Tuesday, April 28, 2009

we can drive it home with one headlight.

sometimes there are those days i have no words to fully explain what it is i need to say.

it's been so crazy lately. time is flying. three days and another semester is over. another year done. another chapter in my life finished.

i miss you. did you know that? we don't talk anymore. i'm waiting for the cycle to kick back in. it seems like it's taking longer this time. but strangely enough, i'm fine with that. there's this thing that i can't explain that makes me feel like it's all going to be okay.

you're going to be okay.
and so am i.
and maybe one day we'll be okay together.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Thursday, April 16, 2009

let us be loud.

"This was just a little, but in the midst of being hurt that someone had done something whack to me, I realized something unexpected that I think is true:

An act of love is amplified exponentially when it is given in response to an act of hate.

Have you ever thought about that? Have you ever thought that the greatest time to send the loudest message of love is when someone has given you a message of hate?

It's kind of counterintuitive, but it's true. When someone hates you, when someone hurts you, when someone gossips about you or steals from you, they open up this deep chasm between the two of you. They dig a canyon's worth of emotional distance, a gorge of separation that feels impossible to span.

Logic would tell you to step back from the edge of that gorge.

Rational thinking would tell you to move away from someone that is actively digging such a deep, painful expanse between where you stand and where they stand.

Reason would tell you that it's probably impossible to ever cross that distance. That years and years must pass before you can even stand on the edge and stare off into the distance at someone far away from you.

But love isn't bound by logic and ration and reason.

Love doesn't play fair and neither does God.

He calls us to love our enemies. He calls us to love the people that are far away from us. He calls us to love the difficult and the sick and the jerks. (I'm not sure if the word "jerk" is in the Bible, but I'm trusting that the Message version has it at least once.)

And the weird thing, is that I think He calls us to do that is precisely because it's the loudest way to show His love.

When you bridge a gap with love, when you step across a chasm that might have existed for decades in your family, you create a bridge that can be seen for miles and miles, generations and generations. Step out and love a close friend that's bruised your feelings and you've created an overpass on a small creek. Jump out and love an enemy that's deliberately and destructively tried to hurt everything you stand for, do you know what you do when you love that person? You create a connection that will put the Golden Gate Bridge to shame.

This is not easy. This is not simple. This is not something I am good at. I wanted to punch another dad in the face the other day at an Easter Egg hunt when his punk 5-year old pushed my daughter out of the way. But this is where I think God has me headed. And what an incredible opportunity we have when someone tells us that Christians are unloving or judgmental or hypocritical or a million other things that we've done to hurt people. We can bridge the gaps with compassion. We can bridge the gaps with surprising kindness. We can bridge the gaps with a love that doesn't make sense.

Hope is heard loudest when it's a response to hurt.

Comfort is heard loudest when it's a response to pain.

Love is heard loudest when it's a response to hate.

Let's be loud.
"

-stuffchristianslike.net
emphasis added

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

some things will never change.

a year ago things seem so much different than today.
but taken into consideration,
today and a year ago are scarily similar.

Friday, April 10, 2009

you can call it fictional if you want to.

it's amazing how much of myself i see in a book character. how much of my life is reflected between the cover of this worn paper-back book. and how much hope swells in my heart because of how the story ends.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

your opinion is so loud i can't hear the love in your words.

you think you know what is best for me.
but you don't know what makes me happy.
i'm too hardheaded and stubborn to take your advice.
especially when it is in the form of a lecture.
so while i appreciate the thought,
you should stop.
really.

i'd rather be happy now with a chance of misery later
than miserable now with a chance of happiness later.


just be my friend and support me,
in happiness and in heartache.
isn't that what friends are for?

Monday, April 6, 2009

laughing is good for the soul.

today has been the best monday i've had in ages.
package in the mail.
good calculus grades.
friends + AAR after finals.
beach plans.
interesting supper table talk in the union.
lots of text messages.
things are going to back to normal.

i love it.

Saturday, April 4, 2009

from time to time.

i do this from time to time
where i can never wake from a bad dream
i do this from time to time
where i can never say the things i mean
i do this from time to time
where i like to watch you as you sleep
i do this from time to time
where i like to think of you with me

i can hear you breathe
im feeling the shake and the sound of
my heartbeat
can't let go
do you know
i'm feeling the pain of my first love
i let it go
can't let go

Thursday, April 2, 2009

just keep me where the light is.

i am driving up 85 in the
kind of morning that lasts all afternoon
just stuck inside the gloom

four more exits to my apartment but
i am tempted to keep the car in drive
and leave it all behind

cause i wonder sometimes
about the outcome
of a still verdictless life

am i living it right?
am i living it right?
am i living it right?
why, why georgia, why?

i rent a room and i fill the spaces with
wood in places to make it feel like home
but all i feel's alone
it might be a quarter life crisis
or just the stirring in my soul

either way, i wonder sometimes
about the outcome
of a still verdictless life

am i living it right?
am i living it right?
am i living it right?
why, why georgia, why?

so what, so i've got a smile on
well it's hiding the quiet superstitions in my head
don't believe me
don't believe me
when i say i've got it down

everybody is just a stranger but
that's the danger in going my own way
i guess it's the price i have to pay
still everything happens for a reason
is no reason not to ask myself

if i'm living it right
am i living it right?
am i living it right?
why, tell me why
why, why georgia why?



john mayer matches my moods.