Thanks

Dear Lord:

I want to take a minute to praise you for all that I am blessed with. First, my wife and my best friend. Thank you for her caring heart. For her gentle touch. Thank you that you have given me someone who supports me, and loves me even though I am as unlovely as can be. Life without her is unimaginable. She personifies many great things about you. She is forgiving. She is patient, She is kind.

Thank you for my oldest daughter. It honors me that she wants to be like me. It is perhaps the most uplifting compliment I could receive. She is funny. She is fruity. She is beautiful and smart. She is caring and gentle and kind to others when they may not even notice. She harbors no malice.

Thank you for my second born. Her beauty is in her bliss. Teach me, Lord through her bliss how to unplug and just be. She befriends anyone.

Thank you for my third born. She is feisty and full of life. She is energetic, passionate and a treasure to be with, even when she is angry. I pray that you would open her eyes to more of the veauty in life and less of the injustice.

Thank you for my youngest girl. She is so overflowing with love she is like a new puppy bouncing around ready to love on anyone who will make eye contact. She brings vibrancy to this home.

Thank you for the opportunity to finish school. I have learned so much even though I don't want to admit it.

Thank you for each new day and my less than perfect heart as a reminder that each one is a gift.

Same Glass, Two Sides

When asked how many sides a circle has, a concrete thinker would say that is has none. An abstract thinker would say "two, an inside and an outside." What about a glass. Unlike the circle, it definitely has a top and a bottom, and an inside and an outside. But the abstract thinker can also apply the half full, half empty cliché and reason that the person observing the glass can see one side or the other. Therefore, it must have those two sides as well. I kind of feel like that glass today.

I have been working since May at a new job. The good news is that I have been working since May. As far as self-esteem goes, it is far better to be employed. The hours are limited. So I only need to work forty-three hours each week. This allows ample time to pursue that elusive degree that is hindering my upward mobility. The bad news is that the pay is less than half of what I used to make. When transferring to another job, there is probably going to be a depreciation in value. The corollary to that is that the work is half as challenging. Subsequently, the sense of purpose one would hope to achieve by gaining employment has been marginalized significantly. I went from organizing financing, project management, and vendor relations with over 200 vendors to cutting plywood, managing equipment maintenance and doing quality inspections. I went from a self managed position to working for a micromanager who changes his mind just to sound important. As a final downer, I must seek alternative employment, if at all, in the Charlotte area. Moving to another town would mean

But I encourage myself with the knowledge that as of December 2009, I will have earned that degree. That is my inspiration. It has to be. With a full time job and three classes, there is no time for anything else.

Revelation

6/7/08

Twice in my life I have had visions. Dreams if you will. But dreamsso real, so intense that you never forget them. They are not so much about what happens as they are about what I felt. The first one happened in 1991. I had a dream where I experienced true love for the first time. It was the most incredible feeling of self purpose I had ever felt. Weeks later a girl I had known in recent years called out of the blue. Three years later we were married. I now experience that bond of love every day.

The second vision came just lat Friday. It was just as intense. Understand that it cannot be put into words. That is part of the miracle of this vision. Its power transcends words. I will do my best. But it is important that these words are only the barest beginning of the feeling I experienced. Like explaining fireworks to the blind or the subtle nuances of Vivaldi to the deaf, I feel inadequate to express this vision.

First I heard cries from outside the house. That was what made me coming outside in the first place. As I opened the front door, there before me in the distance on the prairie was what looked like a storm, but different. It was orange in color as if the sun were somehow inside the tempest. The wind spun and whirled like a gigantic tornado that spanned the entire western horizon from North to South. As I gaped at this phenomenon stupified, several things washed over me in rapid succession. First, it was clear that there was no escape from this storm. It was just too big. There was no time to mobilize. It was coming too fast! It would devour the house and all of us in minutes, maybe seconds. Already it was growing closer. How could something so enormous move so quickly! Then I tried to be practical and figure out what to do. As if my wife could read my mind, I heard her behind me shouting "Get to a room closest to the center of the house under the stairs." I remember thinking "That might possibly be some help in a tornado. But this is no tornado." Then I thought about the kids. As I rushed inside, I managed to find three of them and get the five of us under the stairs. As I stepped out to look for the fourth, it was too late. The storm was already bearing down on the house. I braced myself for the impact, expecting to see the house torn to shreds before my eyes.

Suddenly, all was silent. The "storm" was gone and I was being lifted upside down into the air, lifted not by the wind, but by something much more intentional. I realized as I was being lifted that life as I knew it was gone forever. There was no going back. There would be no more days, no more nights, no more struggles, no more of anything in this old life. Much like the intense awareness that accompanies a skydiver as he begins to fall knowing that absolutely nothing in the universe can get him back to the perceived safety of that plane, I knew that life was over. Yet strangely there was no remorse. For as these thoughts and many others coursed through my body they added layer after layer of intensity to the experience. As a matter of fact, it was the intensity of the experience that put into perspective just how docile life was even with the events that seemed both tragic and euphoric over the years. High points like our wedding, children's births, graduations and many firsts all seemed like dim shadows compared to what I was feeling right now. It was as if all that was just a precursor.

    I thought about my fourth daughter that could not be found, and was immediately comforted. It was as if I knew she was going to be ok.

    I thought about the rest of my family. I couldn't see them near me. I was too disoriented rising so quickly upside down. But I was once again immediately comforted.

    I thought about how much of my life was spent doing useless things.

Then far in front of me the brightness of day became far more intense. I quickly became aware that I was entering the presence of God. It's not that it was so much something to be seen as it was definitely something to be felt. As I realized this, fear and awe mixed with a supernatural love erupted inside me as I struggled to grasp the reality of coming close to the presence of Almighty God. It was the most narcotic, euphoric, amazing, pure overwhelming feeling possible. It was beyond description, beyond imagination, far beyond words. I felt helpless and unworthy. An overwhelming desire to praise God welled up inside of me. I desperately attempted to sing words of praise to God. It was the only thing I wanted to do. Nothing else in the past mattered. How I got here didn't matter. All that mattered was that I was in the presence of this Creator that was the embodiment of love and power and I needed to praise Him. As I opened my mouth, I could not get the words out. It was as if I was both terrified and incapable of finding words worthy of His majesty.

Quickly I began to be reminded of scripture and it was as if seeing them with eyes for the first time.

"pray without ceasing". Of course! With this Almighty as my Creator loving me with an intensity infinitely greater than any other relationship ever experienced, why would I ever consider not praying continuously? Why would I not commune with Him every possible free waking moment?

"If you have faith the size of a mustard seed…" It was suddenly so clear what Jesus was trying to say. The source of your power is merely to love and recognize the love and power of your beloved creator. He would do anything for you in love, anything. Just ask and trust Him. Trust him like I was trusting Him right now upside down countless miles above my home without any logical explanation for still being alive, yet here I was. It was no wonder so many of my prayers had been answered. They were mere trifles compared to what He could and would have done for me had I asked in love.

"Love your neighbor" It was all becoming so black and white. There is love. And there is everything else. We all have loved each other so little in comparison to what was designed. It makes sense though. Since we don't get to truly experience the love of God in its ultimate purity while we are on this planet, we are left with doing the best we can. But it was still so clear how short we fall of the mark.

I thought of the thousands of martyrs and how God must have given them a glimpse of this vision amidst their trial to sustain them. It was suddenly clear why they had endured so much without denying Christ's love. I would do anything for God at that moment. His love was so worth any mere pain, humiliation or torture mere man could dish out until my body was ruined and I could return to God's presence.

Then slowly, I could feel a gulf developing between us. Afraid of losing Him, I groaned unable to form words. My Savior understood. I felt reassured that this was ok, that I wasn't finished. I was given this gift that I might know how much God truly does love me. I was to take this experience and use it as a benchmark to love others. To understand that anyone who was hating, or lonely, or hurting was just in need of the kind of unconditional love God gives us all for the asking. I could see so clearly that my only purpose in life was to love others and share God's love with them.

As I began to awake, I desperately tried to return to that place but it was no use. I was back in the world I knew all too well. But something was different. Any doubt about God's existence, about his love, about His word, about salvation through Christ was wiped away. Our Father in Heaven was truly preparing a place for us. Now I am left in a temporal world, longing to return to my Savior, longing to do what pleases him, yet stuck in a lifetime of schemas that shape an existence that is a barely recognizable dilution of God's plan. But today is a new day.

Fire and Rain

My best friend was killed in a senseless accident six days ago. He was leaning on the railing of his balcony when it gave way. He fell to the concrete below and suffered irreparable head trauma. Now we are left with putting our lives back together. I have been to funerals before, aunts, grandparents. The only other death I can ever remember hurting close to this was my grandmother. I spent every weekend with her growing up. But with her, she had been so ravaged by cancer that I was grateful to know she was finally out of pain and at rest. But with Wade, he was quietly talking to his wife one moment and gone the next. No one was the least prepared for this. It hurts more than I thought possible. My heart aches for Lisa, his wife and his two children Erin and Robert. My heart aches for his friends who will miss him so much. And my heart aches selfishly for me and my family. Wade was a brother and a friend. I always knew that he would be there and now he won't. I miss him terribly. What else can I say.

Shame Proneness and Guilt Proneness as it relates to Christianity

04/12/08

Personal note: I am writing this entry extemporaneously as it occurs to me. So please forgive the incredible lack of documentation. I wish to thank June Tangney whose body of work on shame proneness most of these thoughts stem from. I will attempt to retrace my steps and make the necessary notations soon. For now, I encourage you to watch this podcast to get an idea of Ms. Tangney's work.

The initial observation is that on the surface, the terms guilt and shame seem to be interchangeable. But when the underlying impact of guilt proneness and shame proneness are examined, the differences and motivations are clear. Guilt proneness reflects an individual's perception of failure as it relates to the act. Whereas, shame proneness reflects an individual's perception of failure as it relates to self. Shame proneness is the breeding ground for self loathing. When an act that creates the feelings of shame, the individual turns inward and generates feelings of lw self-esteem. As a result, several outcomes have been associated with shame proneness. Drug addiction, early engagement in sex, aggression, lack of empathy are just a few. In addition, other behaviors have been linked. Procrastination is a mechanism for avoiding failure and the additional feelings of self hatred generated by the failure as well as other mechanisms to create a built-in excuse to delude oneself into believing that the failure is not their fault. This defensive mechanism is similar to blaming others, anger, and lying associated with a negative event.

Guilt proneness on the other hand is a feeling of failure. But it is more directed at the act than at one's self. As a result, the guilt prone individual is more concerned with reparations, with making things right. They are the ones who offer the sincere apology. In addition, guilt prone individuals don't share in the same self loathing. A shame prone individual sees little use in making reparations for a single act. They view their self loathing as so much larger than one act that the effort would be insufficient to offset their self loathing.

Considering these two behavioral traits, the question begs to be asked, how does God's word treat these two types of individuals and does it promote one over the other. My hypothesis is that the Christ-centered New Testament not only seeks to foster a guilt proneness but also offers a beneficial construct for both relating to shame prone individuals and empowering a shame prone individual to become more of a guilt prone individual by realizing the magnitude of grace. More to come.

Conflicting Morale

3/25/08

I haven't had more than two weeks off work since I graduated high school 25 years ago. If you have been reading along, you will know that the streak has been broken. It has been three months since I last worked. Sounds like an introduction at a support group, doesn't it? Oftentimes in my career, I have been so exhausted from running to and fro that I begged for a brief respite, a chance to sleep more than six hours without worrying about where I had to be the next morning. Now that I have had that chance, it is like the consuming the little book in Revelation, so sweet going down, but bitter in my belly. The mental game has become an all- consuming task. I wear sloth and procrastination like a coat. Anger is an itch waiting to be scratched just below the surface. Confidence of my business acumen has eroded to a stubble. Resumes are cast on the wind like chaff. The irony of the situation is like a man on a yacht, lost at sea. "water water, everywhere. But not a drop to drink." The incessant search for land or another ship consumes so much of his time that he cannot appreciate the luxuries he has been provided. Fear of dehydration sours any potential comfort. Yet for all that, what can the man do. Land will come, eventually. But will it be too late. What is too late. Dropping the metaphor, I have until maybe November until we can't make a mortgage or car payment. From there, things get worse fast. Physically, I can feel the toll which once again is an irony. Never before have I had the chance to cook the proper food, exercise enough, and sleep enough all at the same time. Yet my nights are tormented by physical infirmities (purely psycho-somatic in nature) that I rarely sleep for more than five hours without waking up. My skin crawls at night. My back aches. The backs of my knees feel like someone is pulling at the tendons with a pair of vise grips. I am afraid to take analgesics because of the possibility of another episode of atrial fibrillation. Miraculously, I haven't put any weight back on. But I can no longer afford to go to the gym.

I am in a vicious cycle of procrastination. If I work around the house, I am haunted by the fact that I should be looking for work. In addition, I know that everything I do costs even more money that we don't have. But when I start looking for work, I can no longer take more than four hours before I am so demoralized that I just give up. Then there is time spent studying. I have to study for a college course and need to study for additional certifications to boost my resume. But with children in the house most of the time, I just can't focus. When I do get quiet time, my mind quickly wanders to undone housework, unfinished projects and additional effort I could put toward finding work. At the end of the day, even when I give up and turn the stinkin' tv on or read, there is no chance to relax because I am haunted by everything that needs to be done.

 

 

Blessings

1/10/2008

As the days wind on with no prospect of work, I can feel my self confidence ebbing away. A general funk has taken over my thoughts creating a fog through which I experience everything. It is at a time like this when I am reminded to count my blessings.

When I woke up this morning, I was still in a warm house, surrounded by loved ones in perfect health. Meanwhile just three miles away, others were waking up to yet another round of life draining kemotherapy in an effort to beat back the demon gnawing at their life. Down the hall others scarcely wake up at all. Having no hope of recovery, they are mostly sedated to keep them comfortable in their last hours. And down on the first floor, there is a woman who just hours ago had every hope of a long and vigorous life. Now doctors are working desperately to restore her vital signs after the accident so they can begin the endless hours of surgery. Even with a positive outcome, it will take years of therapy and plastic surgery to accomplish anything remotely close to what she used to call normal.

In an apartment down the street as the couple rises out of bed for the day, little is spoken. She longs for a home. He longs for a son. Both of them are forever forbidden from their dreams due to infertility. Sure adoption is a consideration, but deep down in each of their psyches their longing is to produce, love and nurture an heir, not to a fortune, but something more important than money. They long to see the miracle of a part of them in the eyes of another. But it never shall be.

In our very own community a mother wakes her children for school. She makes sure their clothes match, urges them to get their backpacks and makes their lunches while they eat breakfast. But there is a hole in the morning air for them. The father has left. Divorce is imminent. She hasn't worked in years. He has decided he wants nothing more to do with them beyond what the attorneys demand of him.

So when you look at it that way, I guess things can always be worse. My four children are well. My wife is well. We have some extra time during the day while the kids are at school to actually have a conversation. The kids are gaining a new appreciation for how good homeschooling was. I am learning just how much money we have thoughtlessly wasted as I now watch every dollar being spent. We are all learning something.

Ancient Signs and Markings.

Not so much a question, but a curiousity, is there a correlation between the mark on the hand and forehead of Ex: 13:16 and the one in Revelation? Was marking the hand and forehead a custom. Cain had a mark on his forehead as well.

Wiped out

If every Egyptian soldier was wiped out when the Red Sea folded in on them, who other than the Israelites was left to tell all the other city states that were later fearful of the Jews because of what God did to the Egyptians. Was it Moses father in lawJethro who visited him in Ex. 18? It is also interesting that all 600,000 plu Israelites crossed the Red Sea at night. I always thought it was during the day.