A little bit of this, a little bit of that

Identity theft has become a pandemic sweeping our generation, not your credit and name going towards financing someone else’s pet projects, no, your hopes, your dreams, who you are and what you were meant to be have been strategically stolen, muddied, blurred and seduced in order to fuel someone’s pet project: the further attempt of abjection of any image of God. Much like a tenant under eviction, Satan knows he will not be able to keep this place — so he is intentionally wreaking as much destruction and havoc as he is allowed in order to make sure that as few as possible know what it is to be fully loved, fully valued and fully alive.

I know it sounds odd, however I’m writing this from the trenches, as someone who had a small taste of what that could feel like but is currently at the bottom again. I watched Braveheart tonight again for the first time in awhile and felt myself longing for that sort of passion of vision: the singular drive for a large Goal, not for me, but for others, that makes whatever work, whatever pain, whatever energy spent worth it. The vision to know who you are, without question. The vision to know what you’re fighting for and that it’s worth it. Doing something you are fully passionate about that energizes rather than exercises.

I want that. And I want that for you too.

I woke up this morning thinking abut the creation vs. evolution debate and have discovered that the debate is really useless and quite a red herring that many “Christians” are up in arms about. My reasoning? Let’s plot it out for a second:

Theory A: the universe happened by chance after a cosmic explosion which produced the shreds of life which over time came to be ordered and living in the manner we know it today.
Purpose: None — randomness
My Conclusion: Since there is no purpose to life other than possibly to sustain the evolutionary lines, why would I bother doing anything except that which makes me feel good?

Theory B: God created the universe, earth, people, plants, animals, etc in the blink of an eye — but is an impersonal God and is now off doing his thing somewhere else.
Purpose: unknown — because he wanted to?
My Conclusion: Since there is no purpose to life other than possibly to sustain life, why would I bother doing anything except that which makes me feel good?

Theory C: God created a base universe which exploded into being and has now evolved from the basic creatures he originally created — but is an impersonal God and is now off doing his thing somewhere else.
Purpose: unknown — because he wanted to?
My Conclusion: Since there is no purpose to life other than possibly to sustain life, why would I bother doing anything except that which makes me feel good?

Theory D: God created the universe, earth, people, plants, animals, etc whether in the blink of an eye and/or had evolutionary mechanisms in place for more growth and is a personal God, with a vested interest in our welfare, wants to know and have relationship with us and wants us to have a passionate, fulfilling life.
Purpose: unknown — I postulate that because of the fullness of his relationship and the deep creativity, God wanted to share that with others.
My Conclusion: Since there is more to life than getting by, I have something I can live and strive for and relationships that are worth the messiness. I can work to build for the future because I believe the future will exist for me and for others, even after I’m not living on Earth anymore.

So my point is this — it doesn’t matter what people are taught or believe about evolution or creation unless it’s in the context of a purposed life and a relational God. If we have no bigger purpose, then we’re living for ourselves today. If there isn’t a God who cares about us and our fulfillment, then there is no morality or reason for morality — which I believes makes the argument of ‘Do what feels good as long as you don’t hurt anyone’ moot — what does it matter if I hurt anyone in the process?

Let’s not spend our energy, words and reputation fighting a battle that won’t actually change hearts, let’s choose our battles wisely and fight them with intelligence and ferocity.

I’ve noticed a trend in hollywood movies — in the romantic guy A and girl A are a couple and girl A and guy B are friends (but meant to be) there is invariably the jackass litmus test that occurs in the script: the point at which she creates a situation to out guy A as a jackass and prove that guy B is the guy she really wants to be with. You can see that in the Wedding Singer when Glenn and Julia are on the airplane and she asks for the window seat. You can see it in wedding crashers when Claire and John play the speed slap game and then Claire creates the situation later with Sack. I’ve also seen it in Speechless when Julia asks Bob what his reaction would be if his partner admitted they cheated, and it’s returned to when she asks Kevin the same question at the end of the movie.

I don’t have a thought per se on this now — it’s just interesting, though I may amend it later.

Worry is a funny beast. Not funny as in the abominable snowplow, but funny strange. As I’ve been going through the stages of frustration, fatigue, a bit of burnout and stress, I find myself worrying about things that seem absolutely huge and this afternoon had an epiphany — the things that I’m consumed about are the foil which keeps me from thinking about the things that are really bothering me. Not going to get into specifics, but there’s a situation that has been in my thoughts for quite a bit now and I find my thoughts wandering off thinking about the situation and how it’s going to work out — I just realized that it’s not the situation that I’m worried about — the situation makes for a slightly more pleasant (if not neurotic) distraction from the things that are _really_ bothering me.

It may be a defensive thing. I know that growing up I never felt truly liked by anyone and thought that if I showed myself to be really smart or really good at things that people would like me — and it was somewhat true. The problem was that I wasn’t solving my need — I needed real connection with people who loved me, to know I was loved without condition, but that I was in fact feeding the very thing I didn’t want: people liked me for what I did, not who I was. I rarely had trouble getting into a team at lunch recess, I was decently good at most sports and often got to lead and rearrange things to my liking. But there was an unquenchable need that none of that could satisfy.

As I’m considering my current situation, I have some things that I should definitely take care of and not procrastinate doing any longer and I’m finding myself asking more and more often ‘What does it matter if
does or doesn’t happen?’ … yet some of the things that need to be done may appear scary enough that instead of actually considering how to deal with that, it’s easier to be consumed with worry about something else that might be more pleasant and exciting.

The thing I’m coming to realize is that as I plan and execute for the future that I’m going to become more and more settled in the right things to do, that I will have less to worry about because the things I need to do are being taken care of and everything else is gravy.

My goals for this week:
- Get more rest
- Eat foods that my body is going to like and use better
- Drink lots of water
- Walk/Exercise at least 2x this week
- Spend time talking and listening to God every day
- Let the other stuff take care of itself.