Mad Farmer Liberation Front

(by Wendell Berry)

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion - put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

Thoughts - on Justice and Pilgrimage

Justice seems to be one of those concepts which is coming back into vogue - at least, social justice. Personally I've been trying to learn what it looks like to extend the ideas of "justice" and treating people fairly into the realm of art and by extension, towards artists.

There may be another post in the future devoted to this topic in greater detail.

For now:

I saw the Hannah Montana movie last night. I enjoyed it. Now, it was a bit cliché and overall really predictable if you've ever seen a conflict-of-interest-resulting-in-a-change-of-heart-movie. But it was infinitely better than I expected it to be. My point, or sentiment here is not that it was wonderful and everyone should go see it, but simply a reminder (to myself first of all) of how I tend to judge things, art, and worst of all people, based on hearsay or annoyances with elements surrounding the particular thing/piece of art/person rather than the thing/artwork/person itself/themselves. It's pretty close to slander. I shouldn't do that.

Right now I'm definitely still learning how a desire to "do justly" plays out in my everyday life - especially when it comes to the arts and culture and the implications of this desire. But I think it's a worthwhile issue to trudge through. Especially when works of art, like ideas- but to an even greater extent, are tied back to people. Many things cannot and should not be accepted or excused just because people are involved, but if people are important, we as Christians ought to take care with our words and opinions. I don't think there is a place for uninformed flippancy among God's people.

And now a quotation: (which I just found on a stick on my comp...but originally saw displayed at a sr. art show at Biola)

“Once you accept the existence of God-however you define him, however you explain your relationship to him-then you are caught forever with his presence in the center of all things...
You are also caught with the fact that man is a creature who walks in two worlds and traces upon the walls of his cave the wonders and the nightmare experiences of his spiritual pilgrimage.

- Morris West

Too Easily Pleased

A sobering quotation I stumbled across while reading Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding:

[U]pon a stricter inquiry, I am forced to conclude that good, though apprehended and acknowledged to be so, does not determine the will, until our desire, raised proportionally to it, makes us uneasy in the want of it. Convince a man ever so much that plenty has its advantages over poverty, make him see and admit that the handsome conveniences of life are better than nasty penury, yet as long as he is content with the latter and finds no uneasiness in it, he does not move...

Were the will determined by the views of good... I do not see how it could ever get loose from the infinite eternal joys of heaven, once proposed and considered as possible

....................................

However much men are in earnest and constant in pursuit of happiness, yet they may have a clear view of good, great and confessed good, without being concerned for it, or moved by it, if they think they can make up their happiness without it.

Sometimes I think there is a great danger in being too content. (Granted, life presents many scenarios in which we need the grace to be "content" with what God has given and where He has placed us)....so does C.S. Lewis...and Bono :) <-- who "still hasn't found what he's looking for." If we see this as a reminder to always press on, and go further up and further in, I think he's right.

Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

–C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

The Songs are in our Eyes

Every day I die again, and again I’m reborn

Every day I have to find the courage

To walk out into the street

With arms out

Got a love you can’t defeat

Neither down nor out

There’s nothing you have that I need

I can breatheBreathe now

- Breathe, U2 - No Line on the Horizon

Just came back from L.A. As much as I walking around big cities, I find that they exhaust me.
Oddly this post connects back to a post I wanted to write a few weeks ago after coming back from a collegiate speech and debate tournament. Somehow the two experiences, from my perspective, were fundamentally the same. A lot of comes down to 1. How/What you view yourself as and 2. Whether or not you're willing, or even able to face the world with open eyes.
I love the song Breathe because the lyrics describe a sort of life in which a person sees the world as an opportunity. He's not really looking to "get" anything - and there is a sort of freedom in that. He is motivated by the song he wants to share...
(I had the chance to share the gospel twice today and discovered that I'm not very good at it. My next thought (connected to many other thoughts about apologetics), was "Wow, being able to defend your faith is worthless if you're inept at sharing it." Both men I talked to today volunteered the information that they wanted to go to heaven, but weren't sure if God would let them in. I pulled out my Bible and shared a few verses (also realizing how poorly I navigate scripture without Bible Gateway) as well as the basic gospel story. I pray that God works through and in spite of me because I feel like my words were empty. I felt like they had closed off their souls to any sort of hope with legs. They agreed with what I said about Jesus, but it just seemed like one more piece of information. The first man, Curtis, did express his enjoyment at listening to scripture and was eager for me to pray with him - that was encouraging.)
How do we cope with brokenness?
Sometimes it's very easy to spot. For example, you're not very disillusioned about the miserable condition of some people when you walk through Skid Row. A man urinates on the sidewalk. A girl puts her shirt back on near a darkened door way. A man lies unconscious on the sidewalk as people pass by.
It's a bit harder to recognize brokenness when it manifests itself among intellectual peers - people who equate traditional Christian values with fascism. We feel like those who consistently joke about getting laid, use the f word, and consistently push limits are less deserving of respect, compassion, etc. Maybe I'm the only one that has seen that as a struggle.
Either way, it's really been on my heart recently to get to the place that I can look at people - really look at them - and just have the sort of compassionate desire for their salvation and redemption that I think Jesus would have had. Sometimes it's hard to look at people on the streets because I feel as if I can't do anything and therefore can't handle the pain. Sometimes it's hard to look at people who offend us because we have knee-jerk reactions against some aspects of who they are. Honestly, my day at the tournament a few weeks ago was made when a fellow competitor offered me a cigarette. I don't smoke and have little desire to, but it made me happy to feel like her friend - or at least someone that she'd be willing to spend more time with.

How will we change or impact or love those in "the culture" when we're not willing to get close enough to see them?

We are people borne of sound
The songs are in our eyes

Vice Verses

Vice Verses - Jon Foreman

Walking along the high tide line
Watching the pacific from the sidelines
Wonder what it means to live together?
Looking for more than just guidelines

Looking for signs in the night sky,
Wishing that I wasn’t such a nice guy
Wonder what it means to live forever?
Wonder what it means to die?

I know that there's a meaning to it all
A little resurrection every time I fall
You got your babies, I got my hearses
Every blessing comes with a set of curses
I got my vices, I got my vice verses
I got my vice verses

The wind could be my new obsession
The wind could be my new depression
The wind goes anywhere it wants to
Wishing that I learned my lesson

The ocean sounds like a garage band
Coming at me like a drunk man
The ocean tells me a thousand stories
None of them are lies

I know that there's a meaning to it all
A little resurrection every time I fall
You got your babies, I got my hearses
Every blessing comes with a set of curses
I got my vices, I got my vice verses
I got my vice verses

Let the pacific laugh
Be on my epitaph
With it's rising and falling
And after all, it's just water
And I am just soul
With a body of water and bones
Water and bones

Where is God in the night sky?
Where is God in the city light?
Where is God in the earthquake?
Where is God in the genocide?

Where are you in my broken heart?
Everything seems to fall apart
Everything feels rusted over
Tell me that you're there

I know that there's a meaning to it all
A little resurrection every time I fall
You got your babies, I got my hearses
Every blessing comes with a set of curses
I got my vices, I got my vice verses
These are my vice verses
These are my vice verses

There are clothes all over the floor. Dishes are piled on the counter. The television is on. Girls are laughing (loudly).

In the middle of the clothes and the dishes and the television we are sitting on the floor, talking about the meaning of life.

And now the water for broccoli is boiling and we're standing here drinking tea and asking God to save us from ourselves.

This is the stuff of life - the stuff that cant be ignored - the stuff that makes rolling out of bed a movement of meaning.

Praying for war

Yesterday I payed that God would give me battles to fight. Today - halfway through the day that is when I finally made time to pray - I prayed the same. 

A few hours later I found myself in the kitchen severely questioning the sanity of those petitions. 

Is it arrogant to ask  for battles?

Isn't daily living enough of a challenge? ( Ironically enough I'm wondering these things as I'm attempting to multi-task a.k.a do anything + exhibit the fruits of the Spirit) Why am I asking God for a battle when I feel like I mostly fail at living well? 

I could be very wrong in my conclusion, but a few moments into this mental conversation, it did occur to me that apparently battle-filled days might be no different from all the others in every respect save one.  It could just be that today I noticed that I was in the battle I face daily. 

As someone who does experience "happy days" ( when it seems like everything is wonderful even when things go wrong circumstantially - something I attribute to grace) I do think we are able to heavily experience the effects of grace from time to time and rise above the clamor of " sin which so easily entangles."  Most days however are spent in the trenches and it seems like we ought to notice. 

This thought may not apply to those who have more fully put on the new man and participate more entirely in the life of Christ, but I'm pretty sure I'm still in the needing to notice the battle stage. 

I'm probably praying for the wrong thing, but I think God is ok with feeble attempts as a starting point. I know I don't want to sleep-walk through life, even though the thought of waking up is rather daunting. 

Encouraging Thoughts:

"There are times when there is no illumination and no thrill, but just the daily round, the common task. Routine is God's way of saving us between the times of inspiration. Do not expect God always to give you His thrilling moments, but learn to live in the domain of drudgery by the power of God." - My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers

I wanted to save the world... so I got a tattoo

Perhaps it's the fact that I'm 20....(still in the young and foolish category by most estimations) which hands me so many days characterized by restlessness - days in which I just want to do something. 

"...Blood is fire pulsing through our veins, we're either riders or fools behind the reins..."

I've tossed around the idea of "contentment" quite a bit in the past year. I've thought about the virtue of being satisfied with where you are in life, as well as the merits of refusing to settle for less than the possible.  [ Mostly I think it's good to sing along with U2 and be in the place where you still haven't found what you're looking for. Otherwise it seems like you will think you've "arrived" in a way which contradicts Paul's determination to not think he'd obtained perfection yet, but to press on towards something greater.]

I fear that I am too easily pacified. I will see needs in the world, be drawn to care about certain individuals, and wish to make the effort to change. I want to radically love people, wear myself out in ministry, converse with those whose lives are only distantly connected with mine and ultimately change the way I live in order to become the sort of person I believe to be good. 

Instead I'm afraid I channel my energy towards cheap catalysts which weakly mimic actual good.  Knowing that it's a bit "out there" or "radical" I might tattoo of a phrase like Imago Dei or Kyrie Eleison somewhere on my body in order to fully embrace their symbolic meanings in hopes that my life will incarnate such truths.  Knowing that I must really care about the meaning of that phrase or symbol (in light of the fact that it will look tacky in 20 years) almost makes it worse. I feel as if I've done a great deed.  Realistically, have I done anything more than quell an intense desire to do something through self-oriented action? Perhaps. ( it's a rhetorical question ;) ) 

Thoughts for your consideration. 

"Socrates was perfectly right when he declared that there is a direct short-cut to winning a reputation: 'make yourself the sort of man you want people to think you are' " - Cicero, On Duties