Talking is over-rated

I was thinking the other day about Adam and his plight as the first man. Not for any reason in particular, I was hanging out at the farm and realized that I had not spoken to anyone out loud in about 29 hours, and that happened to be the lady at the bank. She was very nice, but I know she talks to people daily and probably wouldn’t remember our conversation hours after we spoke. But if I was the only other person on Earth, I know she would remember and probably hang on every word I said no matter who I was or what I looked like.
It got me to thinking about what was it like when Adam would talk? Who did he talk to? He was alone a long time considering He didn’t meet Eve until after he named all the animals according to Moses text in Genesis. I’ve had many bonehead discussions with women many times. You know the ones… saying the worst possible thing and stumbling over my words and then watching her walk away. Adam didn’t strike out in his conversations with Eve. I mean, even if he did say something bonehead, apparently Eve found it an endearing trait and loved him any way. I mean they DID have children and lived a long life together. I have to wonder if they really were attracted to each other or did they just settle because they were the only game in town? So what did they look like? Did he look like Brad Pitt? Was she just a super hottie? Maybe they were very average people, but because she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen and he had such a vast and interesting job naming all the animals and they totally intrigued the other, they just could not stop looking at each other. Who knows? But the one thing I do know is they were naked before God and they were unashamed. I can’t even begin to imagine such a relationship with God, walking along in the garden, having all of your needs met and yet not ever longing for anything more as the relationship you have with God is all-consuming. I mean I think about my needs more than anything. My prayer life is a lot like this, “God? Fix this… God? I need that… God? Could you make this happen or that happen” I submit to you that most of us think like this because we always trying to fix the things in our lives that would essentially make our lives good. Seriously, if you think about it, we are ALWAYS looking for the answer to our problems during every waking hour. I have thought about this a long time and it’s clear to me that somewhere in my mind there seems to be an imperfection or a virus that keeps telling my brain that when I get my problems fixed then my life will resolve and I’ll experience some euphoric sense of being. Will my life really be better if all my problems are solved? I have all my work finished, I have nothing else to do except come to town and write this out and it’s like there is still something missing. My mind keeps saying “if you had more money… If all your debts were wiped out… if you had a beautiful wife… if you lost a hundred pounds… if you were a published writer… if you were a better father…” and on and on and on it goes. Seriously??

The problem I have concluded that with all this thinking about what could be and what is going to happen, I have turned 42 and have 4 kids and a van payment and rent that is due and part of my life is gone and I have nothing to show for it except the lines on my forehead. I have a few collected assets but I mean the memories and the fun times and photos of a full life I don’t have. I guess that is why people win the lottery and realize it was all meaningless to begin with. Why are we programmed like this? The happiest people I meet realize that life is more than accomplished work and long hours or building equity in our 401K. They are content with what they have and are happy with where they are in the “moment”.

It must have been like this for Adam in the Garden before the fall. He was content at every moment, he loved life and probably was amazed at everything God showed him about the beauty of creation. Everyday something fascinating and new came along and he was just blown away by beauty or the excitement of it all, and God was there, reveling in Adam’s enjoyment of it all.

Sometimes God will stop me in the hustle of life and show me something like a sunset or a waterfall or even a squirrel at play. These are the things God loves. Simple? Maybe so, but God is not interested in the euphoria of the stock market or the insanity of the vastness of the internet. NASA sends a man to the moon and we call it remarkable or unbelievable. God makes a rabbit and says it is “good”. Scientists figure out the genetic code and they call it phenomenal... He spoke the sunlight into being and said it was “good"... go figure..right? But for me to stop in my busy life for five minutes and see the beauty of the trees in bloom in the yard at the farm?? God simply whispers “I did this just for you”. I am his bride, his love and he digs it when I stop and shake my head in amazement and tell him I am dazzled or wowed by something great he has done. My sin isn’t his great interest, he is busy wooing me. Calling me daily to enter in to the place where it is just he and I. Sure we could plant churches, and build missions, and donate money and help at orphanages but those are just the busy work that we do everyday. His greatest joy is for us to find him walking in the garden daily, completely unashamed in his presence so he might just love on us. That’s the place where worship happens. Mornings in the mirror when we put on make-up or on our commute to work or when we stop in our business and just remember him and thank him for all he has done for us. That’s where life happens for us. It’s not the things I have collected or built or the money I’ve saved, but it’s the look on the faces of my children as they witness the grandeur of the Grand Canyon and the knowledge of knowing that it pleases my Father to see us enjoying him in his creation as well.

I would bet that if God came down in human form, he would visit the park and sit on a bench in the shade and admire the children playing on the toys in the playground. I can imagine he would sit and smile and realize what's the most important things on this Earth and I'll bet you anything those things can't be found on the home shopping network : )

Where is YOUR focus??

So? Where is your focus these days???.... and WHY am I the guy no one comes to and says, "hey, where is YOUR focus buddy?" Okay... so sometimes people do and I don't listen... sue me, right??
I get off track in life a lot and I look for my strength and my peace in EVERYTHING except for the one who really provides. I look to my job, to my girl, to weight loss to find identity etc and the one place I forget to look is UP...
Why do we do that? I have to be really honest and transparent right now.. I haven't kept my focus. I hate it too because I lose everyone's respect around me. I want everyone else to admire me and fix my issues etc. and I have NO problem laying this out there for you guys because if you are reading this??? you probably need to read these words for YOUR life too. I'm not the only one who ever does this you know... scripture is full of guys and gals who's focus was centered upon other stuff. Most of God's people were liars, theives, braggarts, and losers. I mean really... look at some of these guys... they were street people who didn't have a clue about their own identity and tried everything else first too. King Uzziah had to die off this earth before Isaiah could fully see God in his glory, before that, King Uzziah was his idol. Noah was a drunkard who fell down naked as a jaybird. Abraham LIED and told the story twice of his wife being his sister so his life would be spared. My favorite of all those who were nothing was David. A man after God's own heart. This king not only committed adultry, he hid it and had the woman he made pregnant's husband killed in battle. This is God's GUY! and he lost his focus... so If he screwed up... maybe God will forgive when I do the same.
You know the funny part about this is when I read about David, I know we all remember Bethsheba and his sin etc, but I also remember the story about David when he and his men had been living with the Philistines and Achish sent him back to live among his people. He and his men had reached Ziklag and the Amalakites had attacked their camps and taken their possessions and their families and even their wives. Vs 4 of Samuel 30 says " David and his men burst out in loud wails—wept and wept until they were exhausted with weeping. David's two wives, Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail widow of Nabal of Carmel, had been taken prisoner along with the rest. And suddenly David was in even worse trouble. There was talk among the men, bitter over the loss of their families, of stoning him.

6-7 David strengthened himself with trust in his God. He ordered Abiathar the priest, son of Ahimelech, "Bring me the Ephod so I can consult God." Abiathar brought it to David"


See? Even in the midst of his sin and a life of lies, David had a heart after God. He was always finding himself in a dark cave hiding from his enemy and calling on the name of God and asking for wisdom, direction, care, provision etc, and the funny part? God ALWAYS took care of him. ALWAYS....
I've been in that place of finding my strength in him again... its not an easy place because it's like learning to eat healthy again, and finding a taste for good foods, but when we do? we feel like we are on top of the world...
So? I'm in your face... poking you in the chest asking YOU... where is your focus?

Street bum with a job

I heard something on the radio today that stuck with me… a man was talking about us as people. He said “Who we really are as people is not who we are when we stand triumphant on the mountaintops, but who we are under the rubble of the disasters of our lives” At first I was indignant about this… in fact I was quite snotty about it. I wanted to argue and tell this man he was wrong to speak for us. I am a man who is triumphant and making great strides to undo a lot of bad things and am doing quite well etc. etc. etc…
I thought about what he said all day and it finally struck a chord with me. Who we are is NOT who we are when things are going well… who we are and the real character of who we are is who comes out when our world collapses. I was pretty impressed with myself for figuring this out, and then another thought passed through my head… I’ve been here when my world has collapsed several times and I gotta say… I pretty much suck. I mean really. I would love to brag and say I was the guy who was on top of the world and when my world caved in all around me, I was still standing tall and rebuilding walls and being the mighty man blah blah blah... but you know? When my world caved in, so did I.
Who we are is not the issue here. If our lives are based on who WE are then we fail. I know that’s contrary to the champion lifestyle we are all striving to achieve, but it’s true. When I found myself in my lowest points, I’ve always realized just how far away from a loving God I have walked. God has yet to allow me to walk next to him and then let my world collapse. It’s always when I’ve strayed. I’ve realized that short of God… I am a street person with a job. Nothing more… it’s his grace that allows me to have a life apart from sleeping in cardboard. People don’t aspire to be street bums. They just fall on hard times and never get out of the trap of being where they have fallen.
Life is hard… but walking in a life without the grace and goodness of God is harder. But the hardest thing I’ve ever done is to walk along and not acknowledging the goodness of God in my life and to take what he freely gives as a gift and spit on it. I have had the opportunity recently to watch a friend of mine give and give and be stepped on by the person being helped. It caused me to realize how many times in MY own life I have taken God’s goodness for granted and how many times I should have been pounded into dog food for doing it, and never getting what I deserve. I was indignant with my friend’s guest for the way they treated my friend, and yet I find myself being ungrateful for God giving me the grace to make it through one more day and I just leave dishes on his sink and toothpaste on his bathroom floor… I’m a piece of work I tell ya…
Maybe one of these days I’ll figure it all out, but then again… I doubt it. ; )

Dream a little Dream

You know? There is something kinda all warm and fuzzy and kind comfortable about Sunday afternoons. It's a time to be reflective and yet make new plans and set new goals. It's the first day of the new week. Some would argue and say it's the last day of the week, but I learned in Mrs. Caufield's 5th grade class that Sunday is actually the 1st day of the week.
I remember in highschool.. my sister and I would plan nothing on Sunday's, which in the little Oklahoma town I grew up in, wasn't hard to do. We would lay in the warm sunshine on the trampoline and listen to Casey Kasem do the top 40 countdown. We were living the life with a cold soda as we were "keeping our feet on the ground and reaching for the stars". I never did understand what that meant growing up.
I thought maybe Casey had gotten too comfortable doing the voice of Shaggy from Scooby Doo and had taken a few too many hits off the bong and was just spouting off, but if you think about what he said, he isn't too far off base. Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars... Stay focused on what's real... but never give up on your dream.
When I was little boy, I wanted to be Bill Cosby. Not the pudgy pudding salesman or the bumbling Dr. Huxtable, but the REAL Bill Cosby who got started as a comedian. I had a few of his LP's and we would put them on and I can remember memorizing his material and regurgitating it with what I thought was the body language he would be using. I had my family in stitches from the time I was 4.
I still want to be a comedian, but I keep my feet on the ground by remembering how hard it would be and how little they get paid... Well that is until they become discovered.
It never hurts to dream a little and I have a great dream that one day I will use my wit and words to make my living. I'm not sure if I will ever achieve that dream, but I do have the dream. Many folks get so entangled in their day to day, they forget to remember the dreams of their youth. Kids, jobs, mortgages, it takes a lot to make life work and I can easily see how a dream could be forgotten. But it doesnt' have to be. Life should never be so hard as to give up on our dreams. When we cease to dream, we cease to live.

Do-over button

I often have people tell me from time to time I should author a book. I really am at a loss about it too. Why me? I'm just a basic boogerhead with no focus on the outside world other than a few observations about stuff I see around me. I saw a black guy at the bus stop in Independence today on my way home and he was waiving his arms all up in the air and screaming and kicking at trash on the ground. I know YOU are probably thinking you should lock your doors and drive faster when you see stuff like that... Me? I just take two seconds look at that and think, "Dang, someone must have pissed him off something fierce" and I chalk it up to the dude just working it all out. It's just a matter of how we interpret things.
In the town where I work in Kansas, there is a guy who wears long hair and skirts and women's shoes and rides a bike. Now most people think "hey? who is the nut job" and they make fun etc. Personally? I've not worn a skirt to ride, but I got to thinking about it... if you ride and a lot of wind blows up your skirt? it's got to be like an ac unit blowing up there in that area that gets hot when you work out... so I thought to myself? Maybe he is on to something? There are times that I think I'd LIKE some ac blowing on my... well... "Area" down there and wouldnt' mind a cooling system for physical activity... call me crazy..

The point is this... We all have a different way of looking at things. People think I'm a little needy because I post on FB all the time... Okay.. so your secure in your thinking and you think everyone should think like you? How much fun is that? do we all want to wear plaid shirts and khaki's and bostonian topsiders with shiney burgundy leather? I think not! I think Facebook exists as a proving ground for humor... somedays I'm the funniest guy alive? somedays I'm an idiot.... most days I mean. But if you are sharp and you work to hone your craft... you can see the world from a different angle and start accumulating stories to tell. My story is a good one and it's getting better all the time. That's the fun part about being a writer. You can change it with that crafty little delete button located on the top right corner. I refer to it as the do-over button... I wish my life had a do-over button... I've often thought I would have it on maximum warp overdrive and be hitting that bad boy every time I spilled coffee or posted something I shouldn't on Facebook... but the more I think of it? the less likely I am to hit that button. I'm finding more and more on a daily constant that I am less likely to be wise and more likely to be voted "most likely to smoke crack" by anyone's Sr. Class. I screw up more stuff than the guy that tests the reverse button on the drills at Ryobi...
but you know? I'm wiser than I was before I jacked up a few things in my life... somedays I am brash and arrogant and quick to do stupid things and I learn from those mistakes. The more I learn.. the more I realize how little I know. I think that's the definition of becoming wise... knowing where you stand in the midst of what you don't know and how much you are willing to be transparent so that others know you are just trying to "work it out" ; )
I guess you can say I have some really great friends... cause when I mess up? Those that mind don't matter and those that matter? well... they just don't mind : )

Cornering The Market

Today is the day before Thanksgiving. Tomorrow is the first of the major holidays in what we refer to as "The Holiday season" or "The Holidays". We refer to them like they are a noisy couple from Scranton that come in once a year to celebrate and they dress colorfully and usually laugh a lot when they drink too much wine. The Holidays are a wonderful time of year for families and memories and showing each other love. I really enjoy this time of year like everyone else, but some days my heart is saddened by our attitudes towards each other when the stress becomes too much.

Like every other situation, we seem to lose ourselves and our focus in the hustle of the season. Its rush rush everywhere and push push in the stores and it's very easy to forget the reason we are doing what we do. I was headed home this past week on the 4 lane when we came to a complete shut down. Nothing was moving up ahead and you couldn’t see anything moving at all. The emergency trucks whisked by like horses at the track and I wondered how devastating it would be to have a wreck on the freeway. As I sat in my truck waiting on traffic, I began to notice the other drivers around me as we inched along. Their faces drawn and their brows heavy as if the thought of them now running late was a 50 lb bag on their head. I wondered if anyone in the mix of traffic was fearful for the lives of the drivers in the accident. I wondered if anyone of them had stopped to ponder if those who were injured were children. No one looked as if they cared. They just wanted the traffic to move faster. I wanted to be angry at the other drivers in the situation but it occurred to me they were just busy living their lives just as the drivers in the accident were. No one really plans on having a wreck, sometimes it just happens. It’s like getting a cavity or a speeding ticket, it’s just not something you want to happen but it does.

I felt pretty bad about being critical of the other drivers. Who gets snobby about compassion? We all screw up and stuff but to look down on others for their frustration was pretty dumb I think. Yeah, maybe it would be good for the drivers to be more concerned, but what about the guy who was in one of the cars who was late to the daycare to pick up his kids and had to shell out another ten bucks for to the sitter during this time of year when he is already strapped for cash? What about the woman who might have been on the way to pick up a client for business. This same client might be the one who makes or breaks her career with her company? When we sit high on our horse of judgment, it becomes very easy to criticize others for what we see as their shortcomings.

While I sat there, I felt like one of those who stood with a stone in his hand around the woman caught in the act of adultery. The revelation of my own sin of judgment was so horrifying to me as I realized I was no better than anyone else and yet I had elevated myself. Sometimes my own selfish nature implores me to seek a deeper truth, to look beyond the everyday life of good and bad. To not be such a schmuck about stuff like looking down my nose. Jesus loves the other drivers without prejudice and longs for each one of them to love deeply. I had been pretty selfish honestly and I laughed to myself remembering I had not cornered the market on his love.
I was glad I had a new view on things. I was only detained for about 45 minutes. I was on my way home to see my honey and I know she wanted to see me, but the lesson I learned about life was worth the time ; )

Endless...

Recently I had a friend who told of their pastor saying how they had to live up to God’s standard or not be a Christian at all… I was crushed. To me that’s like me telling my son who is ten to give me straight A’s and get algebra passed and have his drivers license by next summer or he could stop calling himself by my last name. He is a child and he will learn, but he will learn quickly if I offer him more love than criticism. Call me crazy : ) This love thing… there’s a lot to it we don’t really have a grasp on.

I was listening to a song by Brandon Heath and one of the lines in the song says “I write about love and such, probably cause I want it so much”. I write a ton about love all the time probably for the same reason. Maybe I am deranged or off center here, but I’ve come to know God well enough to know he doesn’t make mistakes. God doesn’t call his people to walk in places in their lives where they have no purpose of being. I think for me God wants me to understand HIS heart about love. He wants us to know he loves us. He gives and wants our love in return. I talk about love myself for the same reason Brandon Heath talks about it…maybe it’s because I want it so much? But wanting love all your life, you learn the qualities of love. I know I know…duh… love is patient, love is kind etc, but I mean the purest quality of love. Love ALWAYS gives itself away. Love never sets itself up to be served. It always always always gives itself away.

I’ve learned God’s love for the church is not at all unlike the love a man has for a woman. It’s not a book of formulas, it’s not steps we can read in a book, It’s a mystery. It’s relational and for us to walk it out with God we must seek to walk it out like a new couple formulating their love in a relationship. You know what I mean right? Maybe its some woman who is eager to love someone and simply give her life to someone completely or a man who has nothing but a big heart full of life to give away and formulate a family and is ready to get on with it. They can’t just unload their emotions on the first date. I can just see some guy with chocolates and a ring and the waiter helping to make arrangements while they wait for his date and when the waiter says “so what does your future wife look like, can you imagine the look on his face when the guy says “oh I haven’t really met her yet” ?

God is a perfect gentleman. He is waiting for us to come to this relationship with him. He is ever so patient and when we are there, he tells us he loves us. He woos us with his kindness. He comes into our presence with a smile and gifts and peace and he isn’t rushed. He waits and sits and lets us enjoy that place as long as we desire. He is so slick at it, he allows us to make the moves and when get to the place where we are ready to fall in love with him and never want to leave his presence, he does it in such a way that we actually believe it was OUR idea the whole time. We talk to others about our new relationship as if God found us at the right time and we were just so ready to love him etc and he allows us to go on believing like that but if we were honest, we would realize he was there before the dawn of time just waiting for the day when he could rush in and love us.

Not long ago I was at the farm and as I was coming into the house from the truck, I was forced to park quite a ways out in the drive. It was nearly 80 yards or so to the door and It was a bright night and I stopped to admire the stars. Not because I usually do this, but because the stars were SO amazingly bright. You could see the entire galaxy. Billions and billions of stars existing right there and I heard the voice of God say “this… all of this…I made for you” . I was so blown away. I looked around trying to understand what he meant. What I began to understand in that moment was God wanted to dazzle me. To impress me and show off and give me a gift that no one else could be capable of giving. I asked him “God? If I was the only one you had ever created? Would you still have done it?” He laughed and said, “of course….. I love you THAT much”.
He gives in such measures that we could NEVER understand his goodness or his kindness. He stands there wooing us. We don’t understand his love. We are scared to enter in. We can be saved 20 plus years and still not understand his love for us. He gives continuously and we look and say, “it’ll all end” or “why would you choose to love me?” it’s not until we learn to embrace it and enter into his love that we realize…it’ll never end. It will not run dry. We often hold others at arms distance and usually its with good riddance, but God is used to that kind of stand off, and yet he still loves without fail. Without end, we can run to him when we are hurting or when we want to celebrate and he will always be there with outstretched arms waiting for us so he can tell us how much he loves us. I’ve heard God’s love described recently by an author as a scandal. The writer is correct. How many times have I reached out to love and more than one person says, “be careful” “don’t love TOO hard”. People can’t understand God’s love. It IS a scandal. It is too hard for the human mind to comprehend. We aren’t ready for this kind of love. It catches us off guard and it forces us to deal with issues and attitudes so deeply buried within our beings that we can honestly stand and say “that’s not really me”, when in all actuality, Its exactly who we are.

So many of us have been wooed by other people in this life, only to be lied to or hurt, to be let down and disappointed. We are hard wired to disassociate and disengage from the situation and run away. Well that is to say depending on how close we let people in. I have a friend who has tons of friends and this person revels in how great their friends are. I was wondering just how well those hordes of friends actually knew this friend of mine.

You see when we come back to God and we decide to fall in love with him, he will accept partial knowledge of him. Although permits us to keep up our walls, he isn’t about to be satisfied with it. He longs to know us intimately like he knew Adam and Eve in the garden. In Gen.2 Moses tells us of the story of Adam and Eve and tells how well they knew him and how they were naked before him and knew no shame. I think what it meant was they had no shame… shocker huh? There was no guilt, no condemning nothing. They simply knew God loved them, they drew their life from it and it was NOTHING heavy handed. He simply loved them.
When we are on our walk with him and end up in a place where he is talking about his love for us and how he only wants us to be in a place to receive it, it’s pretty okay to accept it and just enjoy him.
Because anything else? Is just heavy handed religion and the spirit of God doesn’t involve itself in it.