my unbelief!

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Walking quietly with God is not something that I naturally want to do. Listening quietly to him is not an option when my mind is racing. A billion ideas flash in my head, yet not one of them originates with Him. So I squeeze the brakes and quietly begin to listen.

When you listen, you can't be talking.

When you listen, you can't be thinking...

When you listen, you can't be worrying...

When you listen, you can't be planning...

When you listen, you can't be bitter

When you listen, you can't be mean

When you listen, you can't have a plan.

Your whole being must be quiet when you listen.

Another addiction

I think I am addicted to unforgiveness. I cannot seem to let go of things. Especially my own short-comings. I re-read my posts on forgiveness from a month ago. They were great. But I have fallen right back into my old pattern.

First I re-read "Spoiling our view of the world" , then the prayer "the remaining records" , then I read that this morning's realization isn't a new one in "Un-forgiveness", Then I was reminded of "what Forgiveness is not"

Then I thought, "For someone who wrote so much about if, you sure do suck at it." And Now I am crying out to God to help me to forgive myself for putting myself and my family in this stressful situation. I am also crying out to him to help me forgive him also. So much has gone wrong and I wish he could have protected me. But, look where he has brought me. Where I wasn't before. On my knees praying for forgiveness and praying for help.

It is days like this that I love to remember the prayer of desperation and faith found in Mark 9:24 "I do believe, help thou my unbelief..."

echo

I read this excerpt from the poem "The Old Life" by Donald Hall - sent to me by the Writer's almanac.

It made me realize again that much of the emotions we have are an echo of the feelings and responses we had to a similar earlier incident. If we are to heal, not only do we need to address the present echo, but we also need to address its source.

 

Poem: excerpt from "The Old Life" by Donald Hall, from The Old Life. © Houghton Mifflin Company. 
There are miseries
of childhood that an old man's mind—alien
in the hour of injections
and restraints, ignorant of what
day or season it is—
will clutch to itself with angry tears.
I wanted a Mickey Mouse
watch as much as, later in life,
I wanted a job,
a prize, or a woman. It disappeared
a month after my fifth
birthday, and sixty years afterward
I grieve for it whenever
I regret something lost.

Dreams

So I dreamed that I was working on a house. I had an undergound passage that
we could run through to get to the otherside of the garage. Then I dreamed
that I was on a highway and I had permission to take a new road that would
let me totally by-pass the bad spots. Some how I heard the highway's
engineer talk about the troubles the highway was having because the it was
built over bogs. They keep on swallowing up the dirt - so there are spots on
the highway that are constantly sinking. There was also a bear, a huge young
pet bear in my house. I had to love on it whenever I saw if so it would
never turn mean. I always want to recall my dreams. I wonder what they mean
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One thing at a time

Today was an exceptionally bad day. It was preceded by a couple of good days. But today stunk.

I think I am grieving what I gave to God....Grieving what I, now, know is not mine. Grieving who I wanted to be - and could never have been.

So earlier in the week I expressed some anger.... Not at anyone, just me and objects that could not tell or hit back (yes Lisa, your dog is safe ;) Then today, I hit profound sadness. (Kind of sounds like the middle stages of grief.....)

But All that, and I learned another lesson. (or the same lesson - another way). That it isn't good for me to multi-task. But take things one at a time... and do it well. - It seems to keep me in the moment.... were God is...

Lucky Potion

I have hesitated posting this, but maybe I should anyway. Several weeks ago I was reading the latest Harry Potter book. I was struck by how the author described the Lucky Potion that Harry had used. Harry, at the prompting of the potion, made decisions and went places that he never would have thought to have gone. But at it's prompting, a whole series of events took place that he never could have planned and orchestrated. But it's results were perfect.

Not long after I read the book, while experiencing "the ride" (a short but life-changing ride I took on my Motorcycle), I learned that God is very much like the Lucky Potion described by RJ Rowley. Except he does not wear off - We drown him out; He doesn't give us what we want, he gives us what we need; He is not a tool we can use, but a relationship we can enjoy.

You can tell when you are listening to his promptings. You begin to experience his fruit. Love, joy peace, patience, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control. (I compare these words to what I am experiencing - If something is lacking, I am usually drowning him out...)

The rock

I am sitting on the ground next to where my brother and sister are buried. I just made a list of everything that i hold dear to me.
I made it because I needed to remind myself that none of it is actually mine. Holding on to them is an exersise of futility and eternal frustration. God giveth and he taketh away. Because it is all his to give and take away. So I need to stop putting my hopes, plans and dreams in these things. So I, today release my death grip on these things and these people. I hold on only to God. He is the rock on which I stand.
His plan will work out better than mine anyway.
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The Beauty of a plan

The Beauty of a Plan is - you haven't had to implement it yet.....

 

mind chatter

There was once a time when little could be written down. Nor could we pick up a book and read it for hours. Perhaps it is this act of reading that taught us to create thought exclusively. But the art of listening, quiet hearing, has been lost. Is it that we have learned to fill our mind with so many thoughts that we cannot absorb what is around us in this moment. When we run out of thoughts, we turn to other meaningless stimulus to fill our time. TV, computer, Internet, radio, books.... Perhaps that is part of the the magic behind the ancient gift of Praying-in-the-spirit. The apostle Paul said that he did it without stopping (at least that is what I think I remember.)

It is amazing that since Sunday afternoon, the purity of my mind has been attracted and I set aside the recent lessons in hope that I could address the issues. But instead, I reaped the fruit that I have so long despised.

It is time to walk the little used paths that my God will lead me on.

(Note: When practicing this, I notice that my breathing suddenly changes from shallow short breaths, to deep long breaths. It isn't a conjured up affect; it seems to happen without my will, I just find myself drinking in the air....)

Returning to visit

Sometimes it is necessary to visit places that we wanted to leave behind. Visit mistakes we made. Remember loves we have lost, try life directions we have rejected. It is as if... we need to remind ourselves.... why....

Fighting to subsist

Today is a struggle to get up. I guess that is not a surprise. So I go through my mind trying to find a to get up and Go. But I am questioning every surge of energy and worried about every motivation. I don't trust any of it anymore. My mind settled on the fear of loosing my house, and my heart started to race. So I ended up praying to God to help me.

After, I retreated back to my list of Life Goals. I keep them as a check list on my palm PDA. I looked at them, and I was sad. It is an un-inspiring list of Goal. Like someone trying to create the perfect list of unquestionable honorable objectives.....

Oh my, I just tear everything down when I am in the low stage of my energy cycle. Time to stop. Time to let my body recharge - Time to write out all these negative thoughts and forgive myself again. They are not useful to me right now. I need to recharge now. Dwelling on my failures will not enable me to climb out of my hole.

So I am off, for a little personal TLC.... :) Sounds like fun!