sick

umm, i don't know if i am really willing to write this post.

there's a lot of crap going on in my own life lately, i think, and i've been struggling with God. i'm back home this short weekend, and there's a lot of crap going on in my church as well, at least i feel that way. we get distracted so easily, our focus isn't even on God when we walk into church functions. no offense, and i know i'm being incredibly hypocritical at the same time, but we should leave our agendas at the door when we walk into church. church is for God, it's even the body of God that He has created for Himself to delight in, so when we enter church, we should really focus on Him instead of ourselves.

i put words to it last night, that i think what we really need to get us through the day is...not a focus on ourselves, but a focus on God. focusing on ourselves - focusing on the things that we do so well or even the things that we don't do so well, our grades or our possessions or our social life or anything. focusing on ourselves is not big enough to free us from burdens and pains and problems that these things probably generated in the first place. focusing on how good my grades are won't justify me and make me feel better and focusing on how bad my grades are will only worsen my conception of myself.

but focusing on God changes things. God makes all these promises that in Him, you can find life and truth and sustenance, courage, joy, peace, all these things. all your desires, all your hope, all your strength. God promises these things, and to touch the heart of God means to touch a piece of life, to touch a piece of love. so when we really need something to get us through the day...it's not a focus on ourselves that changes anything. but it's God that changes us...and it might not change the circumstance, but it'll certainly change our perspectives. God won't necessarily change our grades so that they're all A's (though there's no reason He couldn't), but at least God will change the way you and your heart view grades so that whether or not you have all A's, you will understand that everything will be okay. that's a lot better answer than just studying your butt off so you might be able to justify yourself in your own eyes.

and i want to suggest that it is only by the real work of God that things can really change for the better. we can change things a million different ways with our own hands, but it won't really change us. we switch from Xanga to Myspace to Facebook, and Facebook will be replaced by something else, and we never satisfy ourselves. we jump from the hottest trend to the next, one addiction after another. in the same way, church can switch between a million different models and songs and pastors and draw all sorts of numbers and good works, but if it's not God, it is just grasping for the wind, the corruptible work of man.

sorry if this is coming out as offensive, but i sorta feel this way right now, even if i know i might not fully believe it myself or to any kind of real depth.

i don't know. billy and i are playing worship tomorrow. and it would be great if we had a miracle. our whole church, it seems, needs a breakthrough. we need to be re-aligned and re-focused with the heart of God, so that we can at least serve Him and bless Him when we meet on Sundays, even if that's all we ever do. i'd rather be a sweet smelling sacrifice in a small task than to go out and do great things and lose my soul. interestingly enough, if God is simply the reason why we are alive, and the meaning of our lives is to love God and be with God...then it doesn't exactly matter what we're doing. it's a mindset, a paradigm, a lifestyle - "i will stop at nothing to be close to God. i am willing to do anything and drop everything in my life to be close to God, because that was all i was created for." that's how someone could die to the world and die to sin and yet never turn around to the loss and chaos around them and never blink - because they will be so focused on God at that time that they would literally be one. that person would very literally be completed by God.

but we go to church and we go to Sunday school and all we do is socialize. we never take our eyes or our lives of ourselves... and this seems kinda dooming or hopeless, and it certainly feels that way to me sometimes, but we should not hesitate to remember that God provides the breakthrough and is still loving all of us through this. somehow, in His own timing, He will still get to the heart of us, and He'll keep us from falling too far away from Him. anyways, my prayer is that we would really just patiently and humbly serve God tomorrow, and to be a sweet smelling sacrifice, even if nothing big happens. yeah, even if nothing big happens, expectation or not, emotion or not. if we can exalt Your name tomorrow morning, that would simply be enough.

and here's the hard part for me to write.

i am really socially inept. i feel that way, anyways. i have been thinking a lot about relationships lately, and it's frustrating most of the time, and sometimes i think it causes me not be so close to God. but i don't know how long i can keep my composure and pretend like nothing is going on. i pretend to be composed and cool and even careless, but...inside, it is like i am consumed by desire, and sometimes i fear it is desire for the wrong reasons. i fear it is replacing God with relationship, so i shy away and remind myself there is a very distinct need to focus on God. but that doesn't work. my heart doesn't listen to my mind.

i think i'm going to ruin myself.

stopping to smell roses.

baggy pants frayed at the bottom. mat kearney and paul wright music. a new pair of running shoes. anticipation. the good kind of tension. determination. staying awake when you should be falling asleep. pursuit. intimacy. come as you are mentality. humility. comfortably cold weather and a yard of grass that has just been cut. a mind set on things bigger than life, bigger than imagination.

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i wrote those thoughts in april of 2007.

i adopted this notion of integrity as doing the things that no one would see. i remember there was one morning at school, junior or senior year, i just didn't feel like being at school. i think i was tired or i was just sick of it all, and i just didn't want to be there. i called my sister and asked her what she thought i should do, and i don't remember what exactly happened, but i ended up staying. another time, i called my sister and said that i was turning in my English homework a day or two late every time because i wanted to spend the right amount of effort on it instead of turning in something thrown together at the last second for a good grade. and she said there was something called integrity... it was a balance between giving your all and still meeting deadlines. i guess doing what you could do in a timely fashion.

what strikes me is that i've been going through ups and downs lately. spiritually, physically, mentally. two tests this week, another next week, going to sleep at unhealthy times, and it seems like my passion for God is wavering. i still read...i'm going through Matthew and around James/1 Peter...i don't know. after this morning, i felt at odds with God. by the end of my classes, i was singing Everything by Lifehouse over and over again and perhaps praying in my heart, and i felt like things were great again.

i...realize i had this kind of conviction or something about two years ago in New Mexico. this thought that all i wanted in life was to be God's, to be claimed as His, and that would be my identity and i would be okay with that. lately, i think i've kind of forgotten that. identity has become wrapped up in so many different things, things that have to do with fitting in with a certain crowd and with looks and even sometimes with morality...identity comes in the form of so and so's boyfriend or girlfriend or the kid who got the highest score on his math test or the guy with the 4:03 mile. and i start to realize and actually feel in my heart that... there is a reason we need God.

because without, all we have is this law. our identities can get so wrapped up with who we hang out with and what we do that it is almost like our identities are based upon insecure and corruptible foundations. if i'm the 4:03 mile kid, what happens when i can no longer hit the 4:03? am i suddenly...worthless? what happens if my relationship breaks? am i helpless and broken? what if you really are me, someone who feels compelled to pretend and maybe even twist personality to fit a status quo, to find acceptance?

i guess this is the same spot that i was in my freshman year of high school. looking for friends, looking for refuge. the funny thing is that, as high school went on, i grew farther and farther away from people at school. i ate lunch by myself, hardly talked in some of my classes, and spent nearly the whole week looking forward to the Friday night i would get to spend with my youth group and with God. i actually didn't care about who saw me or not. i had an answer, and it was greater than anything school or popularity had to offer me. i could be myself...come as you are mentality.

and so... after these couple days of running around with my head cut off, man. may i return to my higher calling, an identity based and rooted in God. paul makes it clear that he could brag as much as he wanted, but he always seems to introduce himself as a bondservant of Christ. towards the end of the gospel of John (i think it was John), John stops mentioning himself or his name, he just calls himself "the disciple whom Jesus loved." may i take my eyes off this world, off the status quo, off pretending and off fitting in... and in integrity, with eyes fixed on God's reaction, may i pursue Him and walk worthy of His calling, knowing that it has already been promised to me and my good works have already been planned.

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hopefully things'll start looking up. looking at the prospect of China this summer, and...well, i don't have class until 10:30 tomorrow. so...God give me strength, i pray. max out tomorrow. let's go.

fast and furious

the Restoration group is coming to the end of a fast, and i must say - i am speechless. i am completely amazed at how much God provided for us - that the amount of grace that was present was remarkable. before this, i had fasted every now and then, but i had never felt what i have felt over these past couple days. last semester, i had struggled so much simply trying to skip a meal. and yet, we decided we would go for three days - a juice and media fast - and God really came through.

i don't want to call any glory to myself, but i listed the number of days because i think it's pretty intimidating. we started Sunday night and i was freaking out, i thought about it as i slept that entire night. i confessed that the only way that i could possibly do it was with God. that night, Restoration met and prayed that our desires for food would be replaced and fulfilled by desire for God. i think i was specifically focusing on trying to give God glory instead of gaining glory for myself (which ends in my shame), intimacy, and prayer and intercession. i really wanted true, deep encounter with God, and as the days passed, i realized that it wouldn't be a great fast if i simply satisfied. i really did have a desire put in me by the grace of God - i really truly wanted to desire God with everything i have.

there was a lot of prayer that went on. when i woke up Monday morning, things were simply easy. i spent my free time with God, keeping myself busy, and by the Holy Spirit, my hungers were satisfied by God's goodness. i played more guitar than i have in a while, read more of the Bible than i have in any other period, prayed more, and it really is all to God's glory. it's weird, but He really did simply just show up, in the same way that i usually say that we were playing worship at a lock-in or on a mountain and God simply showed up. but He showed up in steadfastness, over three days, and it was just brilliant beautiful.

we were doing a media fast, so i was at least off Facebook and Youtube for those three days, and i had really wanted to put a stop to my Rubik's cubing. those three combine waste so much of my time. i really only used my computer for homework and e-mail, and the surprising result was that temptation to sin against my body was hardly anything. in fact, most of my temptation simply came in the form of pride. God is just remarkable. He truly was working. Restoration had also been going through a book called One Thing by IHOP oneThing director Dwayne Roberts, which stressed the idea of steadfast faith - seeking to be God through everything. God really did grant us the desires of our heart by bringing us close to Him.

i've never really fasted and had so much focus on God at the same time, to God's glory again because it was God's grace, all the way. i was still going to classes and doing homework, so i can't say that it was like fasting in the wilderness, but still...i think the only way to get through a fast is to really desire and hunger for God - to take a stand against your physical needs and seek that God would feed you with His Word and His Spirit. and this is huge, because i had fasted a couple times in high school during the 30 Hour Famine and it was mostly just not eating. but focusing on God really truly is filling. it has been so long since i felt so dependent on God, and it was even greater, because i was getting this feeling on the OU campus - an everyday kind of scenario. i didn't leave to Michigan or Chicago to learn this - God taught it to me right in the middle of mundane.

anyways, i am simply blown away by truly how sufficient and overwhelming God's grace is. i confess, before this week, i had been hesitant. when people talked about spending eternity with God, i wasn't sure how excited i could get over that. but i think i am getting to see God as a provider, as someone i could spend my entire days pondering and spending time with. i mentioned at the beginning of the semester that i wondered whether i could make my life God and school and cut out the social heart, mainly. and with what happened in these past few days, i am beginning to see what that might look like, and it really is something rewarding. there's nothing greater.

hope that this is encouraging. God is great, and to Him be the glory that He has blessed me with.