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...into thy hands i commit my spirit....

Thu, 24 May 2007 11:48:36 GMT

i have no earthly idea why God is so patient with me. i've gone through so many periods of questioning, of failing, of cursing the earth i was born into that any reasonable deity should of just let me sell my soul to the devil when i wanted to and be satisfied with cool people like mother terresa.

but no, when this lamb escapes, the hellhound of heaven happily leaves all 99 of the ones who have their lives together. for me. and i have no idea why. don't get me wrong, some times i really love God and feel His-Her joy covering everything. there are times when being in a community, and being free to shout and dance about how God's saving me is the only thing important in my life. but there are other times, when i don't feel anything. i still act excited and reverent before everyone else but it's all a mask. these are the times when i don't feel anything, and God seems so distant, and my own life seems purposeless. there are times when my devout "Thy will be done" morphs into an agnostic "let me go! i want to be done with this whole santification process, it's too damn hard." but its at these times that i find myself less able to break away from God. the angrier i get at God's silence, the more likely it is that something (or someone) is going to come along, and God forces me back to Him-Her, just like a Parent who always lets me come home.

in the words of one of my favorite old blues songs "late in the evening, i'm gonna lay my lonesome head on the railroad track/and when i hear that train a-commin', i'm gonna snatch my damn head back." and it's true. it is at those moments that i feel the despair that hope flood in. and that is how we keep going. to steal a phrase from barrak obama who stole it from rev. jerehmiah wright we regain the audacity of hope only when we begin realize how audacious hope really is. that really corny poem about how God's footprints are always next to ours, but when we only see one set of prints its because She's carrying us is actually on to something.... everything is going to work itself out. He hasn't brought us this far to leave us now....

when i was at one of my lowest points, a very wise friend told me that when we agree to become God's slave, He takes our brokenness away from us, so that we remade as more than the product of our sin, and the ways people sin against us. nearly 400 years ago, a people stolen from africa would gather illegally in the woods and created one of the greatest forms of christian worship in the history of the religion - at a time when all they heard about the gospel was b.s. about how Jesus wanted them to be obedient to the "master." why? i think it's because, somehow, the Spirit let them know that becoming God's slave meant that you could not, and should not, be a slave to anything - or anyone else.

this summer, i've prayerfully decided to start attending st. sabinia, a spirit-filled african-american catholic church on the south side - and have been impressed with how much i, as a white protestant, have in common with their vision and beliefs, and have learned from their passion. two sundays ago, during the mass for mother's day, a woman came up to the alter as father pflager explained that her son had been shot and killed just last week. "i went to the hospital, and we prayed for God to save this boy's life, and for reasons i don't understand, God said 'no, i want him here with Me.'" this beautiful woman then took the microphone from the pastor, and explained that, "it's hard to loose a child. you expect your child to outlive you. but, this expedience has think more about all those other mothers who are loosing children everyday. that's why i want to tell my church that because of this painful experience, i've become committed to ending gang violence in our community." i think she was the only one in the santuarry not crying.

the secret to happiness? - loose yourself. love God with your heart, soul, and mind, give Him-Her your whole being - and love your neighbor as yourself, don't get lost in self-pity, but let suffering be a motivation to work for justice.

random metaphores, loosley based on experiences and thoughts

Thu, 03 May 2007 04:18:16 GMT

i am the folk singer
sick of the prisons your expectations place on me.
i smash the guitar that made you love me
singing with the rock band, violating your expectations that keep me safe..
i love life, so i scream.
i am deaf to your boos, hearing only my blues.
all i can do is sing "it's all over now, baby blue,"
and say "i'm sorry, but you made me this way."

i am the prostitute
sick of the way your slime defiles me
imprisoned
seeing no escape, wanting freedom more than anything,
but caught in paying for the sins you committed
with shame, blood, and tears.
i love life, so i scream.
orphaned by my life
high from my pleasures
each attempt to break free only pushes me further in
i see a new man passing by,
silently hoping to be listened to
waiting for the one whose going to set me free.

i am the gorilla , trapped in a zoo of my own making
some ignore me, others laugh and look to me to be amused by their superiority.
("I thank you, Lord, that you did not make me like that tax collector"...)
in a glass cage, unable to see my boundaries, but knowing their's no escape.
i love life, so i scream
and then, i take my body, and smash it against the walls.
again, and again, i push, hit, and claw at my invisible prison.
sometimes it feels hopeless, but other times
i see the sunlight shining through newly formed cracks.
so i keep fighting the wall,
day and night, i never stop pounding on the walls
that keep me away from you.
i know, that one day, everything will collapse
and i will be new
so i never stop pounding the wall.

these are the moments, when i feel empty and hopeless. of all the lies that attack me when these moments of darkness come, the worst one is the fear that God will find me useless - that i'm too in need to help anyone else.
but these are also the moments, when God (and in the best times, those around me) flood into my life. it's at these moments i know i am loved, and it's at these moments, that i learn how to endure - to keep holding on to God and my life, in spite of how i feel.
to those of you who have been supportive of me in this time, i can't thank you enough.
"i need you
you need me
we're all a part of God's body
stand with me
agree with me
we're all a part of God's body
it is His will
that every need be supplied
you are important to me
i need you to survive"

...drops of heaven in the middle of hell...

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 20:47:11 GMT

just when i thought my perception of the world couldn't get
any more intense, my gluttony for getting involved in any extra-curricular
activity that doesn't involve playing sports or being republican has come back
to bite me.

i spent this weekend in uptown, trying to get a sense of what homeless people
go through by both talking to whoever would listen to us and trying to live
it. it wasn't about feeding or helping them, but about learning from
them, forming relationships while we (not us and them) endured the city at its
most merciless.

final reflections... this world is fucked up. i'm sorry, but i've run out
of polite words that help me work through it. God created humanity in
His-Her own image to live in a certain way, but society ain't operating according
the designer's instructions, by a long shot. beyond simple material
comforts that i knew the urban poor don't have, probably the worst part of
their lives is all the little things against you. is it really necessary
for seats on the el or bus stops to be curved in the middle and have arm rests
that make it impossible to lie down? why do restaurants keep their dumpsters
locked - if they're throwing stuff away, why should they be afraid to give it
away to someone who might have a use for it? when we were sleeping under an
overpass (we didn't last long doing that - it was really cold) a police officer
came up to us (because, technically, we were breaking the law by
"loitering" there) and asked what we were doing.
when fearless leader kelly (yes, this is the same kelly who did my hair, i owe
that girl mad props) talked him out of arresting us and
explained what we were doing - he said "yeah, well, you have to understand
that homeless people choose to be where they are - they get into drugs and
become alcoholic, and stop looking for things that can help them."
none of us responded to him... but i kind of wanted to. homelessness is a
miserable life, no one would ever choose it.

before getting to the streets, i mostly expected the people i met to be stupid
freaks, to put it bluntly. my mind was filled with all the stereotypes of
the drunk and dirty illiterate guy who thinks he's from saturn. what i
found instead was many wonderful, intelligent, and wise people. some of them
were well-read, and eager to communicate their ideas and often very exciting
life experiences. some held to their religious beliefs very deeply, and i
learned to call them brother or sister in Christ as we cried and prayed
together. i did meet one guy who called himself an atheist "because
of what i've learned from philosophy." he went on to talk about
cultural constructions of reality and about how he didn't think any one
religious view point was sufficient to fully explain how the idea of God is
within every human culture. i listened to him in silent awe, unable to answer
him and silently repentant for judging him because of where he was on our
socio-economic totem poll.

ultimately to be homeless is, just that, to be without a home, to have no
private space or personal community of individuals who can support you.
my weekend was full of a lot of boredom, of walking around and feeling empty,
and of trying to spend several hours in mcdonalds before they kick us out for
only buying a cup of coffee and going to sleep. the people i met had both
sinned and been sinned against, but then again, who hasn't? all of
humanity has to deal guilt, anger, and regret from painful pasts. the
only thing separating me from the people i met this weekend is that i grew up
in a supportive community that could help me get where i am. where i
could take my pain to social networks filled with people who told me how to get
by and gave me love and encouragement.

but, there are other people in this world who don't have that.
they can't trust anyone but themselves, they have no where to go but places
where they're not welcome. the streets are filled with brilliant people, who
are slowing going insane because they have nothing to depend on - all they once
believed in has fallen apart and left them alone. all human beings are
radically dependent on each other, no one can survive on their own - because it
is only by mattering to someone else that we get the motivation to keep
surviving. more then a hand-out, or even a hand-up, what Christ in the
poor really needs is our love - reminders of a God who cries for their pain and
cares for them enough to expel the demons that keep this world light-years away
from His-Her kingdom.

i'm a rebel (soul rebel)

Fri, 02 Feb 2007 04:49:13 GMT

so...i realize anyone who was reading this has probably stopped because i never update... hey, man, i'm busy... leave me alone.... i do too much, and am always about two steps away from compete insanity ... oh well, i guess it's better to have passion and no sense of direction then a sense of direction and no passion...

in the last week, my physical appearance has been radically altered (for those of you who don't know, i actually look nothing like jimi hendrix. nor do i, in fact, make a habit of setting guitars on fire, so don't read too much into my profile pic...) the david crowder/bob dylin-esque white-boy afro is no more, having been twisted and waxed into submission into dreadlocks..... and i'm happy.... it took about ten hours with the wonderful assistance of kelly, wheaton's african hair braider-in residence, and hurts like hell, but its fun and makes a statement.... (btw, if anyone's interested in taking the natty pluge, i highly suggest getting the stuff from www.dreadheadhq.com - when you do be sure to mention me and my email (christ.griot@gmail.com), so that we can both get free stuff (ain't capitalism wonderful? ;))

only question is - what kind of statement? malcolm x in his autobiography goes into a fair amount of detail describing his pre-muslim fixation with the conk, a hair style that used to be popular among African-American me that involved chemically messing with the hair in order to make it straight (think little richard). according to mr. el-shabazz, this desire in black men to play with their hair to make it look like a white person's indicated a lack of dignity and pride in being who they really were. by trying making his hair look "normal" (read: what the white majority thinks hair should look like), the conk-ie was really saying he was ashamed of being who he really was. this got me to thinking - did i put this much expense and time into getting an african-derived hair style because i was ashamed of being white?

for the longest time, i thought i was supposed to be ashamed of being white. the worst of my ancestors owned slaves, fought for the confederacy, and joined "white citizens' councils", while the best ones too often did nothing or stood back as ethnic minorities were being oppressed. - and though i do not directly participate in these generational sins that go back at least 400 years, i still benefit from the wealth my family gained unjustly through free labor on the backs of others. it would be very easy to feel shame... but i don't - because i still believe God, who made me who i am, can use me just as i am. - in calling for diversity, the last thing african-american, latino(-a), first nation peoples, and asian-americans are asking from me is to feel shame or false guilt.

too often, christians are really good at creating guilt to avoid having to repent....

rather then feeling shame, we must learn to celebrate each other, recognizing our cultural traditions as good (equal, yet beautifully distinct), and dealing with uncomfortable issues of structural evil openly - but always being willing to bring what we have to offer to the table - and learn from each other. we are not alone in this world, i hope that my dreads do not communicate dissatisfaction with my ethnic background, but instead tell the world i have found a culture that has produced something beautiful, and wish to joyfully learn from it, without negating other things my tradition may offer the world.

...the day the apocalypse began

Tue, 12 Sep 2006 00:00:37 GMT

a few weeks after you-know-what five years ago, a friend of mine displayed the NY times from September 10, "to remember the last day the world was normal." however, it didn't take long before i realized how abnormal sept. 10 really was. on page 2, there it was - suicide bombing in Jerusalem, nearly 40 people dead or wounded. terrorism was real before i knew about it, i just didn't care because my brother didn't live in the gaza strip.

that's why, in a way, i'm glad to be a part of a world in which 9-11s happen. not to say that it wouldn't have been better for all those people to still be alive, but, in the words of the bible, "what men meant for evil, God meant for good." or, in the words of one of my favorite phil keaggy songs,"suffering restores us, burns away the empty shallowness, softening the heart to be broken bread and poured out wine." i haven't realized until today just what happened to me through the tragedy, and that God used it to change my heart. like i said before, my brother doesn't live in the gaza strip.

"apathy in the face of human suffering is the worst form of evil." i wish i could say i made that up, but i didn't. before the world came crashing in on me, i was apathetic in the face of human suffering. my brother doesn't live in the gaza strip. but at the time he did work in manhattan. for the first time in my life, i had a reason to panic from something i saw on television. i thanked God a million times when we got a phone call saying he was safe, my family cried together and hugged each other, more together then we've ever been before or since.

cut to a worship service in the park two weeks later. i have no idea what band was playing or what church was in charge, but my life was changed. it lasted several hours, some of the most heart felt crying out to God i've ever experienced. we got into small groups, to pray. requests starting pouring out for all the people dying, missing, and grieving, nearly everyone i talked to seemed to know at least one person directly affected. then the worship leader did something really bold. he asked us to pray for the people who did this to us, because Jesus taught us to love our enemies. "osama isn't such an evil sinner that God can't save him, and that's something we should be praying for." if the poles are reliable, it is almost inevitable that at least someone in that park voted for the bush in the last election. but when one of the guys in my prayer circle said that "i really don't think we should attack afganistan, because that's only going to create more violence," both me and my other partner agreed.

a few weeks later, i looked at the news and saw starvation, genocide, death, war, and felt pain for the first time in my life. . i later learned that pain was called love, and its what Christ felt on the cross. i realized that i do have brothers in the gaza strip, hundreds of them - God was breaking my heart, and I was beginning to see the world through His-Her eyes

i haven't had the chance to watch television much in the past few days, so i don't really know what the media is trying to tell you what you should feel about what happened. i do want to encourage you - to not use the pain in hurting others or getting bitter- getting angry at clinton, or bush for letting it happen, or using it to prove that the believers in the world's fastest growing religion are all insane bloodthirsty killers. instead, use it to examine your heart, and try to show love to those around you

together, i believe we will stop the cycle of hatred.

part of the solution, or part of the problem?

Mon, 04 Sep 2006 16:45:49 GMT

so... here i am... back at wheaton for the third year... this is nuts... i'm not ready to be mature yet....time is moving way to fast, and i'm supposed to be in some kind of simple livng project, but my life isn't getting any simpler...
anyway, this being labor day and all, i hope i'll be forgiven for ranting a little about, well, labor in the US. (i realize that, in terms of most people's cultural practice, labor day has absolutely nothing to do with *laborers,* per say, but since any commeration of may 1 makes you a french-loving, pinko socalist, i'm afraid i have no choice).

for a while now, i've really struggled with finding a clothing manufacture that is in harmony with what i consider to be Christ's kingdom and His-Her instructions to promote justice and love my neighbor as myself. the fact of the matter is that the majority of clothing i wear (along with most other americans) is made in horrible and harmful conditions, often by very young children working for as much as 15 hours a day for only, maybe $.15 per item in factories that harm the environment and do nothing to improve the economic conditions of the developing countries in which they are based. as a consumer, and a Christian, i really want to work to stop this and force companies to act more responsibly to the planet and laborers that sustain them. among most of the major clothing companies, one has stood out in my mind as being social conscious and ethical in its business practices.

until now....

american apparel makes all of its clothing in factories in l.a. they pay all their workers twice the minimum wage, and offer many benefit for them. their manufacturing plants are clean, safe, and environmentally sensitive.
i really want to like this company...

however, i feel there are many things about this company that I can't. the first thing i noticed was their advertising. merely all clothing advertisements rely on eroticism to an increasable degree, and while i think this is horrible in all cases (as a Christian, i believe women should be viewed with respect as sisters in humanity - as precious human beings respected as fellow individuals loved by God, not as objectified outlets for my sexuality) AA's ads were unusually bad, overtly pornographic and degrading. in one of their stores i visited, they had penthouse covers framed on the wall. this made me wonder, as both a heterosexual male and someone who is trying to care about my fellow human beings - why do their ads appeal to my baser, sinful instincts, rather then to the higher,God-given desire for love for humanity?

the answer, according to ceo dov charney (who is fighting accusations of sexual harassment and was openly involved in a effort to prevent AA's workers from unionizing [which in itself is kind of weird given all their attention given to how they look after their workers]), is that “[being sweatshop-free] is a secondary appeal and I'm getting a little bored with it... I’m de-emphasizing it."

in this world, everyone has a fallen nature corrupted by sin. every human being, both those actively seeking the kingdom of God and those who aren't, are a combination of good and bad traits. our economy proves this - this world is full companies and politicians who either deemphasize personal morality or social responsibility, and i don't expect every company to be perfect. but when someone can say that they're 'de-emplacing' the 'boring' parts of their lives that benefit others, while at the same time, giving greater appeal to the sinful parts of their lives that harm others, - i can't look the other way. so that's one more company i don't want to shop at....

for more info: (be forewarned, some of this stuff includes 'examples' of ads and dov's strange behavior that are preety overtly sexual, and my purpose is to inform you, not cause you to drift from God's true vision for sexuality...)

http://www.knowmore.org/index.php/American_Apparel%2C_LLC

http://www.oneangrygirl.net/girlcotts.html#clothing

http://www.americanapparel.net/presscenter/ads/index.html

Monday, July 24, 2006

Mon, 24 Jul 2006 12:20:14 GMT

So, right now I'm in Asia for the summer. It's being a really great time. For quite a while, I've been thinking about the prayer "let my heart be broken by the things that break the heart of G--," but it's only here that I'm gaining a better appreciation of what that really means, and learning how to be affected by other's suffering, and to see it all though His-Her eyes. At the same time, I've been overwelmed by the beauty of the people and cultures I've encoutered, and amazed at the creatvity and truth I've learned from those I've met. So ... here's a poem i've been working on to try to sort it all out.... (bit of inside information here - the chickens here sound a little different then American ones, less like a cock-a-doddle-doo type thing and more like a mournful wail. its kind of strange...)

Red rooster, red rooster tell me why are you crying?

Once you woke up with joy, now it sounds like you're dieing.

Are you morning a loss innocence?

Or is there something inside you that feels so intense,

That you try to drown it out with another haunting tune?

Only to have its strains ending so soon?

Left with:

A broken redemption

Insufficient revelation

A beautiful sadness

But still a life without gladness

You're light only shows darkness

Finding joy, but still hardness

Young eagle, young eagle, tell me why you don't soar

You knew that your origins held so much more

Appeasing the sprits won't end your dread

Your karma ran out before you knew you were dead

So why do you persist with the state that you're in,

When what you're longing for is a life free of sin?

More then:

A broken redemption

Insufficient revelation

A beautiful sadness

But still a life without gladness

You're light only shows darkness

Finding joy, but still hardness

love in rejection

Wed, 19 Apr 2006 02:58:29 GMT

so yesterday i got "the letter" in CPO.

i got rejected from hngr. basically, i was told that my lack of confidence in talking with other people indicates that "cross-cultural immersion attempts will come at great personal risk," and they aren't going to let me on board.... i could say some very unkind words about a certain long and bizarre psychological test we had to take, but i'm not going to go there....

today kodon came in, and i remembered that i had sent in a song for the cd, and two poems...all of it was rejected....

God is really working on my heart as a result of all of it... but i'd be lying if i told you it didn't hurt... most of my life i've felt pretty confident about myself and my accomplishments because they usually succeeded...but now, it seems that in a lot of things that are happening to me, i'm being told i'm not good enough... and it's hard

but at the same time, i know these closed doors don't mean God has rejected me. today, (last g.c. rehearsal of the year) we spent a long time in worship and prayer, and i was overwhelmed by this feeling of being pushed by God's hand, i could almost hear Him-Her encouraging me that there is a Divine will, a plan on which i can have a hope and a future, something far bigger then anything i can comprehend. the institution of Wheaton College has nothing for me apart from the loving arms of my Creator. it's a hard truth to accept, but i know that this is not the end -

so i just got back from the hip-hop dance (finally, college union does something cool - *don't even get me started on this school's ridiculous dancing policy*) anyway, at one point the mc/dance teacher told the dj to turn off the music, and told us "you're doing it wrong because you're holding back. don't be afraid, just let your arms go. it's better for you to be loose and wrong then afraid." now, i know very little about hip-hop dancing, but hearing that, i just took his advice and let go. i didn't know what the heck i was doing, but i was feeling it.

so it is with the dance of life.. sometimes i succeed, sometimes i fail - sometimes my success looks like failure, sometimes my failure looks like success, and most of the time i'm hopelessly confused. but all i can do is dance.

and let myself go.

really cool prayer from this interfaith website i found...

Wed, 12 Apr 2006 03:01:04 GMT

we pray to God to eradicate all the misery in the world: that understanding triumph over ignorance, that generosity triumphs over indifference, that trust triumphs over contempt, and that truth triumphs over falsehood.

marx, foucault, Jesus, and me

Tue, 11 Apr 2006 04:31:12 GMT

as shallow as this sounds, i think warm weather causes me to be in a better mood.

yeah, i had really good day today. in chapel today, i was overwelamed. it was theater people, who read all this different stuff about Christ and how different people relate to Him, and then they showed all these beautiful pictures from around the world showing Jesus in differnet emotional states. it was beautiful, a really powerful reminder of how i don't seek His/Her face enough. as i was walking out in one of the most beautiful weather i've ever experienced, one of the gospel choir songs came into my head. i got to a line that says - "why you love me so, Lord I shall never know, the precious lamb of God"

and then i broke down. i spent several minuites laying on the grass, crying - the impact of those words hitting me more then they have before.

anyway, so in one my classes i've been studying the theories of a gay french guy named Foucault, and until today his extreme verbosity has kind of gotten on my nerves, but today i reallized that he has some good things to say:

he talks about how our thought processes are imprisioned by the terms introduced to explain discourse, how our langauge affects how we think, and how terms of diferentiation color our thinking. i believe this type of thinking has corrputed a lot of the church (and society in general), and led to disunity and the creation of an us. vs. them mentality. think about how many debates in the Christian world are sepearted with a label of two distinct possitions.
liberal/conservative,
arminan/calvinist,
catholic/protestant,
pacifism/just war theory,
evangelical/"social gospel"
egalitarian/complamentarian.
my question is, when we take one of these possitions and converse with someone accepting the other label, are we more interested in finding truth or in being right? in actually, God is bigger then us or our attempts at reason, God is bigger then any theolgical boxes we can construct, i seriously doubt that any of these sides is totally correct and the other totally wrong, and even if they were, that's no reason to attempt to amputate any part of Christ's unified Body.

I mean Chrisitanity is about more then simply accepting possitions as true, really it's about falling in love.

may God have mercy on us.