Pencils and Pixels

Reality Is No Longer Real

2006-11-22T16:01:00.000-05:00

Every time I turn on the TV, it seems like a new "reality" show is about to come out, and America is eating it up. But what is it that we are learning from these shows? Or, what can be said about us and our fascination with them?

When CBS first announced the running of its now-classic television show Survivor (how many years has it been now?), I was excited. I had gone through some survival training, and I had read a lot on the subject and on the outdoors in general. So, I was there in front of my TV the night the show premiered, bowl of popcorn in one hand, glass of iced tea in the other. But while I sat through the first of many episodes that season, I realized that what the network had been touting as “Reality TV” was, in fact, very unreal. Survivor was not about real people trying to actually survive under overwhelming conditions, as a true survival situation would be. It was just all a big game show, the grand prize being one million dollars.

The most unrealistic thing about it was not the silly competitions between those on the show or the junk food they won as prizes. What was so ridiculous was that at any time, if a contestant felt like they could no longer go on, they could leave the island, the situation, and the other people involved. They could just get on a helicopter and zoom off to a resort, where they traded in their filth and hunger for a hot shower and a pair of shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, sipping drinks with little umbrellas in them. (Of course the dropouts were “stuck” there until the end of the season.) “That’s not so bad,” the viewer thought. “If they don’t get the money, at least they get a nice vacation out of it.” However, with all the morning talk shows, evening news programs, magazine articles, and water cooler conversations, those who quit, as well as those who plainly failed, received more than a vacation. They received worship.

“You can tell a lot about a man by…” By what? His clothes or his car? By where he dines or plays golf? By who he rubs elbows with at parties?

By what television shows he watches?

Sadly, these are the ways most Americans would answer when posed this question. But it is no different than it ever has been. Our identity comes from that which we worship. Mankind has only changed gods... again.

America is not a Christian nation (and I suspect it never was), but a nation of millions of individualists, all worshipping themselves and each other. The followers of this faith hold to certain unvalues... Mistrust of others for no reason. Self-reliance with an accompanying insecurity. Indifference to those in need while complaining about the state of the world. Busyness without the enjoyment of a job well-done. Sexual perversion without true gratification. An unyielding pursuit of wealth that ultimately produces nothing yet consumes everything. Competition with no real winners. Assertiveness over those who cannot resist. A lack of any kind of resolve (except to get your own way). And a strange mix of extravagance and greed.

They are told through popular culture and its media that if they practice these unwritten commandments, they will find all that they are searching for. At the same time and through the same media, the public is learning exactly what it is they should be searching for—more and better. You need more than you have, and it should be better than your neighbor’s.

Survivor and shows like it (reality or otherwise) are the prophets of the religion of the American Dream. Along with magazines, radio, and the internet, they are the mouthpieces of the 300 million American gods. They teach us that life is all a game, that if you cheat, steal, or just quit, you’ll still get just as much out of it as the other person. If things don’t turn out the way you planned or if you hurt someone along the way, it’s okay, because everyone will forget about it next season.

We have some lovely parting gifts for you.

Christian Tradition Selector

2006-11-14T08:00:00.000-05:00

I took an online poll to test what Christian Tradition my faith best lined up with. Here are my results.

Percent

Rank

Item

(100%) 1: Anabaptist (Mennonite/Quaker etc.)

(86%) 2: Lutheran

(77%) 3: Baptist (non-Calvinistic)/Plymouth Brethren/Fundamentalist

(73%) 4: Anglican/Episcopal/Church of England

(70%) 5: Eastern Orthodox

(68%) 6: Church of Christ/Campbellite

(66%) 7: Pentecostal/Charismatic/Assemblies of God

(61%) 8: Congregational/United Church of Christ

(60%) 9: Baptist (Reformed/Particular/Calvinistic)

(58%) 10: Seventh-Day Adventist

(54%) 11: Presbyterian/Reformed

(50%) 12: Roman Catholic

(49%) 13: Methodist/Wesleyan/Nazarene

This poll is far from perfect. I found questions #3 and #9 lacking in choices. Question 3 should have an option for those of us who are open theists and don't necessarily believe in any type of predestination or divine foreknowledge. Number 9 gives no choice for us simple church (house church) folks out there.

I'm not surprised at my #1 result. I love Anabaptist theology and practice. Want to take the survey yourself? CLICK HERE It's for fun...

This Machine Surrounds Hate and Forces it to Surrender

2006-11-09T10:33:00.000-05:00

This is a photo by Annie Leibovitz from her collection American Music. To see the whole exhibit online, CLICK HERE. I highly recommend it. Thanks, Abby, for pointing me in this direction.

Some Thoughts on Vocation as Sacrament

2006-10-30T15:15:00.000-05:00

An essay on work, career, and calling. Can work be a sacrament as much as baptism or communion?

Prologue: An Evangelical Baptism

Two more to go and then it’s my turn. I am standing at the top of a set of stairs that lead down into a large, rectangular bathtub. God, I can’t believe I’m doing this. The man in front of me is walking toward the preacher… down the stairs… into the water. I wonder if it’s cold. On the other side of the pool is another set of stairs… the women go down into the water and come out on a different side than the men. That lady is wearing a white blouse… someone should have told her not to wear white. The preacher is asking the man if he renounces Satan. The lady with the white blouse is next… she looks nervous. The man in the water folds his arms across his chest… the preacher invokes the three names of God. That guy didn’t bring a towel or a change of clothes or anything… his car is going to smell in the morning. The man comes up out of the water with his hands raised above his head… The church says hallelujah!

The lady in the white blouse is gone. One of the older ladies must have brought her a different shirt to wear… God, I’m next. I am stepping down toward the preacher. He’s still wearing his tie and belt. The water is up to the middle of my chest… he said it would be lukewarm. It feels wrong… I wish it were warm… or cold. My hands are folded across my chest… like a corpse. Dead to sin and alive in Christ, the preacher is saying. He is pushing me down below the water and holding me there. I can’t breathe. The preacher is looking down at me through the water. Dead to sin, he says… Dead… dead. I stop struggling… he is finally pulling me up… I am gasping… heaving in mouthfuls of air.

Oh God… I’m alive… I am alive in Christ.

* * * * *

Our faith is a sensual one. There is no denying that Christ came to redeem every part of us, including our bodies. But it is not just our bodies; rather it is not just humans who need redeeming in the physical realm. The whole earth fell into a sub-standard relationship to the Spirit of God when Man and Woman rejected their Maker. Since that time, the world has been waiting. From the peaks of the Himalayas to the red clay trails of Southern Appalachia, from the slowly-melting glaciers of Canada to the mighty Amazon River, all of creation is waiting for redemption, for a chance to become again what it was meant to be—a perfect instrument of God’s power and grace.

Out of this realization come a few thoughts. First, the entire earth is valuable to the Trinity, so much so that they would plot to rescue it all through becoming and living as one of their own creation, later allowing one of their own members to be tortured and murdered, amounting to little more than suicide. Second, seeing that so much worth is placed not only in humans but in the entire earth and all that was/is/will be in it, it is right for humans to view not only themselves as temples of the Spirit but to see everything in the world that way. Third, in light of this triangular connection between God, humans, and other created things, it behooves the human race, especially those who are redeemed through following Jesus, to recognize the sacred in everything around them.

Traditionally, those in the Christian religion have held to a limited number of sacraments, which could be defined as physical representations through which the Grace of God is received by the participant. In other words, a sacrament is something tangible—something seen, felt, heard, smelled, or tasted—that brings a real and true sense of the grace of the Kingdom of God into the hearts and minds of those partaking of the sacrament. The sacraments include things like baptism (originally, immersion in water as a public sign of repentance, or changing one’s mind) and the Lord’s Supper (or “Love Feast,” which was, historically, a meal shared regularly among the followers of Jesus wherein the poor were fed and the life and death of Jesus were celebrated), and they are generally believed to have been established by Christ himself or the Apostles.

There has been and continues to be much debate over what is sacramental and what each sacrament accomplishes. One thing is agreed upon, however, by all of the major Christian denominations; the sacraments help to make accessible the concept of a transcendent God—the very idea of which cannot be fully grasped in this life. They give substance to our faith, hope, and love.

In the prologue, I attempted to give a sensual, “stream of consciousness” account of an Evangelical baptism, one not necessarily typical, but nevertheless not very much different from my own second baptism, which took place in my mid-twenties after I came to a conscious, saving knowledge of Jesus for the first time. The speaker in the prologue knows that he is about to begin the rite of Christian baptism, but he does not become fully aware of the gravity, the heaviness of his situation until he finds himself quite literally in over his head. This also helps to show the genuine potency that a sacrament can wield in the life of one receiving the Divine Grace (another term for sacrament). The speaker will remember his experience precisely because it was sensual, and very much so, considering the inward conflict and revelation that went on during his immersion.

The sensual element of the sacrament of vocation and calling is similar to the sensuality of the familiar sacraments of the Church. “Work” is a physical thing, no matter what type of job, career, or calling a person devotes their life to. In the same manner, the Holy Sacraments all include some type of physical substance or action through which the Grace of God is said to be administered. Let us again use the example of baptism to explore the similarity between the traditional sacraments and the sacrament of vocation and calling.

Baptism of the evangelical variety uses complete immersion in water to symbolize death and resurrection in Christ, a washing away of sin, and the believer’s immersion into the Church and the Spirit of God. This is an important first step toward maturity and adulthood in Christ. Similarly, an important first step in life occurs within the context of vocation. During the time most teenagers take their first job—perhaps as a grocery store clerk while in high school or delivering pizzas while in college—they begin to slowly step down into the water of vocation and begin to feel it against their skin, begin to sense the reality of what they are headed toward.

Understandably, this place and time of life is full of questions and doubts, not so much about whether one should commit to the experience of plunging oneself into the water, but about what to do once the air is breathed again, after the audience claps, after each one is alone and at home with only a little water left in the ears. We need not try to answer those questions on our own, however. Those aspiring to live a life like that of Christ will be necessarily led by the Spirit if they are to be successful. In the matter of vocation, it is the Spirit of God that leads us into that wet pool and holds us close as it pushes us down into an element that seems as unnatural as water.

“What am I headed toward, and do I have what it takes?” This is a question on the minds of a wide range of people, from kindergarteners to college students. It is questions like these that drive each generation to achieve successively higher and higher levels of education and personal experience. Those among the new generation who follow Christ are finding Liberal Arts learning, global travel, and service-oriented careers to be a means to the ultimate end of preaching the gospel to the entire world and becoming all things to all men so that each might win a few on their mission field—not only the harvest of souls in the two-thirds world, but the much-needed rescue of those who live a life of drudgery and resentment in cubicles and suburbs.

Like baptism, however, the ultimate effects of the sacrament of vocation cannot begin to be understood until one is fully immersed and held in a state of suspension, held in a place outside of total control. It is here that one can learn to “let go” and fully trust the God who is giving out the Divine Grace. Once a follower of Christ surrenders not only their “heart,” but their whole life, including their vocation, the Spirit of God will begin to use that person’s calling and vocation as a means of sanctification. The Spirit will be at liberty to produce the fruit of holiness in a person’s life in a way that is unique to the setting of work: through daily interaction with others, including many non-believers, and the inevitable conflicts that will arise from those relationships; through the cultivation of personal integrity and ethics, which shine brightest when no one is watching; and through the discipline that comes from working in everyday faithfulness to God, ourselves, and others. In this way, the grace of God can do a wonderful work in us, a work that shows that vocation is a sacrament.

It may even be said that the sacrament of vocation precedes all of the others, because it was through vocation—through a called unto work—that the Lord first revealed himself to Mankind. In the second chapter of Genesis, we are given an account:

Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed… The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

(Genesis 2:7-8, 15; TNIV)

Adam was planted in Eden, a place that God had made before “he formed [Adam] from the dust of the ground.” He put him in this perfect place and set before him a perfect work, one which God had planned out as carefully and as meticulously as the creation of Mankind.

I have often heard “Heaven” (or “Paradise” or whatever a Christian might call the afterlife) described as an endless symphony of praise, an incorporeal chorus of eternal singing and dancing and falling face-down at the throne of the Almighty. It is said by these same folks that once we see the face of God, we will be forever mesmerized by his glory, incapacitated at the sight of his previously-unseen face. This may seem an admirable intention on the part of those holding to this view of “life after death,” but I suspect there will be much more to our resurrected existence than one, everlasting church service. A fresh eschatological perspective can come from even a brief reflection on “work” in Mankind’s pre-fall condition.

Genesis tells us that God made the first man, Adam, and put him to work taking care of the Garden of Eden. A popular misconception concerning Eve, the wife that God created for Adam, is that when God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone,” he was talking about loneliness or a lack of friendship. This could not be farther from the truth. Adam had God himself as a companion. Adam would often walk side-by-side with the literal, physical manifestation of God’s presence—in the garden, where Adam was working. Before there was ever a need for the redemption of Mankind, God bestowed on Adam, and later Eve, his Divine Grace through the sacrament of called-unto work.

After the Lord had finished making man and looked on everything he had made, he saw only one thing that was not “good,” and that was that Adam had no one to help him with his work in the Garden of Eden. "It is not good for the man to be alone,” God said. So he and Adam surveyed all of the animals the Lord had made to see if any of them would be a good helper for Adam. But they could not find a match for Adam; they could not find a living thing on earth that could share the calling that Adam had received. “I will make a helper suitable for him," God said. So he did. He made a woman named “Eve,” and brought her to the man. From then on, they shared the work; they shared he walks in the garden; they shared together the sacrament of their vocation. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.” (Genesis 2:24; TNIV)

This same sacrament that the first man and woman were so blessed to receive has also been made available to us. As followers of Jesus the Messiah, we believe that Christ came into this world to give all of us an abundant life, a life in which we live in a constant promise that we are redeemed—heart, soul, mind, and strength—both now and in the age to come. One day, this redemption will end, for it will be complete. We will no longer be full of sin, disease, and death. We will instead be full of the glory and presence of God. We will sing more beautifully than ever before; we will dance tirelessly for the pleasure of our savior; we will find delight in lying before the terrible and awe-inspiring power of his throne.

It is in this new-found holiness that we will finally understand the relationship that God intended to exist between himself and his creation from the beginning. We will be like Adam and Eve were, living in and with the manifest presence of God. It is then that, having been freshly reformed out of the “dust” of our own sin and death, God will place us in a new Garden, a “new heaven and a new earth,” as John tells us. He is preparing a new work for us to do in the age to come. Through this new work he will continue to bless and keep the sacrament that will survive all of the rest—the sacrament of vocation.

* * * * *

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

— Jesus (John 14:1-3; KJV)

If You Forward Something...

2006-10-22T08:25:00.000-05:00

If you send or forward me a link or a "story", and I actually watch or read it, I may end up writing about it on this blog. Here's an example...

If you send or forward me a link or a "story", and I actually watch or read it, I may end up writing about it on this blog. Here's an example...

Old friends I knew from back home in Florida (they're actually not in Florida any more, either) forwarded a link to my email address (and probably every other person in their address book :-). It was a link to an audio recording of children praying with an accompanying picture slide show.

If you would like to watch it now, CLICK HERE. It would be best to watch at least the first 2-3 minutes before you continue, or you can read my rant first...

Let me preface by saying that I believe in the power of the Holy Spirit. I believe that he works in the lives of all those who follow Jesus. And I believe that it is his right and ability to do things in our lives and our congregations that may be inexplicable. Let me also apologize to anyone that is reading this post that may not come from a pentecostal/charismatic or even Christian tradition, because I am not going to try and explain the theology or practice behind what is in this video. In other words, this is a message for all of you out there who know what I mean when I say the word "revival" in a church setting. If you are reading this and you would like to learn more about Jesus, email me and we'll talk. That being said, let me explain what disturbed me about this video.

First, it scares me to hear little children wailing and hyperventilating on the Internet or any other forum. It makes me think that their parents (or more likely, emotionally manipulative church leaders) have led them to believe that a person has to work themselves up into a lather in order for God to pay attention to them. This is just not true, and I feel like these children are being taken advantage of. When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, he prayed something along the lines of:

Father in Heaven, you and your name are holy. I will work to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to this earth and do what you want (instead of what I want). I trust that you will meet my needs for today. Forgive the debt I owe you, in the same way that I forgive others. And walk with me closely so that I will not sin; yes, keep me from evil altogether.

I don't think that Jesus had to do a cardiovascular workout before saying this prayer (Our FAH-huthuh... who art in HEAven-AH... HAH-lowed be... THY name-UH), and I don't think that God expects that out of us. Granted, there will be times when we will get emotional about that which we are praying. That is only natural. My point is that so much of what people call "prayer" in Charismatic circles is, if not in its content or motive, in a lot of ways, unnatural.

Now, before you go slinging some scripture at me out of context, stop and think for a moment about the life and message of Jesus. He is the one which we have to judge all of our theology and spirituality against.

The other thing that bugged me about this video was the "Pro-American" slant to some of the slides. I'll be more specific. If you watched the video, you may have noticed several pictures showing the American flag being burned. The image the editor of the video is trying to get across is that this is sinful behavior. So, let me go on record.

There is nothing wrong with burning the flag of the United States of America.

Wait... don't grab the old "Stars and Stripes" and your Zippo just yet. I am not saying that this is something you should start doing, but the flag is just a symbol of the government of man operating in the geographical boundaries currently occupied by the USA. Living where I live (East Tennessee), I could get mobbed for saying that in public. So, to be sure that I will be mobbed here in cyberspace, allow me to throw out a few more statements I believe to be true:

America is not a Christian nation, and it never has been.
There has never been a "Christian" nation at any time in history.
If there ever is a Christian nation, America will probably invade it.
God is not on "our side" in the war against Iraq, nor is he against the Iraqis. He loves the people in Iraq with the same fierce love that he loves you. You know I'm right.
God has never been on America's side in any war.
Saying, "God bless America" is idolatry, because you are praying to a God other than Jesus, who will not bless America to the exclusion of blessing other nations.
Pledging allegiance to the U.S. flag amounts to treason in the Kingdom of God, because, yes, the kingdoms of this world and the Kingdom of God are mutually exclusive.
I am not anti-America. America is anti-Jesus.

And the list could go on and on and on, and perhaps it will, but not right now. It really burns me up and I am starting to want to say nasty, sinful things about the American church and the Church of America (Pope George W. Bush presiding). So, I will end on a positive note.

I believe that the prayers of the children on that video and every other child in the world are precious to God. Innocence is lost so quickly in life, and innocent prayer usually follows. We can learn a lot from listening to children pray and talk (if you want to hear some great quotes from a cute-as-a-button two-year old I know click here). I can't wait to hear my daughter spout off all the cute things she's bound to say, and I cant wait to listen as we teach her to pray. When that time comes, I think I'll start with... "Father in Heaven..."

In Search of Ritual - Part One

2006-10-20T00:13:00.000-05:00

Middle School. School Bus. Bus Stop. Stop and Think. Thinking about the rituals of my youth and finding new ones. That's what this is about.

When I was in middle school, I had to ride the bus to and from school every day. I got up at 6am and got home every day about 3 o’clock. Long day. 7^th grade was hard, because I had spent most of my previous school years being home-schooled. It wasn’t that I was socially awkward or immature for my age or that I was behind in the learning curve, it was just hard. Bullies, cussing (which I was not yet accustomed to), girls in short skirts, gym class (and the accompanying locker room), never knowing what to expect—all of this combined to form a hellish first semester.

But when I got off the bus at the end of each day, I knew exactly what to expect. I would open the back door, walk into the kitchen, and there, sitting on the counter, would be a tall glass of sweet iced tea and a warm, home-made bran muffin wrapped in a paper towel. My mom would hear the bus coming up the road and would have it all ready for me when I came home. Then it was into the living room with my afternoon snack for a half hour of G. I. Joe: a Real American Hero.

This was my ritual, and thinking about it during school was often enough to send me off into “La-La Land” (an imaginary happy place that was made up of great things like the Nintendo Entertainment System and 1989 Topps Baseball Cards and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure). Day-dreaming like this got me through all of my otherwise-unbearable classes, classes taught by the likes of Mrs. “corn-on-the” Cobb—a nasty-tempered, purple-haired, incompetent, deep-south-black woman who passed herself off as a teacher of American History and who showed little mercy toward us “white boys” in the class.

I had a lot of other rituals in my life at that time. Sunday, for instance, was one long, ritualistic dance made up of a lot of intertwining parts. It started every Sunday morning about 8:30 with my Dad trying to convince my sister and me to get up out of bed. Sometimes when he had to tell us, “One more time,” he would help us out of bed. A shower was next, then breakfast (including Woody Woodpecker). Then my sister and I would fight over counter space in the bathroom; she tried to tease her hair up into a ball at the top of her forehead while I tried to glue the cowlick in the back of my head down.

My dad was the pastor of a medium-sized congregation in central-Florida—the Dundee Church of God. Dundee was a small town then (It was not uncommon for my friend, Kevin, and I to ride our skateboards from one side of town to the other side and back on a school-day afternoon, if that tells you anything). There were a dozen or so churches in town, one elementary school, a Winn-Dixie grocer, and one video rental store (that was back when you rented the video cassette and the VCR, because you couldn’t afford a VCR of your own). The rest of the town was a hodgepodge of small, concrete-block houses and orange groves.

We were the only Church of God in town, and that was worth a lot because we had no competition. I mean, sure, you could drive fifteen minutes in any direction and find another town in which there might be several Churches of God, but why would you want to do that? That’s not your town, and those aren’t your neighbors in the choir, and that pastor’s kid doesn’t go to your son’s school, so, why aren’t you attending the Dundee Church of God, brother?

So, as far as the COG goes in Dundee, my dad was the junk, okay? So, that meant that we kids had to be out the door so we could be on time to church whether we were ready to go or not. So there we are, my sister and I, and my hair is still sticking up in the back, and her hair is still wet because she didn’t get up in time to wash it and dry it, but she washed it anyway. And by the time we finished the 3 minute drive from the hill we lived on to “downtown” where the church was, I’m sure I had punched my sister a couple of times in response to her slapping me or pinching me or whatever she did to deserve being punched.

Every Sunday morning before church was the same. And when the service started, I knew that it would be the same too. First there was Pop. Pop was a potbellied old man with smoker’s lung and navy tattoos on his arms. Pop stood next to the water fountain outside the main entrance to the church building and greeted everyone as they came in. All the young boys would not be allowed in by Pop without first receiving a crushing hand shake from those lean, leathery arms of his. He would laugh his lung-rattling laugh as knees buckled under his squeeze and each boy tried to pull his hand out of those vice-clamps. Then he would pat the victim on the back and send him on his way through the glass double-doors.

The girls, though, had it much worse. As each one of them approached, he’d call out, “Hey, Sugar!” But in his raspy, staccato voice, it sounded more like, “Ay-chugger!” Hey was always trying to sneak in a hug or steal a little kiss on the neck or cheek. And it wasn’t just a little peck, either; he had a bad habit of licking his thin lips, so you’d be likely—if you were a girl, that is, which, thankfully, I was not—to get a nice helping of slobber on your jaw if he was able to hook his arm around your waist as you swung by the water fountain. You’d be just as well off to kiss a belt sander as Pop, though. He always had about two days worth of growth on his face. I think he only shaved during the week, when he was working.

Once you got past Pop on the way into worship, you’d have the entertaining pleasure of watching his wife during the service. Pop’s wife was always the first to stand up and shout during the singing or the preaching. When she shouted, she made a face that looked like she had just stuck her nose under a skunk’s tail and inhaled, deeply. She’d stand up and make that face and then wind up her shout like the siren on top of an old fire engine. While she was building up her vocal momentum, she’d stiffen her arms, holding them straight down at first, then, as the pitch and volume of her voice went up, she’d stick her arms straight out and wave her hands as if she was saying, “Hi!” to Jesus or the people on the stage. The best part, though, was watching the flabby skin underneath her arms dangle as she shook them in that violent, wavy motion… back and forth, back and forth.

Later on during lunch, while my parents laughed and rebuked her at the same time, my sister would make fun of Pop’s wife by grabbing the skin under her arm and waving it back and forth while doing her best imitation of the old woman’s face. Then I’d do my best “Ay chugger!” and by that time most of us would be trying to keep from spewing out our food onto the dining room table.

There were a lot of things like this on Sunday and the rest of the week, and I remember them well. (I’ve promised myself that I will do all of my memories like these the justice and service of composing them into an actual book-length memoir one day, soon.) I remember them all because they happened over and over and over like clockwork. And the more that they happened, the more I looked forward to repeating them again.

What is it about human beings and ritual? Why is it that we derive so much pleasure and comfort from the expected? With popular aphorisms like, “The only thing certain is change,” and, “Expect the unexpected,” you might think that we have thrown aside our need for the predictable life. With our culture of rampant individualism in the West, even those rituals that we do espouse are not usually shared with our family or neighbors.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of spontaneity, variety is the spice of life and all that sort of rot. But I have been missing something in my life (not God… he’s there, thanks).

I could ask my wife to start baking bran muffins, and I could go on Amazon and order some G. I. Joe (pauses a moment to do an Amazon search… holy cow… $180 for the first season). Okay, maybe just the bran muffins.

But it’s not a predictable life that I am missing. All of us have one of those. I have the same classes this week as last week. I ate the same type of meals as last week. I played the same games with Lillian as last week (those never get old). I derive a certain amount of comfort from all of those things. Something is missing, though, something spiritual.

I suspect that it is ritual.

To be continued…

No, I'm not becoming a Jehovah's Witness

2006-10-08T11:44:00.000-05:00

Cara and I have been here at Carroll Courts for a few months now. We like it here. In fact, we may stay for a while, if things continue as they are. If we do stay, I have in mind to enter into the MAT (Master of Arts in Teaching) program here at Lee, which will, in only a couple of years, have me holding a B.A. in English with minors in Bible and Writing, the aforementioned Master's degree, and two public school teaching licenses - one in English, the other in Bible. That's right, in Tennessee, there is a state teaching licence for the Bible in the public school classroom. And no, this is not illegal. It is, in fact, very legal to teach the Bible in ANY public school system. But, I digress...

Something occurred to me a few days ago, and I have been rolling it around in this head of mine since then. As a teacher, you do it every morning. One of the secretaries in the office announces that today we will have fish sandwiches and tater tots and milk or juice and then everyone stand for the pledge of allegiance. Hands over hearts please. Swear yourself to this flag and to the republic. One nation... Under God? Undividable? Liberty? Justice? justice... hmm...

God...

Every day, every teacher in every classroom is expected to make sure every student is out of their seat (hats off please) with their hands over their left breast. Say it. Speak the oath. America is your King, your Liege Lord. Pledge your al-liege-ance.

I can't do that. I can't swear that oath. You see, I swore myself to another Kingdom a while back. Yes, I have broken that vow already many times over. But swear myself to another King? Never. Death first.

(Rage Against The Machine T-Shirt)

Indigo Embrace

2006-09-29T22:43:00.000-05:00

This is my account of one of the strangest occurrences of my life: a dream-vision in which I encountered the tangible person of Jesus.

I was twenty-two years old, and I had just returned home after a failed attempt at college. I had spent three semesters escaping all the rules and expectations placed on me by family and friends back home, and I had nothing to show for all that time but a D+ grade average and thousands of dollars of school loans. Coming back to Florida from Tennessee to live with my parents was a relief in some ways, especially financially, but mostly it screamed my inadequacy, my failure to discover my life’s destiny and chase it down. Because of these pressures (I’ll admit, they came mostly from within), for the first few months I was subject to severe depression and paralyzing anxiety. I wasn’t sure if I would ever go back to college or if I would ever again have a chance to make something significant out of my life. I suspected I would pound out the rest of my existence in drudgery and regret. It was truly a miserable time for me.

In the middle of this “desert experience”, I began, for the first time in my life, to have frequent, lucid dreams, full of color and unimagined images. One of these hit me with full force, and very potently answered the questions I had been asking God for the past several months, namely, “Does my life have any significance or meaning, and what is that meaning?”

It was a dream within a dream; I dreamed I was dreaming (The initial dream I shall call dream 1, and the dream within that dream I shall call dream 2). Everything started in dream 2. I was lying on my back, either in a bed or on the ground. Looking up, I could see a vague semblance of light, but it came from no particular direction and it cast no shadow on any discernable objects. Suddenly, out of this almost-darkness, there appeared the shape of a man, hovering several meters above me, his body parallel to mine and his face aligned with mine. He was clothed in long, ink-colored robes which covered everything about him but his face.

His eyes looked at me very intently, but seemed to simultaneously look through me or past me. His stare did not give me the feeling that he was indifferent, but that he was able to see every part of me in perfect context with the rest of the universe. I felt as if he was reading me over an over like you might do with a favorite book, fully conscious while reading of what was to come, yet giddily eager to turn to the next page. I felt vulnerable, of course, but I was also afraid, because I could not be sure who or what this being was that penetrated me so. If I had not been completely immobile in this dream, I would have had to break his gaze.

Then he began to slowly float downward toward where I lay. He spread his arms out toward me as he descended, and I knew he had in mind to embrace me. The closer his face got to mine, the nearer his body came, the more I was filled with wonder and dread. “He is so dark,” I thought, “that I will surely die within his arms. Yet, there is an unapproachable brilliance about him, and his complexion shines with something infinite. This must be the God-Man, who, although he is perfect in his essence, clothes himself in the darkness that is human flesh.” He did not stop coming closer, but finally lay on me, or in me, for his body was not just on top of mine, but somehow it merged with my own body.

It was at this point in the dream that I realized that I was, somehow, fully conscious, experiencing every stimuli with all of my senses, both physical and meta-physical. I was no longer dreaming; I was not experiencing my unconscious mind. I knew at that moment that Jesus was holding me to himself, pressing me, squeezing me hard enough to break my ribs without actually injuring my body or soul. This embrace of his was sensual. It felt like every nerve, every muscle fiber, every part of the smallest parts our souls are made of, every bit of me was being loved… actively, purely, and without holding anything back. It was as if he was trying to empty himself into me, and though there was not enough room in my soul for it, he kept pouring in.

Periodically, he would let go and hover over me for a while again, and then he would begin his embrace with fervor, as if it were the first time, as if his passion could not be diminished no matter how much he gave out. At last, he went back up to the shadow he came out of, and I awoke from my dream 2 to find myself in dream 1.

This dream consisted of one short image. I awoke from dream 2 and sat up in my bed, realizing that it had all been a dream, yet so very real. I got up out of bed and went to a restroom to wash my face and hands. When I looked down at my hands after washing them, however, I saw that they had been stained the same inky color as the robes of the man in my dream. The ink would not wash off no matter how many times I tried.

Finally I awoke to the real world. This “dream”, if it can be called only a dream, has come under much interpretation and scrutiny by me, and I know it to be as real as any waking memory stored in my mind. It remains the most powerful spiritual experience of my life, and I hope that one day I will experience again this “Indigo Embrace.”