The Second Guess

Doing a New Thing

2011-06-04T00:10:00.001-07:00

For awhile, at least, I expect this blog may lie dormant. But, as was hinted at in the past couple of entries, I'm doing a new thing over here, and I hope you'll check it out. (Hint: by it's very nature, it will require much more frequent posting than I've managed here at The Second Guess!)

Until... the next time, then - cheers!

Matthew

Waking Dream

2011-05-10T17:57:00.000-07:00

I do not have trouble sleeping. Bedtime is my favorite time. Even in periods of high stress or tension, sleep comes easily - often even more so, since my body seems to treat sleep as a sort of opportunity to escape from the day's difficulties. On almost any given night, seven minutes is about all Mr. Sandman needs to put me under.

Then there was last night. Granted, I had unintentionally napped earlier the evening (see?). But even so, I was surprised to find myself completely restless. At midnight, I finally got up and pulled out the computer to compose the previous blog entry. But that was only the starting point.

Next up, nearly two hours of singing along with my guitar. Mostly old songs I hadn't played in years. By about 3 am, I figured sleep would come any minute.

But it didn't. My mind was simply working overtime last night. Thinking about re-centering a lot of my activity around my life mission - "acts of hope & reconciliation" - had stirred up some exciting new possibilities. I was plotting and planning, conceiving ideas and charting various courses to live into this purpose. It was kind of exciting - I hadn't had a good waking dream session like this in awhile. At least not about how I want to make a positive contribution to the world.

There are stories I want to write - maybe even a few songs, too. There are people I want to pursue, to invite into conversation, to better understand. There are languages I want to master - ASL has been a back burner priority for too long, and I very much want to reclaim my proficiency in French.

A few months ago, Donald Miller brought to his readers' attention a really fantastic resource by Michael Hyatt about creating your personal life plan. I'm going to be going through this book & process for the next few weeks. I think it will be a great way to really focus my energies and resources on the things that matter to me. Maybe one or two folks will join me in the process...

At any rate, my excitement about the next season is still building. I'm eager to put the action in my mission of "acts of hope & reconciliation." After a good night's rest, of course.

One Year Later

2011-05-09T23:40:00.000-07:00

my Scrabble cake from one year ago

I did it. I went a whole year without posting an update.

No fresh thoughts. No inspiring words. (Some might argue it's been longer than a year since that happened, anyway.) No lists of three things. Just a year of silence.

Of course, I didn't actually set a goal of not writing so much as a "Hello, world" for a full year. These sorts of things just seem to happen, and you realize at month 3, month 7, month 10, that you are neglecting something important. Not so much a blog, but certainly the passion that once fueled your writing it.

On my end, the year has been anything but quiet. In fact, the past 12 months have probably contained more dramatic, significant change than any other period in my life, which is kind of a dramatic thing to say in and of itself, but it's true. I don't intend to "recap" my year; the changes are evident to folks who know me well, and for the meager audience this blog may still have, well, I expect the changes will surface soon enough as I continue writing.

And that's really the one and only point of posting this update: to write. It's time for me to get back in the game. Back to where my heart lies, what I'm passionate about. A year later, it's comforting to me to recognize that the life purpose I scripted for myself during 2009 & 2010 remains the same: to live out acts of hope and reconciliation. Above all else, I am drawn this this calling.

Writing a blog is just one way I can activate that purpose. But when I write, I'm motivated to live as well. To act. To be the person I write about.

I have a good story to tell - a really good story, with a character you will understand and recognize. He's both confident and conflicted, compelled and cautious, provoked and paralyzed. He wants to make things better, and even though he struggles with an overwhelming devotion to self-first, he is a person of principle. He is simply on his way, in process. Celebrating small gains while undergoing the hard work of not only learning from, but living differently in the aftermath of his mistakes. He strives to connect. He hopes to be a source of hope to others. He fights to be meek.

That character I'm writing about is also the man I want to be. Let's see where the next year takes us.

The Quiet Life

2010-05-04T08:58:00.000-07:00

Honestly? Some days it's really tempting to go the quiet, easy route. Move to Portland or Denver, build a small life doing the things I love with a few people I can trust. Stop troubling over "the state of things" and just enjoy being where I am while I'm here.

I know others are tempted by that idea, too. I think Moses would have been content with his sheep in the desert, never having come across a burning bush. Ms. Parks could have chosen to sit on the back of the bus and gone home to her family that day. The NYC firefighters, police, and civilians pulling people from the rubble didn't have to respond on September 11.

No way am I trying to infer that my efforts are even half as heroic as any of those. In fact, that's part of the temptation... Do people really want what I have to offer? Does anyone really need to take on the mantle for reconciliation between Christians and gay people in San Diego? Couldn't I just let it all play out, or let someone else step up?

For whatever reason - maybe for no other reason than being inspired by the Rosa Parks of the world - I feel compelled to play a role in this production. I don't even fully know what or who my character is, but I'm drawn into the story, and my heart senses a purpose in it all.

Still - on days like today, when I can really touch the tension, feel it firsthand, sense the straining in my dear friendships... I'm tempted to consider the quiet life. The life that doesn't ask for sacrifice, doesn't require me to learn meekness, doesn't expect I would put aside my own self for the benefit of others.

The quiet life is also the selfish life. I know that.

The most inspiring reason of all is still that man on the cross - the one whose meekness, sacrifice, and selflessness make the difference for me. His is still the life I want to model as I live my own. On days like today, my only prayer can be...

Lord, spare me the quiet life... but give me endurance for the alternative.

Being Meek Where It Matters

2010-04-20T14:16:00.000-07:00

If you've poked around the new Second Guess website at all, you might have noticed a tendency to encourage humility & meekness in some of the language I've chosen. That isn't, of course, an accident. I'm a big believer in (and practitioner-in-training of) meekness.

Being meek isn't exactly my natural, default state. Really, is it anyone's? Merriam-Webster defines meek as "enduring injury with patience and without resentment." I wasn't being very meek in the privacy of my car when I got cut off this morning. (I did say I was a practitioner-in-training).

It's not very American to be meek. Toby Keith, for instance, is a fearless opponent of meekness, as demonstrated in his anthem "Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue:"
We'll put a boot in your a**
It's the American way
I've never been to a Toby Keith concert, but I imagine him singing this line to thousands of excited fans whose cheers get a little bit louder at these words.

There is a whole lot of discussion to be had about standing up for yourself, what basic "inalienable rights" are, and what happens when we need to fight for them. We'll be having that discussion ongoing - but I will always push back with this question:

How might an infusion of meekness make this situation better?

For instance, you might have come across the news story yesterday of the Christian Legal Society at the UC Hastings School of Law in San Francisco, which is suing the University for formal recognition of its status as a student group with school funding & benefits. The sticking point is the group's statement of faith, which members are required to sign and which excludes practicing LGBT people (and a whole host of other folks) from joining the group. The University called this discrimination and refused to grant the CLS official student group status.

The whole thing actually began back in 2004. Six years and multiple appeals later, the fight over rights and freedoms and discrimination carries on. The main issues we focus on are, naturally, whether student groups should be able to receive public money when they exclude certain groups of people; whether excluding people on the basis of belief is true discrimination; and whether first amendment rights are at stake if people are forced to associate with others in their student group who don't share their beliefs.

There are a lot of great things to talk about in there. The unfortunate thing, at least as I see it, is that we're not just talking about these things - we're suing, fighting, and perpetuating a culture war in all of it. We've gone a long way down the road and dropped any semblance of meekness by the wayside at the very beginning.

So I ask... how might an infusion of meekness make this situation better?

I can imagine a few ways. What about you?

Thoughts on Jennifer Knapp

2010-04-13T18:54:00.001-07:00

If someone I didn't know were to write a blog post entitled, "Thoughts on Matthew Williams," I might be inclined to think rude thoughts about the stranger whose pontificating at my expense could be completely misinformed. But, alas, when you were a Christian music superstar in the late 90s who announces she is gay to the Christian media, well... I imagine there will be many folks posting their thoughts to blogs. I just hope to bring an infusion of grace to this particular conversation.

Jennifer is confirming rumors that started when she abruptly left the CCM (contemporary Christian music) scene in 2003. Sometime last year, my roommate was playing Jennifer's first album, "Kansas," from his room, which prompted one of those "Whatever happened to her?" kind of conversations. As we listened to some more of her music, I began to feel that my connection to her songs was deeper. Soon, I told my roommate that I believed Jennifer was gay. For whatever reason, I was just convinced that was the case. I even wrote her a letter at the time:

I'm a gay guy who grew up in the conservative Christian world. As a young teenager, your music was life-giving. It is perhaps even more so now as I listen to it with (only slightly) aged ears. I don't know what your journey has been over the last several years, but I do know that it's always the journey that makes living so beautiful. Your letter is refreshing and sounds sincere. I am glad for the beauty you've found and so thankful you are finding the voice to share it with us once again.

I've loved Jennifer Knapp since I heard the first bars of "Undo Me" in high school. She's an incredible songwriter who has always had an unabashed honesty to her lyrics. To hear her speak about her own journey of reconciling faith & sexuality - or more accurately, in her case, reconciling people of faith & sexuality - certainly adds a new dimension to the songs she's written over the years. Check out this quote from her interview in Christianity Today:

The heartbreaking thing to me is that we're all hopelessly deceived if we don't think that there are people within our churches, within our communities, who want to hold on to the person they love, whatever sex that may be, and hold on to their faith. It's a hard notion. It will be a struggle for those who are in a spot that they have to choose between one or the other. The struggle I've been through—and I don't know if I will ever be fully out of it—is feeling like I have to justify my faith or the decisions that I've made to choose to love who I choose to love.

Jennifer so perfectly conveys my own reasons for wanting to help bring reconciliation to the culture war in San Diego. She understands the incompatible nature of a church that outlines specific standards for what type of person is welcome to worship & participate fully in its midst while preaching a message of "come as you are" and "free grace to all." It's mixed messaging at best.

Brave soul that she is, Jennifer will likely face some intense and critical responses. Ray Boltz, another icon of early CCM, came out awhile back. I found this comment from a reader of "Christianity Today" in response to news about Ray's sexuality:

"What can be said? We are known by the fruit we bear. So, being a great musician and exalting the Lord is not enough. Repentance is necessary. Ray should be ignored but welcomed back whenever he truly repents."

This is certainly disheartening - that a man's entire body of work would be written off as valueless, contingent on the state of his own repentance (as defined, of course, by the reader). Jennifer will likely face similar responses.

But the good news is that, despite the fact that she seems intent on avoiding becoming a leader of any sort of gay Christian revolution, this news will continue to crack open the door of conversation for believers everywhere. In this instance, so many folks - like my roommate & myself - experienced defining moments around Jennifer's music growing up. There is a serious emotional connection there, and while many will be able to quickly overlook the impact her songs had on them, others will wrestle internally with the way they were led into the presence of God through the songs of a lesbian. At the very least, my hope is these questions surface in pursuit of understanding - and, hopefully, reconciliation.

A final quote from Jennifer, regarding her new song "Inside:"

It's a challenge to break free of that and to own who you really are. That's my heart's cry for anyone I've ever met. It's not on my agenda to convert the world to a religion, but to convert the world to compassion and grace. I've experienced that in my life through Christianity.

Making it Official

2010-04-08T20:13:00.001-07:00

Long time, no post! All with good reason. I've been friggin' busy. But here we go, into a whole new adventure. I recently launched The Second Guess. This is a collaborative discussion forum thing (yes, that's the best way I can describe it right now) with a goal of working toward reconciliation between the church and the gay community. I wrote about my desire to do this a lot last year.

Anyway, we're moving along. I've built some great relationships both with other San Diego churches and within the gay community here over the past year, and I'm setting out to do this thing. I'm impossibly excited. And, naturally, a little scared, too. But impossibly excited. I plan to blog here much more frequently - but it's still my personal blog, so for updates on The Second Guess, I suggest you visit my new website and the blog that is hosted there! For convenience's sake, I've taken the liberty to post my first blog from over there, right here. Just for you.

Since recognizing that I was gay in Christian middle & high school I grew up in, I always suspected - deep down - that one day I would be using my experiences to help others in a similar situation. There were a lot of emotional, spiritual, and even physical hurdles to navigate before arriving at this first blog post on "The Second Guess," but I do believe that this is the culmination of those suspicions from over a decade ago.

If you've had the chance to poke around the website, you should have some sense of what I'm setting out to do with "The Second Guess." And, naturally, you may have some suspicions of your own. I've found that people are often skeptical about who I am and why I want to work toward reconciliation between the church & gay people. Christians wonder whether I intend to push an "affirming" perspective on them or ask that they perform same-sex weddings. LGBT people ask whether I expect them to change their orientation or give up their fight for marriage equality. It seems everyone has a list of standards that one must meet before any real relationship might begin to take root, or even a real conversation can happen.

The truth is, if I were to lay out my personal convictions in black & white without any context, people from all across the spectrum would find something to disagree with. The problem is that we too often assume that if we don't agree, then we simply can't communicate, relate, do life together, or benefit from one another's perspectives. Not a lot of people would come out and say that - but it's pretty evident in how we pick sides, draw lines, and avoid folks with whom we disagree.

Well, I think we can - and should - communicate with, relate to, do life with, and benefit from the perspective of people who are very different from us. I believe the culture war between the church and gay people is very damaging to our hearts, minds, and souls. And I've started "The Second Guess" because I want to make a difference in the way we relate to one another.

There will be many people who just won't get it, or care about it, or will think it's a waste of time. For instance, if you don't personally care about...
matters of faith & living out the way of Jesus,
LGBT issues,
culture clashes in society,
and seeking unity & reconciliation between estranged parties,
then you probably won't find much of value in this blog, on the website, or at Second Guess events. But I've come across people along the way who do care about those things, as do I, and so those are the people I want to connect with. And at this point, especially those who live in San Diego, since that's where my life is.

You can have your suspicions about me; that's OK. I get it. I tend to not trust where people are coming from either, until I get to know them. But that's what I will be doing as "The Second Guess" unfolds - letting myself be known. I believe with all my heart that what I'm doing is right & good & true, but I want to let you learn that for yourself. So I plan to open up my life here and in person as much as I can. I want to build relationships with other gay people, and with other Christians. I hope to tell, show, live my story in such a way as to help you see that we don't have to fight each other. We don't have to avoid each other. We don't have to hate or even dislike each other.

Reconciliation is hard, slow, and painful. But it creates something beautiful in the end. I'm after that. I think God is after that. And I hope you'll consider being after that, too.

My First 10k

2009-09-03T08:21:00.000-07:00

Sitting on the couch in front of the latest episode of Dexter or 30 Rock. That's what I'd rather be doing than training for my first ever 10k. But that does little to accomplish my personal mission: to live out acts of hope and reconciliation between the church & gay communities. So instead I'm running. I've been running for almost a month now through beautiful Balboa Park. Down Pershing Ave. Through the Florida Canyon switchbacks. Across the Prado.

This is not easy for me - over the past couple of years, well, let's just say I've put on a few pounds. So not only am I attempting to regain the stunning physique of my youth, but I'm hoping to make a difference while doing so. Early this year I determined it was time for me to walk the walk I'd been talking. This meant really getting to know the gay community here in San Diego. I can't expect to be a voice for reconciliation if I don't truly understand where the broader communities in this culture war are coming from.

So this is another small step (or about 6 miles worth of steps, to be precise) for me in my effort to connect with people across the spectrum, show my dedication to the cause of reconciliation, and ultimately represent the unconditional love of God for all his children. That's why I'm running in the annual San Diego AIDS Walk/Run. If you dig it, please feel free to donate.

Love from sunny San Diego.

-MBW

Keep-Your-Cool Boot Camp

2009-08-04T12:02:00.000-07:00

Keep-Your-Cool Boot Camp, I'm calling it.

Two weeks ago I talked about how I'm seriously considering a new venture, one that will inevitably have me playing a bit of defense as I navigate the feedback, fears, and faultfinding that will come my way should I plunge head-long into... whatever this thing might become.

The action steps have been pretty simple so far: start drawing up a document outlining my personal mission, vision, and goals, begin meeting intentionally and strategically with people who may share an interest in my passion, and get to know the gay community in San Diego better than I do via volunteering at the LGBT Center, Pride, AIDS Walk, Dining Out for Life, etc...

All of which is just great. But my friend pointed out to me perhaps the one thing I should be most interested in at the moment, the thing that could be my biggest immediate hurdle, is my tendency to REACT.

Let's name it & claim it: "longsuffering" is not my bag of fruit. At least as it pertains to the general mass of humanity. When people don't navigate well (and that concept translates to many aspects of life: conversation, choices, driving...), my first reaction is to SAY SOMETHING. React. Spew forth my own wisdom - at least, as I perceive it.

I'm not naturally gifted with Jesus' ability to look out on a crowd of people and feel compassion. In all honestly, I'm probably more likely to say something along the lines of "Look at those crazy fools." Not so with an individual - you give me one person who is hurt, confused, broken, needy, ignorant, rebellious, angry... whatever, and I'll be fierce in my resolve to see him through. I can relate to the one. But to the many? Well... it's a challenge.

My friend knows this about me. Which is why he suggested I spend some serious time on my knees over the next few months asking God to prepare me to stand in the middle of a culture war where slings & arrows are being thrown from both sides. To temper my reactionary nature. To give me access to a deep well of patience & grace.

The opportunities to learn this lesson are LIMITLESS, I've found. The old adage seems to be true - if you ask God for patience, a big box of it isn't likely to fall into your lap. Rather, you'll be given moments that challenge, try, test you and give you an opportunity to learn to exhibit patience. One moment it's being stuck behind an inept driver. The next it's answering the phone to a rude comment about the quality of my company's website. Then it's being confronted with the reality of people who just aren't on the same page as you. That urge to yell "GET WITH THE PROGRAM!" is what I'm learning to surrender.

So I'm in Keep-Your-Cool Boot Camp. That's action step numero uno. The great thing is, I've experienced firsthand many times this year how keeping your cool can really change the direction of a conversation. It's a skill I truly want to develop. So, if you see me out of line, you're invited to remind me. I just ask for a little patience & grace and I try to learn a little... patience & grace.

-MBW

The "Second" Second Guess

2009-07-23T09:05:00.000-07:00

This year is turning out to have watershed written all over it. From the big stuff like my new job to the smallest conversations, I've found more personal purpose, passion, and direction than I ever have. It's been a ride.

And here is where it could be leading me. For some time now, I've considered starting a non-profit or foundation that would allow me to fully engage in my passion to see the mainline evangelical church embrace a new way of engaging the LGBT community.

Yeah - a little scary. But I'm bolstered by many things: my own faith community here in San Diego & their support, burgeoning relationships with other people interested in the same thing, learning from the trailblazer in this area, Andy Marin, and - perhaps most importantly - by what I believe to be my little mission in this world from God. From long before I ever even told someone for the first time about my own orientation, I sensed God was writing my story to be a source of help and hope to other people who have struggled with faith and sexuality. Today I find myself in a place to be able to competently have those conversations: rooted in a great community of Christ-followers, focused & purposed with a mission I'm passionate about, and learning more and more to place all of my hope and trust in one who holds my future anyway.

So here's where things are currently. Since this blog is essentially my "stomping grounds" when it comes to my own emergence from spiritual/sexual shame and confusion (I originally titled the blog "The Second Guess" to indicate I was re-considering Christianity itself), and since it's been a place for me to give voice to the journey I've been on, I think it's appropriate (poetic, ironic even) for me to possibly name this new venture "The Second Guess" as well. This time around, the term would obviously refer to something different; namely, re-thinking (second guessing) the way the church and the LGBT community have approached one another over the past couple of decades. My best friend and pastor often talks about a "third way" - an option that isn't necessarily a balance between two opposing views, but another route altogether that might look more like the way Jesus would have taken in the first place. I believe there is a third way in the current culture war between Christians and the gay community, and I hope to be a part of navigating it with others.

So there it is. This is really the first time I've "gone public" with this notion, and the reason for doing so is that I'd like to actually get some feedback, suggestions, or thoughts on approaching the whole concept. I have just a few concepts/phrases that I've been chewing on for a bit that I thought I'd throw out there and see what anyone reading this might have to say.

THE SECOND GUESS

Building bridges between the church and the LGBT community (already the tagline for the Marin Foundation, but still an important concept for me)
Acts of hope and reconciliation amid a crippling culture war
Rethinking the church's approach to LGBTs
Second guess your suppositions
Opening the way of Jesus to his children in the LGBT community
Opening the church's doors to the gay community
Navigating toward a place for LGBTs in the kingdom of God

For me, the "acts of hope and reconciliation" phrase best captures what I want to be about - a tangible expression of understanding between two communities at war with each other. But what do you think? Is there something you would add, or a question you would expect to see answered in the first moments of hearing about a group or foundation like this? Tell me what you think - but also tell me why.

-M

6 Months of Reprieve

2009-06-14T22:48:00.000-07:00

For six solid months I was gifted with a reprieve from some of my deepest-seated inner struggles. I don't know why - it just happened. A reprieve from a struggle I've had since I can remember. (If you know me well, it's not what you're probably thinking.)

I'm talking about a certain reaction, reflex, relational paralysis that happens in my closest friendships. An learned response that tells me: "You are not loved. You are less important than other people. No one would stick with you if they knew what was really going on inside."

For most of my life, that has been my framework and foundation for how I see myself in this world. And when good people have attempted to meet me in my need, I have reacted badly time and again: self-sabotage, making accusations, inventing reasons why they couldn't possibly be serious about loving me.

I've been battling this, working through it, sifting out the lies and learning to unite my heart with reason for a few years now. Until last November, it was ongoing.

Then - abruptly, suddenly - it all ceased. I was free. Everything became as clear as day. For the first time, I found myself relating to other people in an almost completely healthy way, able to give and receive love without any sort of self-doubt or self-torture that used to accompany my attempts at friendship. It was absolute bliss: there are not words to describe how shocked I was to find that life could be lived outside of that prison of despair, perpetual fear, and paralysis that I had always known.

It was a gift - that's all there is to say. I didn't do anything to make it happen. It was a gift - a beautiful, miraculous, sensational gift.

But it ended. Last month, on an odd sort of night following an odd sort of day, the floodgates opened in full force and I fell prey to the darkest of fears and self-doubt. In an instant, I found myself right back in the thick of everything I had been so glad to leave behind. It was almost devastating.

But not quite. Because of those six months - because of that gift - I was able to look my fears in the face and with a resolution that surprised me, say: "NO. I do not have to live this way."

I prayed that night like I hadn't prayed in years - fervent, desperate, but with resolve to overcome my fears. I wasn't going to quit until I'd sent the demons back to hell. (That's a metaphor... or maybe not.)

I said:

"God, you have gifted me with 6 months of reprieve from the pain, longing, and disappointment that has shadowed my whole life. You picked me up out of the muck and mire and held me close, shielding me from the darkness that tries to overwhelm me. There wasn't a hint of it to be seen, felt, or heard.

And in doing so, you've given me a glimpse of what life can be like. You've let me taste freedom. You've given me reason to believe in something better. I had no proof that I could live unencumbered by the chains of mistrust and self-loathing - until these 6 months. Now I know what it's like; I've sampled it; I've lived it... for a moment.

But nothing worth having ever comes easily. And I believe that you showed me this way, this freedom, to give me something worth fighting for. Like you did for Moses, you took me up to the mountaintop and showed me the Promised Land. You let me know it that it is real - that there is more to hope for than these desert wanderings.

And because of that, I can't help but be filled with hope. I won't despair and I won't retreat. I will fight for freedom because it's the sweetest thing I've ever known. And because I believe you are a God who values the journey over the destination, I will answer your call to follow the the Way that is messy, unknown - yes, frightening - because I believe it will be worth it. You have made me believe it will be worth it.

There is one more thing, God. During these six months of reprieve, the interaction I've had with people has been revelatory. I've made the discovery that my story can make a difference for someone else. That because I have known the darkness and the oppressive weight of fear and doubt, I can speak to other people in darkness from my place of hope, from the promise of freedom. In a divine twist that only you could imagine, my personal history of pain can be a catalyst for a future of hope for many. I want to serve you in that way. I want to serve others in that way."

That was my prayer that night.

It still is.

-M

I Am Not Alone

2009-05-08T11:26:00.001-07:00

Some time ago, my roommate pointed me to a blog that I've read faithfully ever since. Andrew Marin is a self-described "white, straight, conservative evangelical" who lives with his wife in the middle of Boystown, a predominately (that's an understatement) gay part of Chicago. It's simple, really - he's taken incarnational ministry to the gay community. The type of "move-into-the-neighborhood" approach that is so popular right now among Jesus-following urban dwellers, inner-city ministers, and even those in international, third world work is Andy's approach to bridging the rift, gap, divide between the mainstream church and mainstream gay culture.

I can't tell you how excited and moved I was to learn of a guy on the conservative & straight side of things who had made it his life's mission to eradicate ignorance in both the church and the gay community about the "other side," and is so humble, open, and willing to go where the road leads him. When I had the chance to hear him speak at the National Pastor's Convention here in San Diego a couple months ago, I was in tears by the end of his presentation. I'm convinced he's the real deal - love is his priority, and he sees people before he sees an issue or agenda. Which is why I'm REALLY excited that he is coming back to San Diego next week, and I"m going to have the opportunity to take some friends from Citywalk, my church, to meet with him personally and get deeper into the dialogue about what needs to change in the church for reconciliation to happen in a big way in this area.

It's one thing for me to be committed to the idea that gay people would one day be a vital and integral part of the American church. It's another thing entirely for a well-respected, conservative, straight dude to write a book about it, build a foundation around it, travel the country and speak the truth about it. It's given me a lot of hope for my own future, and one more reason to keep working for and believing in the possibility of peace in the current culture war.

I'll have a lot more to say about Andy & The Marin Foundation in coming weeks, I'm sure. First, I'm gonna finish reading the book and enjoy the time I get to spend with him next week!

-M

A Late Submission: My Top Ten Movies of 2008

2009-02-24T14:24:00.001-08:00

Ok, some lighter fare for a blog that's been a bit heavy-handed lately. I know I'm SUPER late in getting this out, especially since the final word has already been said with the close of the Academy Awards Sunday night, but I still wanted to get my own top ten list up before I start working on 2009!

Before reading this, it's probably helpful to know that my main criteria for rating a film is this: "Did it exceed my expectations?" A moviegoer's expectations are (or should be) very different depending on what film he is going to see. Hence, I found the summer bomb "Speed Racer" to be a fantastically entertaining time because I had almost no expectations, while the bar was set so high when I finally saw "Slumdog Millionaire" that I left a little confused as to what all the hullabaloo was about. (Neither of those made my own list.)

So, without further ado - my favorite films of 2008.

10. Marley and Me
I am an avid dog lover, and also a fan of cathartic crying. This film supplied both in healthy doses. Half feel-good movie of the year, half emotional breakdown - it's an assault on the emotions (and my emotions like to be assaulted).

9. Kung Fu Panda
A certain other digitally animated film received most of the love this awards season, but darn it if I didn't laugh harder at this than anything else all year. "Skadoosh" was my catchphrase for weeks after seeing Po take on the art of kung fu.

8. Then She Found Me
This was a little-seen passion project by one of my favorite actresses, Helen Hunt, who poured her heart and soul into this small story of a woman who experiences a midlife crisis of sorts when her adopted mother dies and her biological one shows up. Hunt does a phenomenal job as writer, director, and actor in a story that you think is about identity, family relationships, and romantic love - which it is, until the final chapter when Hunt's protagonist reveals that the true nature of her crisis is... well, you'll just have to watch it for yourself, won't you? A cast consisting of Matthew Broderick, Colin Firth, and Bette Midler should help convince you to pick it up.

7. Frost/Nixon
Apparently much of the minutiae of this plot is fabricated, but the setting for the story is well-documented history, and part of history about which I knew very little. So fascinating is this story that I spent most of the night after watching it voraciously reading any historical account I could find of the David Frost interviews with Richard Nixon. Pitch-perfect acting and a cohesive film from the deft director Ron Howard make this a must-watch.

6. Australia
By golly, when I go to the cinema to see a Baz Luhrmann film, I'm not going to see historical accuracy, or subtle nuance, or even a seamless storyline - and all of the movie critics who complained that Australia was lacking in these categories can just go on a walkabout to Faraway Downs. Lurhmann films unabashedly embrace the spectacle of cinema: sweeping vistas, swelling music, costuming, passion, and a larger-than-life story. And it's ok to go to the movies and hope to be taken away to another time and place to experience adventure, romance, danger, and laughter. Australia excelled at all of these things and for that, it most certainly makes my top ten list.

5. The Dark Knight
No best of 2008 list would be complete without this film on it. As has been said countless times, Nolan & Co. have elevated the superhero genre into a potent and relevant parable for our time. Fine acting by all and a knockout performance by Mr. Ledger as Joker won the world, myself included, over.

4. Milk
This film honors a man who had a vision beyond himself. The current-day fight for marriage equality is both amplified and dwarfed by the reality of an America where gays and lesbians were threatened with the loss of their jobs simply if their orientation were made public. Harvey Milk, portrayed with honor, personality, and electric life by Sean Penn, stood up in his day and declared to the GLBT community, "You must come out!" knowing that until Americans had a face and name to associate with "the gays," it would always be easy to write off a group of people that were feared and hated. Until people knew of their friends and family members who were gay, there was no reason for the nation to care about this group of people whose rights were being suffocated left and right. A very moving story.

3. The X-Files: I Want to Believe
Yes, I'm a devout X-Phile. Yes, this is a biased pick. Yes, this movie rocked my socks. In terms of sheer satisfaction, nothing trumped this film for me this year. It played like a long episode of the show my family spent so many hours watching as I grew up, and I couldn't have asked for a better send-off for the characters I love so much.

2. Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
Some might call this light fare, and on many levels, they would be right. But this period piece about being true to your heart's heart at the expense of everything flashy and fake in the world hits all the right notes. An inordinately talented cast (the unstoppable Amy Adams, Pushing Daisies' Lee Pace, a sublime Frances McDormand, and even Shirley Henderson - 'Moaning Myrtle' from the Harry Potter films) delivers the story at a clip pace - literally the events of one day - with only the slightest of pauses for the audience to ruminate on how we, too, deny our own passions for things that placate rather than satisfy.

1. Doubt
I hinted a few weeks ago that this film would end up on my top ten list; indeed, it claims the spot as my favorite film of 2008. I'm simply fascinated by this fable (based in an all-too-real universe) of one nun's suspicions that her parish priest is molesting a young boy at her school. Of course the cast is amazing (all four principal actors were nominated for Academy Awards), and the stage play upon which it is based has already become a modern-day classic since it debuted off-Broadway in 2004. But I'm mostly drawn to the layers of social deconstruction that unfold as the story develops: gender roles in and out of the church, the nature of institutional religion, traditional and progressive worldviews, and, naturally, the very thin line between conviction and doubt. The cast is so adept at handling playwright John Patrick Shanley's material that I don't for a minute feel I'm watching Meryl Streep play a nun, but instead am immersed in four very distinct perspectives on how society operates, or should operate. There's no doubt this movie is my favorite of the year.

And there you have it! Hopefully I'll post 2009's list before next year's Oscar ceremony!

-M

Here's Hoping

2009-02-23T21:13:00.000-08:00

Last night I reconnected with yet another friend from college days who had read this blog and had some encouraging words for me. She shared her sadness at the way the church has treated me (and many like me) over the years. It was very kind. It made me realize though, that my blog recently has only focused on one aspect of my journey in and through the church - the largely negative aspect. And so today is about sharing my reason for hope in the church, my own story of reconciliation, and why I don't believe it's a waste of energy believing that two communities currently engaged in a culture war can find common ground.

Part of the reason why I've started blogging again, and why I've been so personal and honest with what I say, is because lately (and by lately, I mean over the past 2 months) I've reached an unusual place in my journey (and by unusual, I mean a place I don't think I've ever really experienced before). That place could be vaguely classified as a place of direction, or directed-ness. In describing it to my roommate, I used the phrase, "Not a destination, but a direction." Much of my life has been puzzling, with varied and seemingly unrelated passions and hobbies, varied and seemingly unrelated personal struggles and demons, and varied and seemingly unrelated places and communities in which I've found myself. I haven't ever really made much sense of any of it. I recall telling my best friend once that I felt like Esau. "Jacob have I loved; Esau have I hated," said God. Jacob and Esau were twins, born into the same family, the same culture, the same everything. Jacob was chosen - given a destiny, hope, a future. Esau was not - he lost his name in the family and becomes nothing more than a blip on the radar. And it seemed largely out of his control. Esau has been a reference point for me over the years as I've wrestled with my own longing for purpose. When I concluded that I was merely fated to oblivion, he became my commisserator. I even wrote a song called "Esau," paralleling his story with my own.

But the God of purpose has been at work. Not just lately, not just in the past two months. But, it would seem, for the duration of my life. That feeling - no, more than a feeling - that underlying sense of reality is something I've heard many speak of over the years. Often, I received their words with a measure of resentment that I, too, did not sense God's underlying purpose for my life. But here I am, drinking for perhaps the first time long draughts of hope, purpose, and excitement over the direction toward which I feel pulled, led... called.

Here is why I feel these things. About four years ago, I was invited to help build a faith community from scratch. It's why I'm in San Diego - I followed my friends here in order to help them in their own vision for an urban church that developed around a common desire for a return to the way of Jesus in community with other people. Not a church that attracted devotees with flashy marketing, incredible music and production, iconic leadership and teaching... All those things are fine, but my friends had a desire for something more organic, rooted in relationship. Something that took the "come as you are" culture and morphed it into "I will come to you as you are." A community built intentionally through the power of reaching into another person's life and challenging her to engage in a deeper relationship with her challenger, and ultimately with God.

FYI - it's working. Slowly, but surely, Citywalk is finding its footing here in San Diego. And this is the community I call home. A place where "come as you are" simply isn't enough. We are challenged to be intentional about our interactions with people, not simply inviting them to come to our church, but finding them where they are, staying with them where they are, coming back frequently to where they are. And trusting that this, which is commonly called "incarnational ministry" in church circles, the way Jesus chose to live his life, will be the means of reconciliation back to the God of purpose and love for people who have been disconnected from those things.

My faith community (we call ourselves Citywalkers) loves me. There is no arrogance in this statement, it is mere truth. The people for whom I am privileged to lead music on a weekly basis, really, truly, unconditionally love me. In particular, the friend who invited me to join him on this journey to San Diego, has so devotedly lived the incarnational way of Jesus toward me that it has radically changed my perspective. I used to be Esau. Sequestered, separated, and unwanted by God. But when my friend chose to live the incarnational, unconditional love of Jesus toward me for 5 years running - despite my best efforts to sabotage, disprove, reject, deflect, or otherwise destroy that love - I couldn't help but be changed. That's just the way of love. It changes your understanding of yourself. It changes your understanding of other people. It changes your understanding of God.

I promise you, I have not made it easy for people to love me. I looked for holes in their love. I jumped at any opportunity to twist a word, action, or even facial gesture into a sign of their rejection. Rejection was familiar. God had rejected me. The church had rejected me. People I once loved very deeply had rejected me. Life as Esau made sense. Until I learned I couldn't change the love these friends had for me. Until I learned that this love was reflective of the love Jesus showed to people in his own life. Until I could no longer believe I was unwanted because incarnational, unconditional love convinced me otherwise. And I learned this from the church. Not the church of my youth - but the church, nonetheless. A group of people following the way of Jesus in community.

(For the record, Citywalk is not what some might call a liberal and affirming church. It's not a place where being gay is celebrated at every gathering. There are many differing opinions between Citywalkers in regards to moral issues such as gay sex. Some are more traditional. Others are less restrictive. But what matters most in this family is that incarnational, unconditional love that characterizes all interactions, all conversations - and believe me, there is a healthy and multi-faceted conversation within our community surrounding this issue. The point is that Citywalk does not affirm homosexuality as a rule, but neither do we, as a church, condemn anyone who is gay or is having gay sex. Not only is that person welcome, but we will go to that person, we will be in that person's life, we will return without condition time and again to where that person is and choose to love that person until she is changed - and by changed I do not mean 'turned straight' - by that incarnational, unconditional love.)

Here within a mainline Christian, American, evangelical church community, I have found my place. I've experienced healing from the wounds my previous involvment in the Christian community inflicted. I stand confident in unconditional love from people who have my back. I stand confident in the unconditional love of God for me. So when I talk about the pain I've felt, the hurt I've experienced, the desperation and despair, the solitude and separation, the anger, defiance, and defensive attitude I adopted as a result of what I confronted in the church - I am talking about the former things. The old has gone, the new has come. I am happy. I have joy. I have purpose, direction, and am surrounded by people who love me. And I'm finally free to talk about my experience, share my story, and pray that I am able to connect with other people who are experiencing what I've gone through. To pray that my story can give hope to someone who has none. To find the Esaus of the world and show them incarnational, unconditional love.

Truly, I have no use for pity. And there is no need to apologize for the grievances of the church - at least to me. I've been through that fire. If you're moved at all by my story, I hope you will choose to love unconditionally that person you come into contact with who feels unwanted and separated from God. That gay son or daughter of God who feels so overwhelmingly condemned by the church that it may take five years or more of unconditional, incarnational love to break through the lies that bind his or her life. It will break through. We can't help but be changed.

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up - do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.
-God through the prophet Isaiah, chapter 43, verses 18 & 19

Incarnational. Unconditional.
-M

Strip

2009-02-23T18:57:00.001-08:00

I just walked past a nightclub on my way to the coffee shop where I'm currently sipping my iced soy chai tea latte. On the window of this club was a flashy flyer with a nearly-naked man on it. The advertisement said, "Come before midnight, strip down, and your first drink is on us."

If you ask me, that's one expensive drink. Or a seriously underpriced sexual experience. I'm in no place to cast judgment. But it makes me think, and I think it's very indicative of the cheapened sense of sexuality in my neighborhood. Sex is no longer measured in spiritual value, but monetary. And you have to admit, that's not the way things should be.

-M

The Snowiest, Tahoe-iest Trip Ever

2009-02-21T00:25:00.000-08:00

President's Day weekend I ventured up to Reno/Tahoe with my roommate and another friend to see old stomping ground and my pals up north. My travel mates had not yet been to Tahoe, so the goal was to educate them experientially while enjoying a relaxing three day weekend in America's Adventure Place. But after spending 38 hours in the car, and most of that in life-threatening snowstorms, avoiding collisions with other motorists, siderails, and mountain lions, I've decided it was, logistically, the worst trip I've ever taken. Relationally, can't complain - we had a great time with each other. And my friend Becky made some of the best meals I've had in recent months. So it was still worth it. But after broken chains, bumper-to-bumper traffic that turned a 2 hour voyage from Sac to Reno into 7 hours, various closed roads, unplowed highways with 2 inches of snow sitting on them, the densest fog I've ever had to crawl through at snailish speeds, and only being able to see about 8 inches of one of the world's most beautiful lakes - well, let's just say I won't be doing road trips through the Sierras in February anymore.

What Fuels My Fire

2009-02-11T13:04:00.001-08:00

There are those days when the fog in your head seems to lift enough for you to see a clear vision of your future, what you want to be about in this world - perhaps enough to even articulate it. A proverb says, "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." This happened to me today. I was confronted by the Facebook friend mentioned in my last post, who generously read my blog and had a thoughtful response for me. Her response was like iron sharpening iron - it enabled me to think critically about my passions and why I believe what I believe. I'm posting my reply to her below because I feel I've captured in it the passion behind the things I believe and what I choose to build my life around.

I'll admit, what I initially wanted to say was very different. In fact, I simply wanted to write off my friend's thoughts as the type of conservative, traditional thinking that isn't all that helpful in opening a dialogue and a compassionate conversation. But the realization as I started to write back was that if I really and sincerely want to be a bridge-builder, engaging these conversations is imperative. I can't just ignore them. I feel very directed right now - some label it a "calling." I don't know if I would call today a watershed or landmark moment, but I certainly feel I found a voice to the impulses and beliefs I hold inside. Here it is, for better or worse...

You need to know why I prioritize things the way I do. You need to know why it's more important to me that the church chooses to be passive instead of fight, to love instead of picket, to be a voice of compassion instead of being a voice insistent on its own rights. Why I believe with all my heart that the church should stop fighting the war against abortion, gay marriage, and whatever "anti-Christian" activity it is you're referring to.

I am gay. I am the one who grew up in the conservative world, condemned from the pulpit and by my own family without anyone ever knowing what they were doing to me. I am the one who grew up with a secret so horrible I couldn't tell anyone, who grew up with an understanding that God could not possibly love me because of what I was. My only chance, only hope at being received into this family of believers into which I was born was to keep hidden this terrible secret. To smother it, to kill it if I could. To change into something that God, and everyone around me, would accept. Do you know why there is such a high suicide rate among gay people? It is because so many of us have been instilled with an idea that we are something unacceptable, unlovable, and unwanted. For the better portion of my life, every ounce of my energy was poured into creating the person I believed I had to be in order to find love and acceptance from God, from you, from everyone else. It is a devastating way to live.

Everyone struggles with issues of self-worth, with the desire to be loved. We all make decisions as we grow up based on the need to be affirmed, desired, valued, wanted. But the problem goes deeper for the homosexual. For a gay person born into a conservative, religious home, they grow up with the understanding that they personify the most abhorrent, perverse sin in the list of things God hates. An unknowing parent may do everything to show their child he is loved, but when that parent adds his or her voice to the wave of noise that is the church's antagonism toward the "sin of homosexuality," he or she confirms their own child's greatest fear: that God hates him. That he is separate, other, different. Disconnected from his family, friends, and from God. So, inevitably, that child will try to change, will pray for change, will hide his "sin," will do everything possible to cover it up. And that child will fail. There will be no change in that child's orientation. No matter what that child, that teen, that young adult does, he will feel like a failure every day of his life because he does not, cannot meet the standards of holiness that have been set for him.

And you will say, "But that's why Jesus died, to cover our sins and make us holy and presentable to God."

Try telling that to a gay person who can only see a church that spends the majority of it's time, energy, and money pouring into a war against the gay agenda - whatever that is. There is no such thing as real grace, real compassion, real, authentic love for the gays in the face the church puts forth in our world. Those picket signs, the "No on Prop 8" campaign, the insistence that orientation change is possible and that God's wish for all gay people is that they become straight - all these things drown out any love that might be trying to break through.

God did not leave us a mission to fight moral battles. Jesus did not fight moral battles. If anything, he challenged the accepted notions of morality in his day. He ate with tax collectors and "sinners." He exhibited grace and love to prostitutes. He (gasp!) healed on the Sabbath!

Until the church can prioritize people before an issue, faces before morality, we will continue to miss the mark. Until we acknowledge that God does not need or ask us to wage war on "sin," we will continue to alienate the very people he so much loves and so much longs to include in his kingdom. The church is working against the heart of God; we are counter-productive.

None of this has anything to do with what one believes about Obama and his policies. None of this has anything to do with aligning oneself with one political party or another. Yes, I was at times critical of Bush's policies. But only because he claimed to be a follower of Christ, and some things he chose to do did not align with the way of Jesus and the heart of God. Because I believe in the way of Jesus, in his mission to reconcile all people to God, it is my own mission to make that way evident to everyone. To give people every opportunity to "come as they are," to not block the gates with picket signs and a version of morality that is better than other people's morality. Right and wrong are not the crux upon which the entire church stands - they are NOT. Morality is not what makes a follower of Christ - it is NOT.

LOVE. Love is what makes someone a follower of Christ. "They will know you are Christians by your love." Love trumps everything - it trumps our "rights." It trumps whatever sin we may think separates someone from God. It blows away the need to white-knuckle the truth. It is sacrificial - it does not retaliate. Jesus straight-up told us that in this world we will have trouble - but, he says, "I give you my peace. Not peace as the world gives..." Christians will have trouble, and we're not told to fight back. Christians don't need to fight for morality because of the peace we have been given. We are free to simply love. Simply love. No fighting, no condemnation, no judgment - God can take care of himself. He doesn't need us to defend what is right and wrong in moral terms. He needs us to love. God needs a body - that was why Jesus came. God needed a body to physically reach out and touch the people he loves. And that mission has been left to us. We have bodies, we have hands. We must use those hands to reach out, to hold, to comfort - NEVER to close to the door on someone. NEVER to hold a picket sign. NEVER to write messages that will make God's beloved children believe that they are unloved, unwanted, and unacceptable.

Because that is what we do when we fight against gay marriage. That is what we do when we picket abortion clinics. We may believe we are defending physical life - but we are smothering spiritual life. In those moments, we are not going into all the world and spreading the Good News - we are spreading hate.

And you can be sure that I will continue to distinguish myself from a church that spreads hate.

So there you have it. What makes me tick, fuels my fire, gives me gas in my Ford so I keep truckin' for the Lord. (Actually, I drive a Dodge.)

-M

The Separation of Church and School

2009-02-09T10:39:00.000-08:00

This morning plunged me headlong into thoughts about justice, persecution, pacifism, loving one's enemy, and the like.

A friend's Facebook today: "I'm taking a stand for my faith - Obama has gone too far and must be stopped!" She proceeded to link me to this excerpt from the economic stimulus package that apparently limits the ways in which schools receiving stimulus funds can use them. Educational institutions cannot use federal monies for the

modernization, renovation, or repair of facilities — (i) used for sectarian instruction, religious worship, or a school or department of divinity; or (ii) in which a substantial portion of the functions of the facilities are subsumed in a religious mission

This article calls Obama an "enemy of Christian liberty" because of this clause in the bill. An enemy.

Even if one perceives Obama to be his enemy (I don't), what was it that Jesus asked his followers to do about their enemies? I seem to recall the word "love." Love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you. (And by the way, elsewhere Jesus encourages us to pray in humility and compassion, not out of self-righteousness and with a desire to see others fail so we are lifted up.) Turn the other cheek. A non-violent, non-confrontational approach to dealing with persecution. And then, of course, there's Romans 13:1-7.

My Facebook friend is worried that her church will be forced out of it's meeting space, a public school cafeteria that it rents on the weekend. My faith community also meets in a school's cafeteria on the weekends. I think it's a bit rash to conclude that schools that rent out their cafeteria on Sunday mornings wouldn't be able to use stimulus money to renovate that cafeteria (or auditorium, or classroom, etc.) The clause is intended to prevent federal funds from going to the renovation and construction of places of worship. Which is, I believe, as it should be. Our government shouldn't be building sanctuaries, cathedrals, temples, and the like - even if they're built as part of a school of divinity, etc.

Nevertheless, even if this clause does mean that schools across the country have to evict their religious weekend tenants in order to receive stimulus money (again, a pretty far-out notion since the churches are paying the school to rent the space to begin with), the type of vehement response that seems to come so naturally to conservatives is so far off-base and out of line with the way of Jesus that, once again, I feel the church misses the mark and ceases to represent God's love, compassion, humility, and long-suffering to a world that is simply not moved by picket lines and angry signs. If we can't meet in schools, meet somewhere else. Meet in our homes if we must. That's more akin to the early church than anything else anyway. Life will go on, the church will go on, we will continue to worship together.

Can you imagine what it would look like if the church in America responded universally with "Ok, we get it. We see why federal money shouldn't be used to construct or maintain places of worship, and we will gladly and voluntarily find other places to worship so that our nation's schools can accept funding that will assist them in providing better campuses in which to educate our children." Can you imagine the positive PR associated with that kind of response? And doesn't that feel like Jesus more than picket lines and angry epithets?

-M

An evening full of 'Doubt'

2009-02-06T14:56:00.001-08:00

Last night I went with my friends Steve & Ali to go see the San Diego Repertory Theatre's production of Doubt, a play that debuted off-Broadway in 2004 and is, as I'm sure you know, now a major motion picture starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, and Viola Davis - all four of whom are nominated for Academy Awards this year.

I had seen the film a few weeks ago, and was floored. (I'll be publishing my own Top Ten Movies of 2008 list before Oscar night - check back to see where Doubt ends up.) The stage provided a distinctly more intimate setting, however, to ruminate on the issues presented in the play. The story revolves around a Catholic school & church in 1964 where a hard-nosed and fiercely traditionalist nun begins to suspect the parish's new progressive priest, Father Flynn, of molesting the school's first and only black student. That's already a pretty heavy-handed, packed production. But there are so many more layers to the story, and I find myself thinking mostly about one issue in particular - that of gender roles in an institution like the church, and the varied restrictions & freedoms that men and women have placed on them when they commit to a life of service for God.

I don't want to give too much away about the story. It's definitely worth seeing if you haven't yet. But I'm left (as I think we're meant to be) with my own doubts - doubts about devotion to the church as an institution, about the price of vigilance against evil, about our ability to discern evil in the first place, about how the knowledge of evil takes away our innocence and whether innocence itself is a good thing or not. This play is probably the most thought-provoking material I've seen performed in a couple of years. The questions it raises are good ones to ask. I hope you and more people will see it so that the discussion can be elevated.

-M

Up to speed

2009-02-05T11:43:00.000-08:00

For my first journey back to blogging, I thought I'd just post a quick life update. My life. (It only seems appropriate, as this is my blog. However, if you'd like me to post an update of your life, I'll be happy to do so.)

The "big news" is that I'm in a new job. New job path. Career, I guess? I had been working for a retail development firm here in San Diego for 2 1/2 years. It was a good job - I enjoyed the company I kept, but alas, shopping is not exactly my favorite activity. Especially in shopping malls (or lifestyle centers, as most developers now prefer we call them). So, much as I enjoyed my coworkers, it was difficult to receive any sense of fulfillment from the work itself.

Last fall, I was actually feeling quite stuck. Believe it or not, I had somehow convinced myself that I had pretty much experienced all that San Diego had to offer me. I wanted to leave because I was unhappy at work and felt overwhelmed in the rest of life. My music was suffering (or rather, it was DOA) as I had no time to devote to it. The one thing I remained attached to in San Diego was my work with Citywalk, the faith community I helped to start. I love Citywalk - it's the most genuine communal expression of faith I've been a part of, and I have dear, dear friends in that community. I wasn't ready to leave that behind. So, I felt stuck because I was bored with my city, bored with my job, but couldn't leave. And who wanted to go job hunting in an economy like this?

Well, all it took to change that perspective was a layoff. As a company providing niche tenant coordination services to large mall developers, my former employer was one of the first to be hard-hit by the current economic crisis because our services were considered a luxury to many of our clients. I lost my job at the end of October. Certainly, there were feelings of disappointment and fears of not being able to pay the bills, but I actually reacted mostly in excitement. I promised myself that I wouldn't simply jump in bed with the first job that came along, but would instead take the time to evaluate where I was headed in life, and where I wanted to go. Options on the table included going back to school, pouring heart & soul into my music, or looking at the non-profit sector.

So, would you believe I was only unemployed for 72 hours? I still managed to fulfill my promise not to take the first job offer (it was a gracious offer from a friend who had a temp position to fill), but thanks to the gods of circumstance (otherwise known as Jehovah Jireh, I seem to recall from an old children's chorus?), I had a friend who was leaving his position at a non-profit here called LEAD San Diego. I couldn't have stepped into a role better suited for me. LEAD, not surprisingly, is a civic & community leadership development agency. We develop programs meant to inspire & educate people about the needs & challenges facing San Diego's future in order to produce a group of leaders who are ready to get their hands dirty, improving the quality of life in our little corner of the states.

Last fall I thought I had experienced all that San Diego has to offer. That was a big ole bucket of naivete & ignorance. I'm learning new things everyday through LEAD's programs and seminars (which I get to help execute!) that make me so thankful to live here, and help me focus my own energies toward the issues that I care about and can make a difference in. I suddenly feel about San Diego the same way I felt when I first moved here - just that it's a chasm of opportunity, and I want to dive in. (Metaphor cheesy meter: 8 out of 10)

So the whole boring job/boring city perspective went down the drain, and I'm totally wrapped up in getting to know more & more about America's Finest City as I earn my living helping to ensure we have educated, enthusiastic leaders to keep it moving. And, I get to stick around to be a part of Citywalk's future and enjoy these great friendships I have. Essentially, getting laid off was the best thing that could have happened to me; otherwise I might have hung around in an unfulfilling job, disliking my circumstances for who knows how long. And I really do believe there was some serious divine path-making going on there: to be laid off, have the human connections I did, receive support & help from friends who did everything from pray to offer jobs to help with my resume, and only be unemployed for 72 hours at the start of one of our nations most disastrous economic downturn in my lifetime - well, I'm just hard-pressed to explain it all away. Renewed purpose, love from friends & family, and food on the table - what more could I ask for?

Fancy Meeting You Here

2009-02-04T07:52:00.000-08:00

Woah, um, hi there! Geez, is that you? You look, um... you look really great! Gosh, how have you been? What's been going on? You're right, its been way too long, I know, I'm sorry. I've just been so busy lately... I'm sorry I haven't called. You still have the same number? Yeah, we should totally get together soon...

Ah, blogging again. It's akin to that awkward conversation you have with a person you bump into that you should have stayed in touch with but haven't. But, it was bound to happen sooner or later. I mean, we live in the same cyber world and all... Anyway - I do have a lot to say now, so here's a list of some upcoming stories I'll be posting (mostly for my own benefit so I don't forget anything):

Life & job update
Surprising things I've discovered about San Diego
The Marin Foundation, and other gay stuff
Church - global & local, and other Jesus stuff
My friends' adoptions
American Sign Language
My take on the 2009 Oscar race
and much, much more!

So if anyone out there still knows this blog exists (and cares), rest assured there is spirited discussion ahead! 'Til next time, in the immortal words of Strongbad: Rock, rock on.

-M

Getting Closer

2008-09-12T10:16:00.001-07:00

A favorite band of mine has been, since they first hit the national scene in 1995, Jars of Clay. I was in 8th grade and completely obsessed with CCM. That's contemporary Christian music for the uninitiated. A mighty subculture. (My high school senior thesis was entitled "Christian Music at the Crossroads," to help you understand how enamored I was.)

The captivating thing about Jars of Clay, from the moment their hit song "Flood" debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, peaking at #37, was that this was a band made up of Christian guys who very clearly had a mission beyond the church. At the time, the idea of blurring the lines between sacred and secular - especially in the world of music - was still something that was dangerous in my insular little world.

Thirteen years later, I have, of course, experienced significant change in my beliefs about the sacred/secular divide; namely, that the divide is entirely invented and unnecessary - wrong and harmful, even. And thirteen years later Jars of Clay is still making music that continues to pull the veil off my eyes. Ingenuity, passion, creativity, and compassion are characteristics I would attribute to this band. Dan Haseltine and the boys just released a new EP entitled "Closer," and its title track has instantly become one of my favorites and an anthem for life now. I don't understand why we can't get close enough / I want your kite strings tangled in my trees, all wrapped up. Could double as my personal cry against the created chasm between "sacred" and "secular."

That song, along with completely reworked versions of the aforementioned "Flood" and "Love Song for a Savior," are proof positive that JOC is far from finished with their mission to sing spiritually about all of life. And the EP is just so darn good to listen to. Check it out.

One Day

2008-08-31T23:51:00.000-07:00

"I can be no bolder than to bite the bitter fruit of self-loathing right there in your face. Right in front of you.

I can be no starker. No more naked. No more true.

I can be no braver than to fill this empty space with an uttered hope: One day I will not need to spend my words like pennies in a wishing well. Instead I'll be plain and clear. One day the words I write will refer to 'what was' and not 'what I wish wasn't.'"

Shine

2008-08-28T22:02:00.001-07:00

cartoon violence

2008-05-22T13:26:00.001-07:00

Jude and Dana, my little creations for Citywalk, discuss violence & peace in their latest adventure.

speedracer: movie review

2008-05-06T22:31:00.000-07:00

What do car races, ninja fights, monkeys, and a funny fat kid have in common? They're all the best parts of the best movie I've seen so far this year.

A few weeks ago I scored free tickets to an advance screening of the new film Speed Racer, which opens this Friday. It showed last night and there were probably a little over 200 people in attendance here in San Diego. Which makes for great buzz & energy, especially when the crowd is comprised almost exclusively of people who are REALLY excited to be there. I love it when an audience erupts into spontaneous applause and cheers at the cinema, which is exactly what happened when the lights began to dim.

I was never a Speed Racer fan growing up for the simple reason that I never had the opportunity to watch it. So I didn't have a lot invested in this movie except for the fact that Christina Ricci is one of my top 5 favorite actresses working today. Also, while I was a huge fan of the The Matrix, its sequels left me disappointed. So you could say my expectations were just average for this new film from the Wachowski brothers.

Boy, was I in for a treat. First of all, the Wachowskis were very smart to make their first writing/directing post-Matrix effort in a polar-opposite genre from the R-rated Matrix trilogy. Because those films are so iconic, they really needed to work with very different subject matter in order to avoid comparisons and break the mold once again. And break the mold they did!

Speed Racer is unlike anything I've seen on the big screen before. The sensation is similar to what you may have felt during last year's Beowulf if it was your first 3-D feature film experience (as it was mine). But the Wachowskis achieve their adrenaline rush without asking their audience to don a pair of 3-D glasses. Visually, this movie is just as groundbreaking as were The Matrix and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace in their day. The unrelenting bold colors fly across the screen and help to transport us to Speed's (Emile Hirsch) world, which is quite a virtual feat and spans the globe, from futuristic cities with hovercrafts and brilliantly-designed skyscrapers, to icy mountain slopes, to desert dunes - even the suburbs look exciting through the Wachowskis' eyes. And the races are amazing. You'll certainly see some of the same slow-motion tricks made famous by Neo and Trinity in 1999, but the brothers have taken their game to a whole new level here. My favorite was seeing the cars flip 360 degrees - sideways - and land on the other side of the track without losing a bit of speed.

But effects and bombast aren't the only reason to see this movie. It has great characters, humor, and heart. Andy & Larry even manage to eek out a relevant critique of corporate sponsorship burying the heart and soul of what makes racing (or any sport or human creative outlet) great. The stylized performances of the cast, who are all at the very top of their game, make for great viewing. Christina Ricci plays Trixie, Speed's girlfriend and air traffic controller, with spunk, spark, and sass, using her trademark big eyes to liven up the screen. John Goodman and Susan Sarandon, as Mom & Pop Racer, are pitch-perfect as a type of 50's-era squeaky clean parents while still giving the story, and Speed, the heart it needs to make this film more than just eye candy. And let's not forget to mention Paulie Litowsky, who plays Speed's younger brother Spritle, and his companion Chim Chim the Chimpanzee, who effortlessly provide the best laughs of the movie.

Not yet having made it to Iron Man, this was a great way to kick off the summer blockbusters of 2008. If you're still not convinced, all I have left to say is... go, go!

child, these are the days

2008-05-05T11:07:00.000-07:00

A new song, with a prologue of useless chatter about the Padres, Simon Cowell, and my best friend and border collie, Winslow. Winslow, whom I love. (Song lyrics below.)

LYRICS
She keep her distance from strangers
Keep her eyes closed to block out the dangers
She should fight tooth and nail
To see truth prevail
These are the words that they told her
With the salvation they sold her
No refunds and no exchanges
This is how the game is played

(chorus)
These are the days child
When the whole world conspires
To steal away your innocence and freedom
These are the days child
When the whole world is wild
So heaven help us if we cannot beat them

She remembers a day when
They shut the door and wouldn't let her in
It was dark outside, but even still
The florescent lighting had lost its appeal
'Cause when the Bible is your congressman
Freedom is a work of fiction
But when you're fed, who would contest
That these days, child, are the best of the best?

(bridge)
Child, tell me are you sedated
Sucking the nectar of things you hated
For so long now, have you lost your taste
For anything real, has it been replaced?

what are YOU talking about?

2008-04-29T18:13:00.000-07:00

A quick little video I cooked up to advertise Citywalk's upcoming discussion series... Hope you laugh!

i don't get grace

2008-04-25T20:22:00.000-07:00

Sitting here at Java Jones listening to a performance bordering on walk-out-able. Thinking about much more than the music and the art on the walls. Thinking about grace, and whether I've ever really experienced it. Whether I have let myself become acquainted with it in any realm other than the conceptual.

I don't consider myself judgmental. But I do hold myself to high standards. At least publicly. I have very stringent expectations for myself. (So many reasons. None to talk about without a glass of wine or two in me.) But because I'm so performance-driven, so consumed with standards and maintenance and doing what's right to please other people, sometimes there is part of me that looks at others and can't figure why the hell they don't own up to the choices they've made; why they shirk responsibility; how they can be so liberated and lively and free from the worry of consequence. Because I am decidedly not.

In fact, I'd say most of the life decisions I make are based on fear of consequences. And there's a big part of me that really admires people who can shrug off the whole "what other people think" thing. I mean, I can do that with strangers pretty easily. But with my close friends, the people I should be able to trust most of all, I am often wrapped up in fear over what they will think were I to live according to what I really believe instead of censoring or suppressing certain beliefs or hopes for the sake of not offending.

My uncle recently "replied to all" on an email forward (one of the many that get circulated in my family) that had a very ignorant and offensive message about "patriotism" and what kind of person deserves to be called an American. His response was simply: Please spare me this shit and remove me from your email list NOW.

I have no desire to be a jackass. (Sorry, Uncle T!) But I have a huge amount of respect for my uncle for being so open about his personal opinions & beliefs. He's always been that way, as long as I can remember - and it hasn't exactly won him a cherished spot in the hierarchy of our clan. But he has no fear about what other people will think. He knows what he believes and what he doesn't, and he has no problem being open about those things. I, on the otherhand, have been quick to retract statements I've made that have brought me the slightest amount of criticism from family, friends, fellow church-goers.

And I have been experiencing an unsettling realization that this is because I don't believe in grace. I don't really believe it counts for anything; instead, my status, the love I seek after, my place in church, family, and social circles, I believe are won and defended by what I accomplish, what I do (or more often what I don't do), and how well-behaved I am. According, of course, to the standards of others - standards that I oftentimes do not personally believe for myself. But I still choose to live by them. Because of fear. Because of obligation. Because I don't trust that I will still be received and accepted. Because I don't trust grace.

I'm going to pack up now and go home. The barely-listenable band is finished & gone. The coffeehouse is closing down. I have a 3 mile bike ride uphill until I reach the comfort of my bed and my border collie, who is the only one I never fear will leave me because I don't meet his standards.

after school cookie & milk time!

2008-04-17T08:51:00.000-07:00

Meet one of the roommates! We do a cover of "May He Poop on My Knee?" Also, help me pick a catchphrase, a la William Sledd. "Hello, little children" might be too creepy. Finally, I cover "Mistake of My Life," by Caedmon's Call (written by Derek Webb).

The music in the intro is "Sunshine Alley" by Stanley Turrentine from the album "Sugar." Hope you enjoy!

video: new song

2008-04-15T00:09:00.000-07:00

A new song, showcasing my first attempt at video editing and a random Brian Regan reference! Hope you like...

LYRICS
God, are you still listening?
Were you ever really there at all?
Maybe I was wishing
Maybe I was wrong
All of those desperate words I spoke
Are they just falling right back down on me?
When I am calling chaos home
Does it appease me to believe?

God, are you still speaking?
Have I ever really heard your voice?
Was it just something I was needing
To make some sense of all the noise?
I once believed that you were near
Whispering which way was best
But you are not a puppeteer
And I am not your marionette

God, are you awake now?
'Cause I don't know where I belong
I hear my friends tell me to pray now
Well, my prayer is this song
We think we've got you all exposed
But are you doing what we say you?
Is there even one remotely close
Interpretation of you?

consistency

2008-04-14T08:23:00.000-07:00

There's a topic sure to grab a lot of readers... Reminds me of Reverend Lovejoy's sermon on "The Nine Tenants of Constancy" on the Simpsons. But it's something that has been troubling me lately. I grew up in a world that was rooted in consistency. It was very important to be true to one thing anytime you showed your face. Of course, this mostly revolved around one's commitment to faith. There was almost more judgment for a person who was duplicitous in his faith, easily morphing from Saturday night hedonism to Sunday morning sainthood, than there was for the person who consistently rejected a confrontation with God.

It became very important for me (and the judgmental streak I was to develop in my youth) to live consistently one way - to be always concerned with the same things, to carry on the same conversations from place to place, to look the same way Saturday night as I did on Sunday morning. This was no easy task for someone with a proclivity toward mischief who (not so) secretly enjoys watching the fallout from broad, polarizing statements that unsettle the status quo. But I managed - and quite well. I was a master of consistency.

But here's the thing. The consistency in which I was brought up was concerned mainly with the appearance of things. In truth, one could have as many inconsistent worldviews, lifestyles, and Saturday night romps as you wanted as long as they were well-compartmentalized and hidden from view. In that way, I was able to maintain consistency, or the appearance of it, while my alter ego dabbled in things that my Sunday self wouldn't dream of exposing! I stopped just short of actually developing a second personality. Each of my selves were true, or consistent, to the expectations under which I had placed them.

So this is where my gauges are now madly spinning and I'm unable to settle on a reading: my world today is one of inconsistency. Spiritual friends will jump from church to bar to community service to racy movie back to church again - all very publicly, in full view of anyone interested enough to watch! Conversations can turn on a dime, from sanctimonious to salacious, from excellent to X-rated. And I find myself merrily joining in, happily going along, and deeply troubled by a fear of being exposed as inconsistent.

There is a residual effect happening here in my life. Something leftover from days when I dreaded being seen as anything less than vigilant. It seems scandalous to be so cavalier about hopping from devout to degenerate in the same breath. But the reality of it is that, if I'm honest, I've been doing just that for most of my life. Just not in public. It's really the removal of walls that freaks me out. It's the exposure of what I've always believed should be hidden. It's the carnal no longer bowing to consistency. But who is really consistent? The ones without scruples or the one who just keeps it secret? Are my friends more authentic than I am? Am I simply being a hypocrite? (It wouldn't be the first time.)

I like to think I've long since stopped being a judgmental fool. There's no part of me that wants to call out my friends for their "inconsistency." But my biggest problem right now seems to be judging myself. I'm doing myself a great disservice by masking my own unholy ambitions in the name of "consistency."

tina turns me on!

2008-04-11T12:48:00.000-07:00

Tina Fey is on the cover of my Entertainment Weekly today! I was really excited. There's something about her that I am just really drawn to. I think it's a combination of many things, actually - her work ethic, of course her humor, her passion for things beyond entertainment... she's just a standout. I absolutely cannot wait for Baby Mama. It's going to be hysterical.

This week my community here in San Diego is kicking off a new "campaign" of sorts - Do What's Right. It's going to be our schtick at Earth Fair on the 20th. I'm excited about it... the website is still going up, but should be running soon!

update: template issue resolved

2008-04-08T12:27:00.000-07:00

As you can clearly see! I don't like it as much as the "Mush Blue" blogger template I had, but so far it's far more reliable! Here's to grunge!

template trouble

2008-04-08T10:39:00.000-07:00

My new template, which I LOVE, has been giving me a lot of trouble lately. If you've visited anytime in the past month, chances are you've seen a sorry excuse for a blog. The template I'm using seems to be down about 90% of the time. Bummer. Wish I knew more about how the whole process works so I could host it myself somewhere else... I'm gonna have to carve out some time to re-do it, I'm afraid. 'Til then, sorry for the ugly blog!

what's right?

2008-03-13T09:25:00.000-07:00

Borrowing from a friend's paradigm-shifting idea...

Americans are negative by nature. (And blanket statements are never helpful! Wait a second...) Really, though - we spend most of our conversation talking about what we don't like, the things that turn us off, excuses for not doing this or that. Even when we're excited about something, it's often in comparison with something else that we're not excited about. (A new restaurant just opened that's way better than that one!)

So it tends to go in relationships as well. Among friends and family, this tends to happen often:

"Hey, Andy! How's it going?"

"Oh, you know. Just another day."

"What's wrong? You seem down."

"Nothing. Just tired/stressed/anxious [insert negative adjective of your choice here]."

What's wrong? The question assumes a lot. It assumes, first of all, there is a standard "right." It also assumes that the questionee is not meeting the criteria for what is "right." Tone of voice, body language, even the 'look in your eye' all inform us as to an individual's status on the right-wrong spectrum.

There's nothing, ahem, wrong with being concerned for people who genuinely seem down. But when you meet a friend who genuinely seems to be doing alright, how often do you ask him, "What's right?" How often do we give each other a chance to talk about the good things? How often do we invite one another to share something positive instead of inviting a complaint? I wonder how much of a difference it could make.

I hope you'll read the entry I linked you to above, comment, and accept the What's Right? challenge.

my ugandan boy

2008-03-06T09:39:00.000-08:00

I sponsored a kid through Children's Heritage Foundation! His name is Joseph Ochola, he is 5 years old, and he likes to sing. I love this foundation for many reasons - the biggest being my friends Steve & Ali became connected with them a year ago, have now visited Uganda with them, and are hoping to be able to actually adopt their sponsored child this year! It's an incredible story that I'll write more about later... But here's Joseph, and his bio. What a cute little dude. :)

Joseph looks forward to Sunday all week long. He loves to go to church and sing with his friends. He prays for his parents to be well and misses his father very much, who recently abandoned the family. His mom supports the family selling food in a small town called Nasuti, earning about $1 per day.

Joseph loves drawing pictures in school and playing with his friends. He hopes to be able to stay in school but his mother's meager income selling pancakes is hardly enough to support Joseph and his two sisters. Joseph prays for a better future.

all is well

2008-02-15T11:30:00.000-08:00

Apparently some of my friends get most of their news from me through this blog (because I am bad at returning calls) and so when I leave those life-is-oh-so-miserable posts up for too long, they start worrying about me. So here's a current picture, to assuage those fears that I am perpetually morose & brooding:

Ok, so maybe that isn't so reassuring. Nonetheless - know that the sunshine isn't the only things that's bright in San Diego.

(It's my perspective. My perspective is what else is bright.)

There have been trying times in recent weeks - I'm not gonna lie (about that, anyway) - but I'm reconnecting with my friends in really good ways. And I have been gifted with amazing friends. There's no better remedy.

So thanks for the concern. Sometimes this space feels like my sole outlet, and my tendency toward the dramatic (what? me?) is irresistible sometimes.

Peace.

proof

2008-01-25T15:14:00.000-08:00

At least I know myself. Exactly when, where, and how I'll break. Exactly how long I can hold out. Exactly how I'll come to terms with the whole thing. But it does make you wish that once, just once, you had the balls to go through with something drastic. Not so much to prove a point to anyone else. More as a way to exhale. You breathe in so much, hold in so much, that eventually it just sort of settles in there somewhere. You thought you were about to explode, thought you couldn't take it anymore, and just when you think it's about to blow, fissure and crack and explode, you manage to pack it in nicely, tidy things up, expand just enough to keep it inside.

I've got nothing to prove to anyone. It's myself that needs convincing.

breakdown

2008-01-23T09:33:00.001-08:00

Predictable as ice melting. Today is day 3, and so it's on to the feelings of loss, the sense that I'm missing out, the acknowledgment that I'm doing it to myself. The cracking of the exterior, the slow breakdown that will ultimately result in admitting my folly, admitting my mistakes and misperception, admitting to anything just to get back the thing I'm desperate not to lose.

It always starts with some sort of righteous anger - righteous, at least, from the perspective of my wounded little corner. I retreat, sure I've been living in a fairy tale, sure that I've been duped, satisfied with a pretense of love that was never actualized. "I am tired of being the first, the initiator, the one always asking and inviting and believing," I say. I want to be on the receiving end of some unsolicited message of approval, of love. Something that says, "You are a difference-maker in my world. I value you in a special way, different from how I value other things."

This something doesn't have to be words. It doesn't have to be a symbol, gift, or gesture. There are no specifications. It just has to be. That's what I think when I submit my proposal. But really, there are rules. I have to perceive it to be what I want. And my perceptions are impenetrable, even to myself.

Is it true what they say, that you can't possibly receive love until you know how to love yourself? If so, it's a lost cause.

At any rate, it's day three, and the exterior is cracking. Breakdown. Caving in. I was wrong, you are right. Please don't leave. The weakness I can't stand to witness in myself.

The temptation to be drastic - to up and leave, or to go screw anonymously - is tempered by the dread of permanently damaging something I believe I can't live without. Predictable. Day 1, righteous anger. Day 2, stubborn holdout. Day 3, cracking, lonely. Day 4, or 5, or Day Inevitable: breakdown. It doesn't matter how long. It won't last. Like ice in the sun.

Viggo Mortensen

2008-01-08T10:58:00.001-08:00

A great interview with Viggo on his political views and why he supports Dennis Kucinich.

help me name this song

2007-11-15T22:57:00.000-08:00

I need your help naming this song... The lyrics are below. Give it a listen and if you have any ideas, leave a comment or email me at matthew[at]matthewblakemusic.com. Thanks for your help!

UNTITLED
Take it to the mirror
Where maybe things are clearer
And the faces looking back at you
Don't tell a lie
You think that you have lost her
And you can't refuse the offer
When a man wearing a halo
Looks you square in the eye
Square in the eye, oh
Square in the eye

You said you're on a journey
And you will not be returning
To the wasteland where the skeptics
Hung you out to dry
You said it left you reeling
Well, I recall the feeling
If you want to hit the road
I'm happy to oblige
Happy to oblige

Oh, I, I had no letter to write
'Cause all my letters were light
Sprouted wings and took to flight
With the words right from my skin

I was learning about heaven
When I was only seven
If you wanna get a spot,
You got a lot to hide
I must've learned my lesson
Now I'm always second-guessin'
But it's better than the bullshit
That I used to buy
I used to buy

Oh, I, I had no letter to write
'Cause all my letters were light
Sprouted wings and took to flight
With the words right from my skin

Oh, I, I still want to believe
It might be naive
But I will hold my breath
And wait and see

Oh I, I got the letters you sent
Wondering where I went
I'll have a say in how my life is spent
With the words right on my skin

-copyright 2007 Matthew Blake Music

musician's block

2007-11-02T22:52:00.000-07:00

Tonight was good for me. If you don't know, I host a local music showcase at a coffeehouse here in downtown San Diego every Friday night. When I arrived tonight, I just wasn't feeling it.

I always try to warm the place up and bring in a few stragglers from the sidewalk by opening up the show, but tonight I felt like I did more harm than good. I had no faith in the songs I was singing, or the fact that it was me who was singing them. Not really sure why. It just happens sometimes, I suppose the same way a writer gets blocked. At any rate, I was relieved when my set was finally over and I could just sit back and listen to the other guys play.

Fortunately for me, Nathan Welden was there tonight. Quite possibly, you haven't heard of him. He's a local guy, and his songs border on country. But while they are straightforward, soft, and as unassuming as the guy singing them, they are still full of passion and pointed lessons.

The song that really got me was called "Everything is Holy Now." I can't find a link to it anywhere, or I'd have you listen to it. It's about how he grew up in church and recognized when a holy moment was happening: communion, or the priest blessing something. But he sings about today:

The only thing that's different
Is everything is holy now

I wish I could truly treasure each second as a sacred event. The majesty & mystery of life wrapped up in every footstep, every heartbeat, every word spoken and heard. I certainly didn't do that tonight when I was singing. How do I get to the point where I forget how important music is to me, and how my songs meant something to me when I wrote them? How do I forget that I play them for a reason?

I wish I could connect with people like Nathan connected with the coffeehouse tonight. Wish I weren't so blocked. Those connections are what make moments holy.

As I was leaving, I decided to stop on the sidewalk and play my guitar. It was a little silly, sitting in God knows what in the middle of East Village, but I just wanted to redeem the missed opportunity in some small way. I hadn't been playing for 5 minutes when a man named Don walked by and stopped to listen. He then sat down beside me and asked to play the guitar. He strummed a few bars of some unintelligible Willie Nelson song (enunciation isn't Don's strong suit), and then we talked about music and how powerful it is. He was clearly moved by even the simple picking I was doing. It made him want to talk about his wife who passed away earlier this year, and how he pawned his guitar to keep up with the bills in the aftermath. Music just made him happy, and somehow it made me happy too. So, somehow, there was a little bit of redemption. Recognition of the holy in an ordinary moment.

the wisdom of stephen kellogg

2007-10-29T09:04:00.000-07:00

I recently went to the House of Blues for a Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers show. What a great band. Somewhere in the middle I was struck by the really deep level of friendship those guys shared. Stephen asked how many people came with friends that night (to lots of cheering), and then proceeded to talk about the importance of having friends that you can call on at any moment, friends without pretense, where worrying about what they'll think of you is the last thing on your mind. There was a song that went along with that sentiment. It was a lovely moment.

I agree with Stephen. Having friends like that is really the motivation behind everything I do. I think about what it would be like to hit the road with my amigos and just go play music all over - really, honestly, there is nothing in this world that sounds better to me than that, no other experience I would choose over that one, if I had the option.

Maybe someday I will.

questions and answers

2007-10-27T02:29:00.000-07:00

This blog's 2 year anniversary is fast-approaching. It began in November of 2005 as my "second guess at what life is all about." A place to reconsider inherited suppositions was it's sub-moniker. Suppositions: things assumed to be true. Inherited, from where? My family, my church, my entire Bible-belt upbringing. I was simply second-guessing what it was really all about.

Two years later things are different. And they are the same. I'm still second-guessing those suppositions. But in the journey I'm uncovering something deep and dense, subtle and silent, something that is good but hard and unsettling and reassuring all at the same time. Faith is requisite in a god-ly pursuit, but problematic, to say the least, for the mind of man and woman. To walk by faith, to believe in the unseen, to trust in ultimate good, to surrender - these intangible, mysterious acts of the will and the heart and, yes, the mind are so incongruous with the perceived experience of life.

Do I believe there is a God? Yes. I do. It's foolish not to believe in a concept as abstract as "God." God is whatever helps make sense of life. Goodwill, compassion, love between enemies, love between friends, charity, selflessness, good decisions, luck, fate, harmony, peace - these things are God, or influence of God, or evidence of God. You don't have to attribute personhood to God, or a name, or anything at all. But if you know that there is a wrong or bad way to live life, and you also know there is a good and helpful way to live life, then whatever influences you to choose the good way is God, whether she be a force, a spirit, something within, sheer will, conscience, a deity, a supreme being, the metaphysical, that is the thing that is God to you.

There are other questions.
Do I believe in Jesus?
In heaven? Hell?
The Bible? Other holy books?
A personal relationship with a savior?
That prayer is effective?

Lots of other questions. Some with answers, but none with resolution. Everything's unresolved, always unresolved, even if there is an answer. It's late tonight. But over the next couple of weeks as the 2 year anniversary of The Second Guess approaches, I'll talk more about these questions and their (unresolved) answers, in my experience.

satellite smoke

2007-10-22T13:27:00.000-07:00

Sad, so sad...

san diego fires

2007-10-22T10:13:00.001-07:00

We camped in Julian this weekend. It was phenomenal, a great time. But it's hard to be glad about the trip when the weekend has ended so tragically for so many. As of the writing of this blog, there are 8 fires raging throughout San Diego County. This link has several pictures, including some from a hiker on Volcan Mountain - a hike that we did on Saturday morning, just 24 hours before the photo was taken.

Honestly, it's becoming a little scary. Several people I know now are affected, one of the people in our company may have lost her home. My friend Ben, who gave me a place to live when I first moved down here, was evacuated from his home in Rancho Bernardo 20 minutes north of downtown where the fires have consumed several houses. He saw it creeping over the hills as he was leaving. Fortunately he made it down here safely, but how many homes are going to be lost before this thing is over.

Not that I didn't already, but now more than ever I have a great appreciation and respect for the men & women who volunteer to fight these flames. Have you hugged a firefighter today?

happy birthday robert

2007-10-17T11:46:00.000-07:00

It's time to celebrate Rob's existence. To do so, I am posting the only picture of him I have on my work computer. Love those curly golden locks.

blog action day 2007

2007-10-15T12:23:00.000-07:00

Today is Blog Action Day.

Bloggers all over are highlighting the need for green living, environmental awareness, and the role each us plays in building a sustainable future.

Facebook users: did you know you can make your page "green"? Simply by adding the "Greenbook" application, you can help generate advertising revenue that goes toward reducing the amount of CO2 emissions that come from the energy it requires to run Facebook.com. Check it out here.

Thanks & I hope you'll recycle today! :)

photos from denver

2007-10-09T15:58:00.000-07:00

We've got a good thing going and so we've got to protect it
Because there's nothing better, baby - don't you forget it
I don't worry 'bout us
-Carolyn Arends

the greatest day

2007-09-30T00:44:00.000-07:00

Today was crazy good.

It started with a whim. I'm car-less at the moment, so alot of things that I had been doing on a regular basis, I'm not doing anymore. Chick-fil-A is one of those things. I've biked there before, and it's a pretty easy ride. But this morning I had sudden urge to really beat my body into shape. One of those empowering moments when you really believe you can take your health in your own two hands and resuscitate it by sheer will. So I decided to run to Chick-fil-A. (Not even going to broach the irony of that statement.)

I made it 4.83 miles. Chick-fil-A was an approximate 2 miles further. I stopped at my friends' house and he had to drive me back. Still - 4.83 miles after not having run a lick about a year ain't bad. So despite my now-aching legs, I was pleased with how I spent the morning.

Then it was on to the Adams Avenue Street Fair, a big annual music event here in San Diego with tons and tons of vendors lining the road. It was there I re-discovered the joy of Mentos (the Freshmaker). They were handing them out for free. I went back for seconds. Also, I recommend a band from here in town called "The Drowning Men" (their MySpace here).

Then it was onto the Stone Brewery in Escondido with my new friends Damian & Tim. Tim was the only beer aficionado amongst us, but we all had a great time on the free tour this brewery gives. Hearing about the passion that goes into good beer-brewing was well worth the trip. Not the mention the 4 free glasses they gave us at the end of the tour!

Then it was off to La Mesa, a city just east of San Diego that I had never visited before, to play a gig at Cosmo's Cafe. We had a great turnout, I sold a few CDs, connected with a few musician friends, and got to talk with Jason Turtle of the Turtle Project (whose music I HIGHLY recommend - though they don't have a CD yet... MySpace here - I'm stoked about getting him down to Java Jones and hopefully playing a show with him myself sometime. It's always great to get a compliment from another artist you really like & respect. Jason's the man.

Finally, it was back to San Diego, to the House of Blues on the block where I live where I had a ticket to a great show: Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers (MySpace here). I saw these guys back in the spring when I was volunteering for the Mocha Club at a concert they happened to be playing. They put on an impressive show then, and so it was a no-brainer for me when I found out they were playing next door for a mere $12. I wasn't disappointed - such a great band. What's awesome about them is that they're 4 guys who are clearly best friends, love each other, and having the time of their lives. There's nothing more fun to watch than great music coming from friends like that.

It was a hell of day. Now to rest my aching body - and dread getting out of bed tomorrow morning...

happy birthday goobrit

2007-09-25T14:45:00.000-07:00

My brother is now in college and celebrating his 19th birthday. I hope it's happy, turd-face.

stand up tall

2007-09-20T15:07:00.001-07:00

tag-along

2007-09-20T09:17:00.000-07:00

Been absent from this blog for awhile, but now I'm just a whole mess of things to talk about.

Emphasis on mess.

My last post was one of frustration at my situation. (Hey, I'm not a rhyming songwriter for no reason.) It's the same sort of thing that's gone on with me since high school. This is the biggest "Duh!" statement ever, but I hate finding myself on the outside. I want to belong.
Fit in.
Be one of the guys.

There is never a moment when I'm not afraid of being left out. This is a big time confession for me! I don't think I'm the only one, but so rarely do any of us talk about it or admit it. My inability to cope, though, is probably a little more severe than most people's. And it's almost like I'm scrutinizing my environment, actively seeking out circumstances that prove I don't belong. Why would anyone spend his time looking for ways to prove he doesn't fit in?

I've been bailed on before, in a big way. It's over, in the past, forgiven - but it doesn't take much to remind me of the sucking-spiral-down-the-drain feeling that I had the day a best friend told me we weren't friends anymore. It stung a mad hornet sting. To squish a whole lot of psychological theory into a summation of my experience: I believe I'm still very much afraid that it could happen again - that I could once more find myself the object of a close friend's disaffection - and so I find it next to impossible to trust that I am loved. At every turn, my fear of rejection rears it's malformed little head (gurgling slightly) and I'm lost in believing that what I've perceived is undeniable evidence that my friend is not my friend.

So this week I'm trying to do this daily Bible reading thing (novel idea, right?) and yesterday's was Exodus 33 where God is all "So, Moses, I made this promise to Abraham that his descendants would live in this sweet-action Promised Land, so I need you to take the Israelites there. But they're stubborn as hell, so I'm not gonna go with them 'cause you know I've got this temper problem and there's a possibility I might, oh, I don't know, get pissed and wipe them off the face of the earth." (Hey, this is my blog - if you have a problem with how I paraphrase God, go tell her about it.)

So the people don't get to be with God. Instead, God descends on the "Tent of Meeting" and speaks to Moses "face to face, as a man speaks with his friend" (actual direct quote), while all the people stand and worship from the entrances of their own tents.

Question of the day: who would you rather be - Moses, or the other Israelites? "Hi. My name is Matthew and I am banned from the Tent of Meeting." That's how I look at my life! I so much do not want God to be this giant cloud that I can't approach. I don't want to watch Moses from afar and worship from the outside. But I'm so afraid that's how it is! That, like the Israelites, the only reason I'm able to tag along on the God-train is because of some promise he made to the people he really cares about - maybe my parents or grandparents, or maybe someone who's prayed for me, maybe Father Abraham. God cares about those people, the people in the Tent of Meeting. But I am stuck worshiping from my own tent and will never talk to God face to face, as a man talks with his friend.

I don't want to be on the outside.
I want to belong.
Fit in.
Be one of the guys.

Jesus was pretty good at making people feel like they belonged. See, this is one of many reasons I'm not an advocate for a literal interpretation of the Bible, or someone who believes that every word that we have today is "inspired, inerrant, and infallible." The God of the Old Testament so often looks more like one of the Greek gods - capricious, hot-tempered, moody, and vengeful. God looks like a human interpretation of deity based on what is perceived in the chaos of life. But Jesus represents a different God. Not a selective, reactionary deity, but someone who talks to you face to face, as a man talks with his friend. An inclusive God. A God without a Tent of Meeting.

It's probably how God always was. But the Israelites, and the writers and record-keepers of Scripture, didn't seem to perceive that God was inclusive. They felt they were on the outside. They believed God loved Abraham, and was merely keeping a promise to Abraham when choosing to lead the Israelites to the promised land. They felt like tag-alongs on the God-caravan (they didn't have trains back then, you see).

There's a lesson for me somewhere in here... If I could just... figure... it out...

fears i can't fight

2007-09-18T07:09:00.000-07:00

I will apparently always deal with the same nagging, frustrating fears.
A friend hugs everyone as he is leaving - except me. I'm given a hasty high-five. Immediately, I am deep in fears that have plagued me for most of my life. "Did I do or say something wrong? Why am I not worth a hug? Is my friend through with me?"

I hate, despise, detest these fears in me. I hate that I can't function normally in social situations. That fear is always just beneath the surface. And all it takes to send it surging upward is a high-five.

do you love me?

2007-09-12T11:15:00.000-07:00

Do you truly love me, more than these?

Someone had to ask it. When love betrays you, how do you recover? How do you believe you are still worth loving? How do you even hope that love conquers all, that it is the most powerful magic, that love is all you need when it was the very thing that betrayed you?

The most painful betrayal wasn’t the kiss in the garden; he already suspected it, anticipated its coming. No, the most painful betrayal was the Great Denial – the thrice-issued public disowning marked by curses and sealed with the haunting cry of a barnyard rooster in the early mist of morning.

Do you truly love me?

Three years together. Traveling, teaching, talking. Three years they walked from village to town to city. He had watched the man called Jesus do unimaginable things: life-long cripples had actually stood on once-shriveled legs and moved about freely on their own; there had been terrible visions of what can only be called pure evil being splintered from the souls it possessed; a man 3 days dead, embalmed, buried – he returned to the land of the living. And he had been there, right beside the man who did it all. In his posse. One of his twelve chosen.

God, were ever men more intimate than this? To not only have witnessed the paradigm-shifting life, but to have been invited into the journey? To share meals, long trips, days and nights for three years long? Jesus had even healed his own mother.

Do you love me?

Proudly, defiantly, perhaps desperately: “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you.” If someone said that to me, I would know it was love. If someone defended me to the point of drawing a weapon against my enemies, I would know it was love. If that is not love – what is?

But betrayal came. It always comes. Not merely once. Not merely a flippant comment overheard. Three times. Emphatically. Well within earshot. “I’ll be damned if I know who that man is.” The man who loved Jesus, denied him.

I’ve always been told that when Jesus appeared to the fishermen on the beach, cooked them breakfast, and then asked Peter that hard question three times, it was Jesus’ way of reinstating Peter, forgiving him, bringing him back into good graces. That’s not the whole story though. It can’t be.

Betrayed by love. By someone you trusted. Cared for deeply. Had invited into the deepest parts of your life. Don’t tell me Jesus didn’t experience in that moment the same pain I know – the same pain I suspect you do, too. The moment that love fails you is a bitter, terrible moment that strips you of the thing that sustained you and kept you going. When you are loved, it means someone believes in you. Can you even believe in yourself when no one loves you? How? Tell me how, because I can’t.

Jesus wasn’t merely reinstating Peter. That couldn’t have been the whole story. Jesus asked the hardest question to ask in that situation. A question that makes us feel weak, needy, desperate. But he asked it: Do you love me? He needed to be loved, he needed to believe this man who had walked with him for three years still believed in him. After going to hell and back, Jesus needed to hear the words, “I love you.”

If he had to ask three times… if he had to hear it for himself… If Jesus’ need for love was so great that he risked it all by asking the question, Do you love me – are you and I any different?

the rundown

2007-07-15T19:04:00.000-07:00

I'm watching "Alien." Directed by Ridley Scott. Several years ago I was whining that I had never seen the "Alien" movies. My good friend Becky - who either loves me very much or was tired of hearing me whine - bought me the Quadrilogy for Christmas. Haven't seen them since she bought them for me, so I figured a lazy Sunday afternoon was as good a time as any to scare myself silly.

Next weekend I plan to visit Amanda and John in LA. Amanda is my pal who sang on the album. I'm excited to visit, first because I really like Amanda & John, and second because I've yet to actually be present in LA for more than a drive-through. It'll be cool to see some of the sights. I will also give Amanda a copy of some demos of songs I'm working on for the next album so she can begin learning them for when we record. I'm looking forward to having her voice play a bigger role next time 'round.

Like I said in the last blog, I'm planning on calling the next record "World Change Me." I've written many songs over the past year or so for this album, some that probably won't ever see the light of day. That's just how it goes. But I do have 8 songs that I'm sure will be on it, and 2 more I'm almost through with that I like. Then there are several that are in my head, but haven't been worked out yet. One is the title track - "World Change Me." I have the chorus:

Everyone before me tried to change the world
Everyone around me wants to change the world
Everything inside me saying change the world
I'll tell you what I see, how the world change me

I'll be enlisting the help of my amigo & bandmate Thomas to finish writing this one. Collaborating on songs is not something I do often - in fact, not something I've done since college - but this one calls for it. Thomas has the skill to make this song what I want it to be, which is a bluesy, funky pop anthem. You'll see what I mean when we finish.

The plan is to shop these demos around to some smaller labels. I really want to create a quality record, one that will stand the test of time. If we have the help of an independent label, the resources available to us will just be greater than what we would have on our own. So think positive thoughts for us!

Also - don't forget to vote for us this month (July) on www.SessionSound.com. We are up for artist of the month and have a good shot at winning - with your help!

That's all for now. Over & out.

Froot Loops

2007-01-05T15:37:00.000-08:00

Today I ate a bowl of Froot Loops for breakfast. Lately I’ve found myself drawn back to the cereals of my youth: Apple Jacks, Cocoa Puffs, Trix, Cap’n Crunch, and Froot Loops. I suppose it’s the nostalgia of the holidays. That and the fact that a person can only be expected to eat so much shredded wheat before the gag reflex is summoned. Anyway, as I chomped happily on my loops of froot, I was struck suddenly by the fact that there were six distinct colors in the bowl.

“Six froots?” I thought to myself. “Why, I recall when Froot Loops were a nearly monochromatic blend of red, orange, and yellow!”

I do recall the first time a new color was added. I believe it was green. I remember sitting a matter of inches away from the boob toob (sorry, my spelling’s all outta whack because of the whole “froot” thing) watching Toucan Sam on a quest to find exciting new flavors for his cereal. It was exciting news back then.

(Remember watching cereal commercials like they were news? It was tough work keeping up with Toucan Sam, Sonny the Cuckoo Bird, the Trix Rabbit, et. al. I watched those commercials back then like I watch the news today.)

Anyway. All this to say that I feel old. I feel old because I got mad that there were six different colors of Froot Loops instead of the original three. I feel old because I remember exactly what those three original colors were. I know there’s a lot out there who will laugh at me for being 24 and writing a blog about aging, but gosh darn it, I feel old. And I think I deserve a 29¢ cup of coffee at my local diner for all the years I’ve endured under the hot, damaging rays of the sun.

New Year to Remember

2007-01-02T13:28:00.000-08:00

New Year’s is my favorite holiday. Has been for several years now. Back at King College, my friend Kristen & I used to bring our pals from school home to Asheville for New Year’s eve. It became tradition:

The evening always began with taco salad. Kristen and I were best friends growing up, and I couldn’t count the number of times I had taco salad at her house. It’s a Mojonnier staple. But they do it well. Better than anyone else I know of, and so taco salad became our end-of-year celebratory meal.

After dinner, we’d move onto games. Cranium was usually the game of choice, though Pictionary and charades both got their fair share of floor time as well.

A movie followed game time. This mostly served as a way to get a nap in before heading downtown. Asheville, like many US cities, has a downtown New Year’s party called “First Night.” It is fantastic. Music, food, hippies, and of course, one of the best fireworks shows I’ve ever experienced.

So, this being my first New Year’s in San Diego, I wanted to start a similar tradition here. It turned out to be a great evening. We had 30 people show up, and let me tell you, if you’re going to feed 30 people, there is no easier or cheaper way to do it than with taco salad. We then played a rousing game of “Best of 2006 Charades,” which included the categories of movies, music, and TV. My favorite moments were watching Sheila trying to make us guess the movie “Slither” and Ben acting out “Dancing with the Stars.” I had the unfortunate task of trying to get my team to recognize my interpretation of Nelly Furtado’s “Promiscuous.” (That must never be spoken of again.)

After charades, we tried a new game that we simply call “Celebrity,” but has less to do with Hollywood than it does hostile takeovers á la ‘Risk.’ My friend April played a sneaky game & ended up dominating the room and owning us all.

We ended the evening by walking to the bay through Little Italy and watching the fireworks shoot off from Coronado. They were distant, but still the only way to ring in a new year!

At night’s end, I think we all had a great time. I know I did. Hanging out with old friends & new ones – it just doesn’t get much better. I look forward to many more New Year’s celebrations in San Diego!

Playing Make-Believe

2006-10-31T00:57:00.000-08:00

I remember the day I decided I wanted to sing. I had become enamored with the idea of writing songs and singing them for people. I remember envisioning my name on a CD... or, rather, cassette tape... full of my own music. I only told one person. It was my sister, Amy. I told her in confidence, and she, being probably 4 or 5 didn't quite understand what that meant. As my biggest fan (back then, and, I suspect, still today), she promptly made it her mission to announce to everyone what my life goals were.

I remember being terrified as she told Dad what I was planning to do. Right in front of me, she proudly declared, in her trademark squeaky voice, "Matthew is going to be a singer when he grows up!" It wasn't so much that I was ashamed of my dream; it was more that I was afraid it might never happen. And if Dad even so much as smiled the wrong way at this news, my hope for one day writing and recording my own music could be exposed as a vain, unachieveable whim. Just a dream that passes in the night.

Last weekend, my good friend Amanda came down from LA to record some backing vocals on the album I've been working on with Thomas Gray for the past several months. Tonight, I was able to closely listen to the new mix, with her smooth additions, for the first time. After hearing how much her haunting harmonies changed the mood of "Don't Let Go," I had to remind myself to breathe. Something changed in me as I heard that song for what felt like the first time, though I first wrote it over five years ago.

You see, up until now I feel like I've been playing make-believe. In Reno, I recorded an album with one of my best friends Rob Woods. We didn't get as far as we had hoped, but we got several decent tracks out of the process. But something in me has kept them silent. With the exception of posting a couple of the better ones on my myspace page, I have done little to expose those songs to the light of day. It's as though I have always believed that my dream would pass, that it was vain and fleeting and a waste of time pursuing with any seriousness, and the best I could ever hope for was to go with the flow when it carried me into occassional periods of exploring the art of songwriting and recording.

People, good friends and strangers alike, consistently tell me they believe I have something to offer in my songs. I always struggle with how to accept those encouraging words, because I always feel like it's just make-believe, that these people are unwitting guests at some tea party where everyone is supposed to be polite and courteous and be sure that we each feel valued and special. But tonight when I heard those words, that melody layered with Amanda's gentle, sombre tones, I realized that something has happened that I didn't expect. Somehow, somewhere along the way, my dream has begun to materialize.

What once were the far-off wishes of a 7 year old boy have now become the reality of a man who never envisioned something this good ever happening. What once were the solitary, silent hopes of a teenager scribbling phrases in a 3 ring notebook have now become the combined effort of friends I've made along the way, people who truly believe in these songs - so much so that some of them have devoted several months of their own time, energy, and talent to create something I never could have done on my own. Friends from college who spent hours teaching me guitar or writing with me; Rob, who stayed up with me countless nights into the early hours of the morning in order to get my songs out of my head and onto a disc; Amanda, who shared microphones with me on a worship team in Reno, taking time off of work and school to travel to San Diego to lend her talents to this project; Thomas, who has carefully overseen the recording, mixing, producing, and playing of nearly every instrument that wasn't my guitar on these songs; the litany of friends and family, near and far, who constantly remind me that they appreciate my songs and hope to hear more... There is (not-so)suddenly a community of people surrounding me who have spurred these dreams into something of substance and promise.

I don't know quite what it is that I'm getting at here. I think that tonight I've had a very unexpected realization that sometimes, a dream is put in us for a reason. Sometimes, no matter how much trouble we have believing it could come to be, we find ourselves in circumstances that enable us to live out that dream. Sometimes you have a little sister who thinks you can do anything, and friends who want to help you along the way. Sometimes... ok, I'll stop short of saying 'dreams really do come true' and spare us all the Disney moment...

But I think you get the picture. How grateful I am tonight.

Sheryl Crow and the Emotional Gag Reflex

2006-08-01T11:11:00.000-07:00

The song playing in my head over the past 48 hours has been Sheryl Crow’s “It Don’t Hurt.” She’s all tongue-in-cheek singing about some lover (this was a pre-Lance song) who’s gone, but:

It don’t hurt like it did
I can sing my song again

Even though Sheryl gets to the end of the song and doesn’t really believe what she’s singing (“It don’t hurt like it did/ It hurts worse, who do I kid?”), she’s still singing it. And so am I.

You know that physical signal you get right before you throw up? The one in the back of your throat and in those glands just behind & below each ear, and the way your mouth all of sudden produces this ginormous amount of saliva? I get another signal that’s very similar. It’s like an emotional gag reflex. My stomach feels like it twists 45 degrees counter-clockwise and I feel the sudden urge to clench onto something very tightly (my misshapen keyboard wrist rest, which is made of a wonderfully malleable gel-like substance, can attest to this).

When I get that signal lately, the very first thing I do, after squeezing the wrist rest, of course, is to take a deep breath and then start singing to myself:

It don’t hurt like it did
I can sing my song again

For me, this does something. I don’t know if it’s because I’m a songwriter who’s felt completely blocked and crippled, an puddle of fears and emotions slowly draining into some forgotten spillway, but the possibility of “singing my song again” is one of the few things that holds weight and light in the world anymore. And I’m just choosing to believe that if I say “it don’t hurt” enough, and keep on singing my song, somehow it will come to be.

The Genesis story of creation is based on the idea that something can be spoken into existence, that the only thing preventing something from being is that no one has said it exists. I’m not waxing theological here, and obviously I’m don’t mean that if I just say “Let there be sweet ride to roll upon the earth” then a 2007 Lamborghini Murciélago LP640 is going to suddenly appear before me, but there is something built into the way this universe works that puts a certain amount of power (with which comes - you guessed it, responsibility) in our hands to believe that something is, or at the very least, can be, even when it currently isn’t. I think somewhere, someone called it faith.

No one sees God without faith. I think this is the same as saying the more one chooses to believe in God, despite the lack of sensory evidence, the more reason one has to believe in God. I think the same goes for what we believe about who we are and how we fit in this world. The more I choose to believe that I’m displaced, forgotten, and unvalued, the more reason I have to believe those things are true. My hope is that it works conversely: the more I choose to believe I have a place, something to give, and friends to share this life with, the more reason I will have to believe those things are true.

So, despite the intermittent onslaught of the emotional gag reflex, it don’t hurt.

My last day on earth

2006-08-01T11:10:00.000-07:00

What if this were the last thing I ever wrote? What if I finish this page and tonight, as I ride home from work, my bike is struck by an inattentive vehicle, sending me to some life after this one? Would I want my last piece of communication to be the sorrowful, solemn piece I'm inclined to write on this quiet Monday morning?

I dont think so.

Life feels long, especially when youre in the middle, when youre waiting for something, something that never seems to arrive. But it isn't long. Its just a breath. One breath of God, and the earth has spun around the sun 70 times, and my body has gone from new to old, and everything that mattered so much in July of 2006 is long gone.

Everything comes down to making a conscious decision about whatever is bothering you. You just have to say it, and then do it, even if you don't feel it, even if you don't believe it.

"I'm going to commit to the life of faith, the way of Christ. I'm just going to do it, to live that way, even though it often feels absurd and isolated."

"I'm going to live in San Diego, to be a member of this urban community. I'm just going to do it, to live that way, even though I often wish I were somewhere else."

"I'm going to be the friend I wish I had to the people close to me. I'm just going to do it, to live that way, even though I often feel unnecessary and undervalued by them."

"I'm going to believe that I have something to offer, and I'm going to offer it. I'm just going to do it, to live that way, even though I often feel no one else believes in me."

No more self-pity, no more tears. Just resolution, determination. Creation of the life I wish I had. That's something I'm comfortable with writing, should this be my last day on earth.

The significance of tense

2006-04-07T12:58:00.000-07:00

I've been rummaging through my memory and revisiting my days at King College, mostly because the advent of my website has put me back in touch with several former schoolmates. Those memories are rife with emotion of all sorts, and it's brought me back to a song I wrote in my sophomore year entitled "I Will Be Free."

Locked in the cages
Paying the wages
Of my sin
Sin that confounds me
Its all around me
And I begin

To pull at the chains that bind my hands and feet
To immovable walls of defeat
Does anyone have the key?

To see the garden
I need a pardon
Deep inside my soul is crying out
I will be free

Turning the pages
Written by sages
Of the past
They tell a story
Of a home up in glory
And so I ask,

Tell me, when will my soul gain its liberty
From the fetters that restrain me?
Will this soul ever be free?

Sin may have bound me
But Jesus found me
And broke its chains
Now Im begging grace
Please come replace
All that remains

You paid the wages
You unlocked the cages of my sin

Doubts abating
Chains are fading
Very soon my weary soul will say
Now I am free

I know, I know, it's a far cry from the person who a few weeks back posted a blog that started out "I don't give a crap about heaven." (Which, admittedly, may have been a, hmm... minor misjudgement on my part - but I still stand behind my reasons for saying it.)

It has been a revealing thing to think about this song and how much it meant to me in those days - and whether it still bears any significance. The entire ideology behind it - waiting for heaven when 'I will be free' because here I'm only 'locked in the cages' of sin - is a worldview that I just no longer believe works. But that is where I was. And if someone had come up to me and said "Forget about heaven - life is here, life is now - live it!", I probably would have kicked him in the shins and ran away crying like a baby.

Because the truth is that sometimes life really is a bitch. I've been reading some of my friends' blogs and my heart just goes out them in thier frustration and pain, because we all know what it's like to experience those things. And you know, sometimes it's just easier to offer a comforting platitude; to say, 'At least in heaven there is no pain,' or, 'Someday Jesus will wipe those tears away.' Sometimes that really is all that keeps a person going.

But there has to be more. I've been having a conversation with a dear friend lately about sin and suffering, and this is one thing that was said to me:

Sinning no more isn't possible on this earth. We'll never live a sinless day... or else we wouldn't need Him. But maybe the point is... keep coming back to Him and going out again with the intention to sin no more. It's a continuous cycle.

Maybe my friend is right. Maybe that is the point. Maybe in this life we are perpetually bound by the notion of our fallen state, a cursed humanity. Maybe freedom will only ultimately come in heaven, in an afterlife, and until then we are to be satisfied with a "continuous cycle" of good intentions, failure, forgiveness, renewal of good intentions, failure... and so it goes.

Or maybe that's not the point at all. I love and respect my friend, but how long can anyone continue in that cycle before something breaks? Before you go crazy from your own inability to measure up? Before you sigh and resign to a listless life of pretense and self-loathing? Before you give up?

What if giving up were really the best thing for you? Suppose with me for just a moment... What if the idea of sin, and our need to be saved from it, was misguided, unfounded? What if sin were not the ultimate enemy, but only a byproduct of something else gone wrong? What if it weren't the bad things we've done that we need to be saved from?

What if the real issue is not morality, but identity?

Perhaps the church has over-emphasized sin and our need to be free from it. Not to say that sin isn't real and something to be reckoned with, but if we all just stopped sinning, would it matter? Would it make a difference? Or would we still be lost, resigned to that listless life of cycles? Wouldn't we still need something more?

I believe that is why Jesus said, "Come unto me, all you who are weary - I will give you rest." If you're weary of living for something you can't accomplish, stop trying to accomplish it! Give up! It could be that what you're chasing after, you were never meant to have - even if you attain it, it might not even be the thing that will satisfy you! There is a more satisfying pursuit, and that is the pursuit of identity: where did I come from? That is the question we need answered - who am I? What am I made of? If I'm just a chip off the old block, what is the block like?

"Come unto me..." Not "continue in your cycle," but "come." Give up on your pursuit of morality and instead find out who you are. Come to ME for that answer.

So, God, if it's not about what I do, but about who I am - then who am I? Where did I come from?

And Jesus says, 'You came from me! You are made of me! You have the same stuff inside you, the spark of the divine, the image of God! Seek, ask, knock! Seek me with your whole heart, and you will find me!'

That is a pursuit worth making. And it's not a cycle - you only get deeper, because we're talking about God. He continues to invite you further and further into the mystery.

I love this verse, absolutely love it: "Seek first the kingdom of God [where you came from] and his righteousness [what you are meant to do] and ALL THESE THINGS will be added unto you" (emphasis and brackets, obviously, mine). I don't think when Jesus said here "the kingdom of God" that he was talking about heaven. And I don't think that when he says "righteousness" he is talking about our modern concept of Western morality.

I think the kingdom of God is right here, right now. I think righteousness is doing justice, loving mercy, walking humbly with your God. I didn't always think that - I used to sing of how I will be free from sin in heaven. I was partly right: I was destined for freedom - I just didn't know my captor. I didn't know myself. And I didn't know where I came from. But now I know these things, and I no longer have to sing in the future tense.

Yes, I believe a day is coming when I will have an even greater understanding of freedom; when the side effects of sin and death are truly abolished; when seeing God face to face will no longer be "the hope of glory." I understand why an orphan takes comfort in the fact that her parents are in heaven; I know why the African slaves sang of a chariot coming to carry them home; I know why I wrote 'I will be free.'

But then... the kingdom of God is here, it is now. Not I will be free...

I am free.

Why there is meaning

2006-03-13T07:53:00.000-08:00

Here is why there has to be meaning: I get depressed. That is why I know there must be meaning to life.

Sometimes the old lessons I’ve learned slip away, and one day I wake up to find myself hurting down deep because there’s something I want and can’t have, or something I have that I don’t really want – and none of it is what I need.

Desire (wanting), ownership (having), & sustenance (needing) – you can almost categorize the whole of life into these three concepts.

I am priority-driven. When something is important to me (whether it be something I want, have, or need), it becomes the focus of my thought & action. It becomes the object of my pursuit.

I know there is meaning because when I pursue, for instance, a person, sometimes I get that person. I uncover that relationship, but it is not meaningful. Not enough, at least, to prevent me from becoming depressed and self-focused. Sometimes I don’t get that person, and that leaves me depressed as well.

But sometimes, once in a while, I am able to step outside of the situation, mentally and emotionally, and see that what matters is not wanting or having, or sometimes even needing – it is giving.

Giving. It is the only way out of that hole of personal sorrow. So there is meaning to life, because giving is not natural, it is not built into the psyche and soul. It is supernatural, extra-natural, outside-of-natural. Giving forgoes the natural responses I have, the depression, and wakes me up.

I think there must be a Giver out there.

In the mundane task of living
When you’re pouring out and giving
And you’re waking up and trying
And you’re laying down and dying

That’s a little stone, that’s a little mortar
That’s a little seed, it’s a little water
In the hearts of the sons and daughters
This kingdom’s coming…

-Sara Groves

What it feels like

2006-02-20T15:57:00.000-08:00

It is the warm sensation of vodka slipping down your throat, only it’s in my belly and my head, just behind my eyes. It is the still frame of a party in a dark room, the dance floor illumined in flashes and beams of reflected light. It is the silence of a movie theatre, just before the compelling moment on screen sweeps your sensibility away with violent sound from every corner.

That is what these days feel like, when every hour seems to bring me closer to a fuller understanding of what is in store – complete inebriation, the pulsing bass thundering beneath my feet, the catch in my throat at the unfolding of suspense and romance.

The crest of the wave.

More and more each day, every conversation, every chapter I read informs my vision. Matt Hammet said, “The church needs more skeptics.” Those willing to seek truth, to investigate, to scrub the stained glass until the centuries of grimy tradition and convention are gone, until the light shines through revealing the big story going on.

I don’t see far enough to know where this path leads. I have a lot of questions. I’m playing follow the leader. But it feels like God. It feels like those scattered moments from my childhood when there were no voices, only wind, only earth underneath and a hundred questions blown away like umbrella seeds, twirling away and behind them the sky with its constancy. That’s what God feels like – everything is still there, but behind it all he is the backdrop.

There is an erratic ebb & flow to despair & hope. A capricious cycle that unfolds without our input. I believe in something beyond this corporal dimension that maneuvers our ships, helps to navigate through it all, and there is a goodness there, a quality of comfort. Something done well despite the chaotic nature of our existence. I trust in that, and will continue to do so as the warm sensation in my belly spreads to the tips of my fingers and outward, into word and song and touch. I might not always be right – I might not even be close. But I am small enough that it won’t matter, and big enough to chase hard after what does. God grace me as I seek it.

Being OK with Belief

2006-02-17T09:57:00.000-08:00

Reconsidering inherited suppositions is tricky business. A supposition is an assumption, a foundational belief that generally goes unquestioned. It is something one supposes is true. Most of us form supposition by experience. In my life, I have never once started to float away from the face of the earth, so I suppose that the force of gravity is eternally in effect. I’ve never questioned that belief.

If we all had exactly the same experiences, wouldn’t it follow logically that we would all come to the same conclusions as well? That we would believe the same things? This idea drives utopian and communist philosophies. It also fails miserably, because it does not recognize the variable factors of interpretation or temperament. Take 100 newborn babies, place them in the exact same situation with the same influences and same schedules and same wallpaper in their same-sized rooms and you still will not have 100 identical worldviews or ideologies. That’s because people interpret their experiences differently, based on things like temperament, or personality, or proclivities that are innate to them. Some things aren’t learned.

How do you reason with belief, when belief is nothing if not illogical? Oh, belief may be based on the most thorough observation, it may be rooted in cold, hard fact, it may have been engendered by the most obvious of circumstances, but when it comes down to it, belief is completely personal. I may be giving a lecture about an apple sitting on the table in front of me. What I see is a red, ripe, clean piece of fruit. To the students on the other side of the apple, however, my words may sound like nonsense, because the half that they see was eaten yesterday, and is now brown and dried-out, with a fly picking at what’s left. Both I and my students fully believe we are correct in our suppositions, which are based on our experience & interpretation. When it comes down to it, it doesn’t matter what is; what matters is what each of us believes about what is.

Some tell me I am assigning significance to my ideas of mystery and God. That there is no meaning, and I am simply creating meaning by calling it significant. I agree. And I’m OK with that.

There is no meaning except that which we create. I am fully aware that at the very crux of the issue, all I have for certain is my faith. There may be no God. But I choose to believe there is. In that sense, it is the belief itself that matters, even more than the object of belief.

I do believe God is both the mystery and the meaning. I do believe that the meaning God gives to life is universal, that every person can find significance in his life from God. And I do believe God gives each of us a purpose, a role to play in the story of human history, and a chance to make things better. I believe, and that is what makes the difference. My belief is illogical – based on the best observations I can make – but irrational nonetheless. So is yours.

You might think you are in a good place because you cling to God. Or because you trust scientific answers. Or because you were abducted by aliens and they told you that we are the result of intergalactic experiments. But my claim is that it’s not God, or science, or aliens that matter – it is your belief in them.

Despite that absurd claim (which is nothing more than a belief, mind you), I fully advocate talking about our beliefs, hearing those of other people, debating their validity, reasoning through the issues, and stepping back to see the biggest picture possible. Had I, just for a brief moment, circled the apple a mere 15 or 20 degrees, I probably would have seen that the other side did not look red, ripe, and delicious. It may have caused me to further investigate the claims of my students that I was wrong. I may have even joined them on the opposite side, seen from their perspective, realized there was more than meets the eye, been awakened to the possibility of mystery. It may have humbled me. In turn, it would have given me the opportunity to bring my students to my side of the apple, where they too would draw new conclusions.

I fully advocate looking for the biggest picture possible.

If there is the possibility something could be true, investigate it. If there is the possibility life is random, a complex collision of mere particles, that nothing lies behind the veil, go pull it back and see. If there is the possibility that God is as real as you and I, that he dwells in another dimension but our story is his to write, consider it. If there is the slightest chance that President Bush is an insufferable liar driven by personal vendettas with little regard for the consequences of his decisions on the poor, the environment, or the future of American foreign relations - check it out. (Hey, it’s my blog.)

White-knuckling your piece of the puzzle will only give you a sweaty, soggy, crumpled piece of cardboard. Do your best to see how it fits into the bigger picture.

Another song

2006-02-16T22:24:00.000-08:00

I've been writing a lot of songs lately! It's been awhile, but I'm starting to enjoy the craft again. This one just talks about what I'm going for, what I'm aiming at. It's the first upbeat tune in awhile - guess that's a good thing!

Song for a new day
When we wake in new ways
The sunrise, a surprise
Oh, it's burning in our eyes
Sing when they see us
They cannot believe us
Voices together
We all hope for something better
The kingdom is come...

And it's love
And it's love
And it's love
And it's love

Song for the kingdom
For justice, we need some
Peace in the war zone
Oh, we need it in our homes
Sing out, unashamed
Stand up, unafraid
It's our voice, it's our song
This is where the world belongs
The kingdom is come...

(chorus)

Song for the pieces,
The puzzle, we need this
Song to remind us
All those moments are behind us...

What Matters

2006-02-16T12:31:00.000-08:00

Something matters when you give it significance.

www.mochaclub.org/join/217

www.invisiblechildren.com

"Lay It Down" - new song lyrics

2006-01-23T22:06:00.000-08:00

I've been writing this song for a few weeks. I had the first two stanzas written, and they really spoke to how I feel about war and hostile attitudes and then cynicism and complaining about the state of things. I feel like neither of these approaches solve much, and do not address the real needs of our hearts. I was stuck for some time on how to end it, until attending church on Sunday morning. I realized that I feel the same way about the modern church that I feel about war and our unending capacity to whine: so often our methods miss the point. It takes a bit of idealism, but I'm told that hope does not disappoint - and I believe that's the truth. The last stanza revealed itself as I sat on the sand at Solana Beach Sunday afternoon.

Soldier, put down your rifle
Lay it on down
Soldier, there's a life at stake today
Right here in the middle of the battle
Lay it on down
Soldier, I say there's a better way

If you come, drop your arms

Well, I swear I mean you no harm

So turn around

Let's go down to where the sidelines are

Cynic, put down your pencil
Lay it on down
Cynic, we're running out of time
Page on page of endless drivel
Lay it on down
Cynic, there's a better chance to find

An empty page, a brand new start
Well it's really not very hard
So turn around
Let's go down to where the margins are

Preacher, put down your Bible
Lay it on down
Preacher, what we need is more than words
We know what the Good Book tells us
Lay it on down
Preacher, can you show me how it works?

If you have a hope to give
Well, I need to see it lived
So turn around
Let's go down to where the lepers are

Addendum

2006-01-09T23:01:00.000-08:00

To be found, though, does not end the pursuit. By saying I don't know, I am inviting, I am daring the mystery. This blog is intended to reconsider inherited suppositions. I have a feeling it's only the first of many. And I am confident that with each stone unturned, another waits on the horizon.

Blogger's Log: Stardate 1.9.06

2006-01-09T21:47:00.000-08:00

A folk singer named Jan Krist sat down and asked herself:

What do I know?
What do I really know?
I know:
1) Mercy will find you.
2) Unforgivness will bind you.
3) Children grow, and it's hard to let them go.

I'm not a parent; I can't really speak for her third conclusion (though I know my own mother has struggled seeing myself and my siblings grow and leave). As for the other two absolutes, I feel I can attest to their accuracy. It is a strange but welcome relief that mercy, or the giver of it, finds us. Not forsaken; we hid. Not lost; we sequestered ourselves. Not forgotten; we were found.

Ms. Krist's purpose, obviously, is not to enumerate the precious few truths she can speak with surety, but rather to hint at the mystery not included in her list. I was re-reading some previous entries here, and realized I mentioned the mysteries of life more than once. For several months, I've been pursuing answers and reasoning through my doubt and suspicions, looking for something concrete: What do I know? What do I really know?

Little did I know. Little did I know how essential it is not to know. The necessity of mystery, it's pivotal role in providing hope, inspiration, motivation to continue on through the bleakest of droughts. I think (because we are all now aware of my sci-fi obsession) of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the fictional Enterprise starship. Episode after episode, season after season, Picard and his crew piloted through galaxies harboring the unknown. No amount of knowledge they could amass was sufficient; there could not plot enough maps, could not encounter enough new species. Every stone unturned left open wide the door for the next adventure, the next unanswered question.

I've been so obsessed with answering the inconsistencies of my faith that for a long time, I've found little reason to hope, little chance to dream, little motivation to overturn the next stone. Little pleasure from the pursuit.

Thank God, literally, for number one on Jan's list. When all the fun was gone, all the mystery deconstructed, I hid among pieces of disassembled framework that once composed my worldview, my "metanarrative," as the postmoderns might call it. I hid away, because I had stared into that abyss and seen the bottom; the pit was shallow and devoid of meaning. But in that moment of actualization of my greatest fears, mercy found me. I wasn't even crying out because who was there to cry to? But mercy, separating me from what I surely deserve, found me amid all the rubble of dead and dying dreams. It lifted my eyes, illumined my periphery, where sat ensconced in the darkness, an unturned stone. And the mystery returned, painfully pulsing like fresh blood through long-closed veins, spurring movement, inspiring hope, rekindling the pleasure of pursuit.

God is the mystery; he is the chase. Be wary of anyone who peddles a well-defined portait of divinity, a deconstructed diety. Be suspicious of any who lobby for their agenda in the name of religion, or who claim God's sanctions on thier morality. It's not that there is no religion, or that there is no morality; it's that those things are, very emphatically, not the point. Were a human's highest calling to be "correct" or to fit a moral mold, there would be very little use for choice, opportunity, decision, time, pain, pleasure, communication, relationship, emotion, touch, taste, sight, birth, growth, death, sex, language, hope, despair - the entire nature of the human experience would be something altogether different. The originator of these great mysterious human capacities has in mind something far more significant even than every good Christian's highest hope of heaven. I don't know what it is (hence, mystery). I don't know when we find it (or when it finds us). I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.

(I don't know.)

The B-I-B-L-E

2006-01-04T18:10:00.000-08:00

The following is an excerpt from an email I sent to a friend that details some of my current thought regarding Christianity's sacred book.

Basically, I’ve been taking a long, hard look at my faith and I’ve decided that it’s an inherited faith, full of suppositions given to me by the environment in which I grew up, based on an extremely narrow view and a giant bias. The “answers” to hard questions I’d been given, and have been giving, are really the shoddiest sort of justification for the Christian faith that I think could be constructed. I no longer believe the Bible is an actual manuscript dictated by God and preserved through all the generations in its pure form – the whole “inerrant, inspired Word of God” creed. I actually think it was really naïve of me to believe that – there is so much evidence showcasing the biases with which different authors wrote, plenty of documented translation errors, the councils of people who took a popular vote on which books and letters (among hundreds) would become canon, and studies showing how much of the Bible is folklore and myth – how even the creation story is probably a Hebraic retelling of the Babylonian ‘Enuma Elish’ tale detailing the origins of the world.

That’s not to say that I no longer put stock in the Bible. I had a professor in college who taught that the Bible is “true to its genre,” meaning that the Psalms are valuable for their aesthetic, poetical insight, the law defines the values of the culture in that time, the epistles chronicle the birth and growth of a fledgling faith in Roman society, etc. I believe the Bible is the human narrative of God’s story. To me, that means the authors wrote about what mattered to them, their interpretation of God’s work in their lives, and those stories are framed by their own beliefs and biases. Just as we have shelves and shelves of Christian books today in which authors derive meaning from history and experience, but do it through the use of their own faculties and base it on a deep-rooted belief system, I believe that the stories that were passed down and retold and rewritten through the generations inevitably harbor their authors’ slant.

I don’t think that taking this perspective has to diminish the wonder and awesomeness of God. I base it on how I experience God today. God is not a dam-builder who, as a rule, constantly dictates where a stream will flow. He is certainly involved and interested in the movement of things on this planet, and I feel cares a great deal about what goes on in individual lives. But though I’ve known God to influence (even to points of pain & brokenness), I do not know a God who uses irrevocable curses or controls the hearts of people like a puppeteer. I simply do not think it is in his character to mandate a book that perfectly represents his nature to us. The Bible tells many of the innumerable facets of God’s character, but it still asks that we seek, in order to find. The pleasure of God is to be pursued willingly by us, and to see us earnestly striving to exhibit the holiness of his nature in our lives. In a world where everything is boiled down to numbers, where reduction rules, God is the last great mystery. We need that in our lives – mystery makes it meaningful.

The Big Squeeze (part 2)

2006-01-04T17:53:00.000-08:00

It’s funny how as children we are often possessed by very physical fears. Even though their manifestations may not be real, things like the boogeyman and monsters under the bed are, in the minds of children, fully animate, physically embodied manifestations. As we grow out of those, they are replaced by the metaphysical and emotional fears that often dictate our actions. Fear of failure, or of never finding love – these things are not incarnated by slimy blobs or little green men, but they have no less of an effect on our psyches and habits.

My fear of a doctor squishing the life out of my manhood was the physical manifestation of youth. Today it is far better explained as the intangible anxiety over my status as a working adult. You’re born, you work, you die.

Among the greatest of my fears is that almost inescapable malaise that plagues those of us who succumb to the deadness of corporate America. We encounter hardship in career and finances and somehow find ourselves stuck in a job that was never even a remote part of our dream, but is still a necessity. Something to pay the bills. My fear is that I will continue to fall deeper into the “American dream” mindset where career becomes the pursuit of every waking moment, or at least the means to an end that somehow justifies the slaying of soul in the process. Passions that meant everything in the idealism of youth are slowly bled to death.

And that is the goal of corporate America, of government, of institution and advertisers, of authority and the establishment. “The man,” as it were. Streamline processes, file documents, avoid legal entanglements, and above all, NEVER factor in emotion. Like a doctor who won’t allow a penis to grow at its own rate, “the MAN” squeezes our figurative testicles until we lose the will to fight anymore, until we’re, in a sense, emasculated, genderless (passionless) drones who work because it is the only perceived choice, who spend money because there’s nothing else to do with it, and who are, essentially, dead men walking.

This post brought to you courtesy of Wachovia Corporation, on whose timeclock it was written. The author has devoted over three years of his life as a dutiful servant of said company. Upon requesting a recommendation from his managers (who are reportedly very pleased with his service and will do “anything” they can to help him in his future endeavors), they subversively reiterated company policy that states “managers are prohibited from providing references to outside employers.” What’s three years of work history worth to you?

The Big Squeeze (part 1)

2005-12-29T15:54:00.000-08:00

The following is not just a random memory of mine. Ok, it is. But I wrote it down (at work, where else) for a reason, and I promise I will get to that reason in a soon-to-come post. But I thought I'd go ahead and share the story now 'cause it makes me laugh, and you might too.

I was thirteen years old when I first became aware of how important my testicles are. My mother, the French teacher, had taken several of her students to Grenoble for the summer, and as a result, my sister, brother, and I were on our own holiday at my uncle’s farm in Minnesota. He and my aunt had six children, and Aaron, who was the oldest, was closest to my age, so we were naturally partners in crime for the summer. We shared a bunk bed in his room upstairs.

One night after my aunt had sent us to bed and turned out the light, we began talking about things that mattered to us. Being adolescent boys, the conversation turned inevitably to the concerns of puberty; namely, the size of our packages. I confessed that though my body had begun to manifest its awkward transition into manhood in other ways, the highly-anticipated growth of my member was still forthcoming. As soon as I said this, Aaron’s tone became grave and cautionary.

“Have you had a check-up lately?” he asked. I hadn’t.

“Do you know what they do to you if you haven’t started growing by now?” His Midwestern accent was masked by the ominous whisper in which he was now speaking.

“When the doctor sees that you’re not growing, he makes you lie down on the bench. Then he ties your hands and your feet down so you can’t move, the same way they tie down the women when they’re having babies. Then he takes your balls, one in each hand. He puts them between his thumb and forefinger and starts to squeeze. He starts gently, so you can’t really tell, but soon he starts to use more pressure. He squeezes harder and harder and until he’s squeezed out all of stuff in there that’s supposed to make it bigger, and all that’s left are two flat, empty sacks. It’s the worst pain you can imagine.”

My cousin had never given me reason to distrust him, and so it was with a paralyzing sense of dread that I clasped both hands onto my groin, and kept them there for the rest of the night.

Where are we going?

2005-12-14T18:58:00.000-08:00

From my day @ the lake - a much needed respite.

"Alright" - new song lyrics

2005-12-14T18:51:00.000-08:00

She said, "It's strange and yet it's common sense
There's no telling what it really meant
Often it's the mystery that shows us who we are
Even more than comprehension can

Things will always break, but listen:
It's not your burden to rush in and fix 'em"
I said, "You know it's not my style to let the story just unfold"
She said, "You don't know what you're missing"

Where you're from is very far
But it's not lost, it's where you are

Alright, alright
There's a little bit of magic in the air tonight
Alright, alright

She said, "I know that it's nothing small -
You went and made it on your own resolve
But I want you to know it's who you are that makes me proud
And nothing that you've done at all

I know there's no stopping you
If you're sure it's what you want to do"
I said, "8 out of 10 never find what they're looking for"
She said, "Baby, we must be the other 2"

Let's walk in stride, let's take our time
I believe we will be...

Alright, alright
There's a little bit of magic in the air tonight
Alright, alright
Alright, alright
I won't be afraid if you're by my side
Alright, that's alright

Something to believe in

2005-12-05T22:27:00.000-08:00

This was a full, but relaxing, weekend. It was a vacation of sorts, a chance to get out of my typical setting and into a hot tub up on the mountain, watch lots of movies, and read a little.

One of the most poignant moments for me came while watching sci-fi, of all things. I’m a somewhat rabid alien takeover & government conspiracy fan, and so when a friend found out I had not yet seen Spielberg’s Taken, she all but insisted that I watch the series. So I found it at Blockbuster and she was right – it’s a fantastic story with tons of engaging characters; though what really drew me in was the insightful narration written for Dakoda Fanning.

At the end of the second episode, she says:

People will believe what they want to believe. They find meaning where they can, and they cling to it. In the end, it doesn’t really matter what’s a trick and what’s true. What matters is that people believe.

This idea is so important to me right now. My whole life, I’ve been submerged in an environment where discerning between tricks and truth is of ultimate consequence. People I know say belief by itself is nothing (Even the demons believe in God); it is not useful, it has no significance, and it is deceptive. Believing in truth is what matters, and there is only one truth, one way, and if you don’t find it, God help you.

But isn’t it true that we all strive for meaning? What makes one person’s search more successful than another’s? How does one guy find the way when his friend, with a longing as intense and a goal as noble, misses the mark? What of the countless people who have never heard the name ‘Jesus,’ and never will? Are they faulted for not knowing “the way” when God has provided them with no signs or direction?

Maybe the jewel doesn’t lie in a creed or a code. I know hosts of Christians who stake their lives (both physical & eternal) on their acknowledgement of a transcendent set of rules or a written statement of what they believe. The problems I encounter are the irreconcilable disparities between who God is supposed to be (according to his own claims) and the state of things in his universe.
So do you throw out the whole notion of God? Is the only option disbelief?

What if God isn’t necessarily the point? I cringe even asking the question, because I know the horrified look my grandfather would have on his face if he heard it, but it’s worth asking. What if belief is not so much a means, but more of an end itself? When it comes down to it, there will always be an unanswerable question, a doubt, a conflicting creed; nothing is solid, nothing is certain. There always has to be faith to fill in the holes, and what if that faith itself if the thing that gives meaning to life and allows for peace in chaos?

Faith is what we use to explain things, but when we sit down and try to explain faith, we end up with all of the conflict that makes it so hard to believe the things we’re trying to explain in the first place. There has to be something in this world that is mysterious, something unknown. Some things can’t be captured with reason or science or a creed. Whether it’s God or karma or reincarnation or extraterrestrials, or perhaps simply the act of believing, you have to ultimately put stock in something you can’t adequately vindicate.

I’ve always believed it was God, and that has left me lost because who really knows what God is like?

I’ve always believed it was God, yet never been able to reconcile my circumstances and struggles to his promises.

I’ve always believed it was God.

More importantly, I’ve always believed.

"I didn't even get a chance to shoot my rifle"

2005-12-01T16:46:00.000-08:00

Last night I blew off the gym (since the holidays are a great time to do that) and went to the movies. I saw Jarhead, pretty much the most depressing film I’ve seen since The Perfect Storm. If you haven’t seen it and want to, you might skip this blog, as there are potential spoilers ahead.

The story is about a group of guys overloaded with potential who enlist in the Marines just before Operation Desert Shield/Storm. You watch them in all their best and worst moments and see the inevitable, devastating effects of their interminable wait in the desert. They are slowly sucked down a vortex of unfulfilled hopes & dreams – lost girlfriends, missed opportunities, forfeited careers. When their moment of glory comes, they are denied even the chance to excel in the war they’re fighting – they’ve become outdated, unnecessary.

After it was over, I was left with such a sense of futility, an insurmountable malaise. I’m pretty sure the intent was to make us feel the futility and waste of war, but for me it became commentary on the whole of life.

I walked out of the theatre, where it had begun to rain, and shuffled my way toward the river. An enormous Christmas tree had been erected, accessorized with the hues of hundreds of lights. I kept walking.

Behind an Italian restaurant, there were three homeless folks, two men and a woman, taking shelter beneath the awning. They were loudly discussing the troubles plaguing our city, and the woman wished me a happy evening. I waved and kept walking.

I crossed the bridged and stared at the swelling rapids beneath me, carrying water from one of the purest lakes in the world through the dirty city channels, an endless procession of tumbles and torrents, moving on because it had to go where gravity & earth dictated. I pulled on my hood and kept walking.

After crossing through a park closed for the winter, I ended up at a beautiful Methodist church, among the oldest in our city. It’s a small stone building with a courtyard in the middle. At the threshold was a sign declaring a downtown-centered ministry that reaches the whole world. There were vines climbing its rough walls, and stairs leading into dark corridors, littered with trash.

I’m sure hundreds of stories have been told in that church. Weddings and funerals, potlucks, communions, parents pulling unruly children out of the service – everything you’d expect and probably much you wouldn’t. Stories have been written at the Christmas tree, too, and under the awning by the river, and in the park across the bridge.

The thing is, I really believe in stories. I mean that they affect me deeply. When I watch Tom Hanks talking to Wilson the volleyball, hear Paul Simon sing about the boxer who cries, “I am leaving, I am leaving, but the fighter still remains,” or read Francis Marion Tarwater’s fiery revelation in the fields of the south, I connect with those people. I feel like a friend on the barstool next to them, a member of their fellowship, a long-lost sibling reunited with his brother. I feel like their story matters, and somehow that makes my search, my journey worthwhile.

The question has been posed so many times: why do we yearn for more if there’s nothing to be found? One of my favorite songwriters, Carolyn Arends, wrote:

At times it seems a tragic fate
Living with this quiet ache
The constant strain for what remains
Just out of reach

Why did the “jarheads” end up hollow people haunted by visions from their past? When everything was taken from them – dignity, true companionship, dreams – they got to the center of things, they stared into the abyss, so to speak, and saw the bottom. To me, that prospect is far more terrifying than staring into a pit that never seems to end. When you see the bottom, you know there is nothing more, and all of the mystery of life, the search, the yearning, and the journey – it’s all futile.

Standing in the courtyard of that church last night, I was gripped by that fear. What if those ancient stones, the stained glass, the bell in the tower, what if they are just part of a shell, just a thin cover over a very shallow pit? And what if the stories told there are no more than fleeting, vain attempts by humans reaching hard for something to validate our existence? What if nothing lies behind the veil?

It’s ironic that only 8 months ago I walked those same streets in a completely different mode. I was with 3 friends, and we were praying out loud as we moved, and everything was beautiful. The world was full of potential, God was writing a story for us, calling us to be builders in his kingdom, there was adventure and mystery and a hope that seemed unshakeable.

So much has changed since that night.

Ironic moment of the day...

2005-11-29T15:02:00.000-08:00

As I was writing the previous entry, a co-worker came up and asked us at the front desk, “How’s everyone doing today? Happy? Healthy? Spiritually satisfied?”

If God does exist, at least he has a sense of humor.

The moon is evil

2005-11-29T14:51:00.000-08:00

How do you undo 23 years of thinking? How do you crawl out from underneath that thumb?

I’m sitting here at work and people are discussing the new Chronicles of Narnia film that’s coming out next month. They’re throwing around all sorts of erroneous information about Lewis & Tolkien – “Apparently, it’s a series. There’s like 3 or 4 books.” – and my instinctual, jump-the-gun reaction is to correct them with my extensive* knowledge of the subject. (*extensive = I’m a Christian, so naturally I know more about Lewis than you do.)

Do you see how pervasive this mindset can be? How easily I have been deceived into thinking there was no need for second guessing?

This morning as I drove toward the freeway, I caught an awesome glimpse of the moon. Just an orange sliver, hanging timorously above black silhouettes of faceless mountains. It was strikingly reminiscent of an incident from nearly two years ago, on the other side of town. I had just moved to the area and had hooked up with a guys’ group that discussed faith and the Bible and how to best hide sinful erections. After leaving the discussion, I was elated because I felt like this would become my core group of friends, something I had a great shortage of at the time. I was listening to worship music and driving down a sharp hill in the rain, singing along of course, when I looked to my left and saw an oversized, bright yellow full moon. It was beautiful, and I began to pray and thank God for such an awesome symbol of his love.

When I looked back onto the road, I had a bit of a start. I was about to veer off the road entirely, so, naturally, I freaked out and overcompensated by swerving hard to the left. The effect in the rain was not so good. I ended up doing a 180 at about 55 mph and backing into a sandy hill, only meters away from a guard rail and steep drop off into a canyon. There wasn’t too much damage – a few scratches and a blown tire – but someone did see the accident and called 911. Get this: after explaining to the officer that I had only glanced away for mere seconds to view the moon and lost control of my car, he issued me a ticket for failure to maintain a lane. Is that even a legitimate traffic violation? I mean it’s not like I damaged anything except for my car and my ego!

Anyway, at the time I remember being both bitter that my non-accident ended up costing me several hundred dollars (it didn’t help that I later forgot about the ticket and missed my court date), and also relieved that things didn’t turn out much worse, which they certainly could have. I attributed the accident to demonic forces – yes, I was that kind of Christian – and thanked God for sparing me.

It’s a perfect example of how a worldview so heavily influences one’s response to circumstances. Put twenty different people in that same situation, and I’m sure you’d have 20 different interpretations on why it happened, or whether it even matters that there be a reason for it.

This is strange territory I’m entering. For some time now, I haven’t felt right praying, because I no longer feel confident in who I’m praying to, or that he (or she, it) even hears or answers prayer. But I still find myself whispering thoughts into the air as though words exist in a separate dimension where they have the power to influence my present reality.

There is a certain safety in playing the game of Christianity – the security of always having a reason, an answer, a God to boss around with prayers. But the answers are still vapid, the satisfaction empty. Somehow, I have to press on, thinking outside of the parameters of modern Christian faith.

Ultimately, the whole car accident was just a headache-inducing fiasco. I’m still not sure what to make of it… though at least one good thing came of it. I no longer steal prolonged glimpses at the moon when the result might be my death. Or a damn ticket.

2005-11-28T16:50:00.000-08:00

Question the sky

The Second Guess

2005-11-28T16:21:00.000-08:00

For 23 years I’ve lived under one significant assumption. It has been the benchmark of my experience as a human being; it has colored every aspect of my existence. Nothing, no piece of information, no circumstance, no setting, passes through my lens without being scrutinized by the eye of faith – a very specific faith, one that holds true and literal all stories and teachings in the Bible, one that relies on a creator in three persons but who is one being, one that supposedly “rests” on promises made by a man, Jesus, and his followers two millennia ago.

This belief is so all-encompassing that it delineates who I am in reference to the rest of the people around me; in fact, the rest of the world. Essentially, I’m “in” – eternally secure, saved, sanctified, bought with the blood. Anyone who does not believe as I do is not “in.” This is how I was brought up to view the world. Two sides, two warring parties, one victor and one defeated rebel – and I am nestled happily with the flock inside the narrow gate.

Who would even begin to question this philosophy if it’s what you’ve known since you were able to register memory? As a member of the Christian faith, everything is for you, God himself cares for you and knows you personally, mysterious cosmic forces are orchestrating a beautiful destiny for you specifically. This faith has an answer for everything, from rainbows to rock strata to why snakes have no legs. Even seemingly inexplicable realities such as pain, devastation, and suffering are easily thwarted as pastors and preachers construe meaning for every heartache from principles taught in Scripture.

When you’re a Christian, it’s so easy to be right, and the best part is: you never have to second guess.

I’m so fed up with easy answers. Throughout the course of my short life, I continually find myself at breaking points where I realize how my narrow, insular worldview has made me numb and indifferent to the reality of what’s going on around me. Time after time I find myself broken and having to acknowledge my prejudices and vices, harmful attitudes and presuppositions that are the source of that dividing wall of hostility between me and those who don’t adopt my beliefs. And with every moment of epiphany I become further frustrated with the so-called “easy answers,” mainly because I find that they in no way live up to their namesake.

There is no easy answer. Every presupposition from my youth has been a very poor disguise to make palatable the bitterness that pervades my chaotic existence. Not having to question my basis for belief led me to dark, dark places and has ultimately left me dissatisfied and angry with, and mostly hurt by, a God who, if he exists, cannot possibly be what I’ve assumed him to be.

For some time now I’ve felt lost – sometimes drifting, sometimes vehemently opposed to everything I’ve built my life around, sometimes desperately in need of grace (from God or man, I don’t know which), and sometimes clinging with every last hope within me to the fragments of faith that remain. Why I’m here, why I am writing this, is because I have to uncover the missing pieces; I have to go behind the veil that obscures the meaning in this world. Life is not random or coincidental – I am sure of this. Too much evidence says otherwise. As long as I can reason, emote, and feel, I have to pursue meaning. The choices I make depend profoundly on what I believe about why I am here. I don’t know where I’m going on this journey, but here I am losing the presupposition and bias that has so colored my worldview. Faith is what is it is – a perspective-shaping belief that one cannot prove – but the kind of faith I’ve known up to this point is simply insufficient. It does not answer the questions I need answered.

This is my second guess at what life is all about.