"Big Papa"

It has been awhile since we've posted...nearly three months. Quite a bit has happened in those months. For one (and a major one), I (Michael) received a job at Southeastern Seminary as the News & Information Specialist (writer). Without going into great detail, the position entails marketing, writing, and traveling. As a great initiator, Jade has encouraged me (by a loving kick in the butt) to take on this full-time position. Already in the second week of training, I have had to relearn my entire structure of life that was formed and reformed in the past two years while at the Seminary. As a "different chapter" in our lives, this new job will drastically change how we think about money (cause obviously we'll be making more), how we tithe, where we live (we're possibly thinking about moving into a house), helping fund missionary friends going to the field, and many other decisions. Quite humorously and on a different note, Jade is giddy about the job because we now work in the same building. She's such a girl.
Another change has also entailed from this new position: I have become the "bread-winner" in the household. By no means am I boasted about the middle-grade income I'm officially making; rather, for the past three years, Jade has been the "bread-winner." She has been so patient and loving in remarkable ways, specifically as the predominant economic supporter for us (and Eli; he eats a lot of bones). Now, I have been given a new opportunity to be, what I like to call, "Big Poppa" (hence, Notorious BIG's pic above [who sang/rapped "Big Poppa"]). Whereas Jade was "Big Mama," who brought in the dollars supporting us financially, I am now "Big Poppa" (Yes, I walk around the apartment singing "Big Poppa," which Jade refuses to sing with me). But "Big Poppa" and "Big Mama" have new responsibilities: loving God and neighbor with new financial and economic responsibilities. We (Jade and myself) must realize that money is not the root of all evil, but it is the love of money that corrupts the heart (1 Tim 6:10). So, we're praying through this new transition period as to how we can love God with slightly larger wallet.

Chance of a Lifetime

There once was and there once wasn’t a boy named Chance. Chance’s dream was to see the world, and not just see the world, but travel the world and soak in each vista, breathe the thin air of the Himalayas, touch the water of Niagra, and smell the muggy air of the Rainforest. As a child, he loved maps. He collected them, as well as globes. His father was a man who loved his child so he always bought his son a new and different map of the world each time he had to travel out of town for work. Chance would tack his maps all over his room, and each wall was filled with a different map, and even the ceiling had maps on it too so that he could lay in his bed and look straight up to see another piece of the world hanging above him. He also placed his globes around his room, he had five in all. They were beautiful. Each globe was turned perfectly so that from one point in the room he could look around and see a different section of the world from where he stood. He not only dreamed of seeing the world, but he had a passion to fulfill that dream. He knew one day he would be given the opportunity to travel the world.
Chance saw the world around him in a different light than most. He loved people and he always took time to help them the best that he could. He worked at a small town automobile shop just outside of Henderson, Arizona off of Interstate 15. And working at this shop meant that he had heard many stories of people’s travels coming from the East and going West to marvel at the ocean, or he heard about the people traveling from the West and heading East to the Big Apple, or Houston, or maybe even New Orleans. Each person’s stop at the shop was filled with a story, and each time Chance saw someone pulling in, he hoped for an amazing story. He especially loved the people whose cars were broken down. They would have their vehicle towed in, then they would sometimes have to stay two, three, or maybe even four or more hours to have their car fixed; in this amount of time, he could hear all about someone’s journey.
One day, at around 9:30 on a Friday morning, Chance was pumping a young woman’s gas while a Greyhound bus pulled in to the dusty station. It slowed down, coming to a complete and squeaky stop, and took up four parking spots in the parking lot. He pumped the last gallon of gas and took the woman’s money, never really taking his eyes off of the bus. The door slid open and a group of people stepped off of the bus. A few children were wiping their eyes from a restful nap and then squenting their eyes, attempting to open their eyes fully. Their mothers and fathers were behind them walking impatiently toward the restrooms. And the elderly followed after the children and adults. The older women and men were taking their time, not rushing anything because they had no reason to rush. They had already passed a majority of life, so they had no reason to hurry life. Everyone crammed inside of the shop, bought drinks and snacks, then made their way back outside to enjoy the sun and their refreshments. An elderly man approached Chance, and this was Chance’s opportunity to hear about the man’s travels on the bus. He greeted the man with a “Hi, how are you today, sir?”
The man cleared his throat and responded, “I’m fine today young man, how about yourself?”
“I’m great sir. We’ve been a little slow until you guys came in. Where did you guys come from?”
The elderly man chuckled, and then washed his Twinkie down with an old fashioned glass Coke. This was the only bottle the shop carried. Charles, the owner of the shop, wouldn’t buy plastic bottles or cans because he said he wouldn’t drink out of anything other than what he drank out of as a child.
The elderly man told Chance after his sip of Coke, “We started somewhere up in Kansas, done forgot the name now, but then we headed down the interstate into Colorado then backtracked down into Arizona and here we are now.”
Chance couldn’t stand it any longer, he asked in a subtle careless tone, “Where you guys headed now?”
“Oh, son, we’re going down this here interterstate a little further until we hit some road, then right off of that, we’re gonna see the Grand Canyon. It’ll be my second time seeing the Canyon. My wife and I went to see it some thirty years ago. We were coming to see if it changed any since we saw it last. You know, if it got bigger or smaller.” He ended with another chuckle, knowing what he said was humorous.
Chance imitated the man’s chuckle and said, “Oh, I see, so you and your wife are headed to see the Canyon, sort of like an anniversary thing, right?”
“No, son. You see about three months ago, she passed away and we already had this trip planned, and knowing her, she would have wanted me to go anyways. So I did. It’s a little of a rehabilitation thing for me right now. You know, the air, the mountains, the scenery, the people. God just made a beautiful world for His creation to ponder over. So, I’m here to do the pondering.”
“Doing a little pondering huh? Well, I’m sorry sir about your wife. I figured she was with you on this trip.”
“No, It’s fine son. No harm done.”
Chance glanced over to the bus and saw everyone loading up, and turned back to see if the elderly man realized the same scene, and his eyes were cast on the same as Chance’s.
“Well, I guess that’s my cue to get back on huh?”
Chance smiled, realizing his fun was over temporarily until the next visitor at the station. He looked at the old man and said, “Yeah, it seems so.”
The elderly man finished his vintage Coke, sat up from the chair, and threw the bottle away into the trash can. Then he stopped. Looked back. Then he said, “Hey, son. Do you have any plans until next week?”
Chance hesitated and then responded, “No sir. I work next week but I have vacation time anytime I wish to take it.”
The elderly man then said, “Well, this seems like your lucky day. My wife’s ticket isn’t being used, and I would love to have some company to the Grand Canyon and then to San Fransisco. The only catch is that I don’t have a ticket for you back to this place. Sorry, but you would have to find a way back home.”
Chance still was hesitating. He knew this would be an opportunity to see a piece of God’s country he had never seen. A chance to see a little piece of the world he wished to see as a little boy. But he was unsure about the time he had to spend with the elderly man. Would they get along? Would he enjoy the trip? Would he find a way back? What if this and what if that? Then he said to the man, “Sir, I would love to go but I better stick around here. They might need me in case of an emergency. You never really know about things around this area of the desert, but I thank you for the offer though.”
The elderly man understood Chance’s responsiblities but was a little upset that he couldn’t accompany him for the remainder of the trip. He told Chance, “It’s fine son. No worries. I really enjoyed the conversation with you. And hey, maybe I’ll send you some postcards of the trip.”
Chance smiled and responded, “That would be great sir. I would really enjoy that.”
The elderly man gave a smile and a quick wave as he made his way back to the bus, where he slowly boarded and took his seat.
Chance picked up the trash from the kids who decided to use the ground as their trashcan before they left, then he watched the bus continue down its south bound path. He continued to watch the bus until it disappeared into the horizon and wondered what life would have been like if he had taken the man’s offer.
A month later, Chance received postcards, and lots of them. He knew who they were from. They had all been packaged and sent at the same time. They were from all around the world! One from the Grand Canyon, San Fransisco, and a few from Oregon. Then Chance saw what he couldn’t believe. There was one from Paris. Another from Russia. One from Spain. One from Ireland and they continued on and on. He couldn’t believe it! The old man decided to travel the world for the past month, but he never told Chance about these expected travels. Then Chance began to read the postcards. The elderly man signed each postcard with his name that Chance never knew. It was Evan. And Evan had all of the postcards in order from his travels. Chance began to read about the man’s journey from around the world. He realized that the man never had intentions to travel the world. He expected to only see half of the West and then head home. But once he arrived in Oregon, he had an offer from a woman who had just won tickets from the radio station for a trip around Europe that began the next week, but she was unable to go due to her children, husband, and job. So, she offered them to Evan, and obviously, Evan took them but had much reluctancy before taking them from the woman’s hands. There were two tickets. He offered many people to join him across Europe but everyone thought it was a gimmick. They never believed the elderly man with a free ticket to join him around the world. Evan wrote about the amazing time he had and had wished that Chance could have joined him throughout the trip. Then, it hit Chance. The IT was regret. It was sharp and painful. He just realized that he could have fulfilled his long time passion and dream but gave it up. He said no. Turned his cheek to the man who offered him a small time of fun, which turned out to be an unforgetable trip around the world! He couldn’t believe what he had done. His chance, his opportunity was before him and he threw it away. He made up excuses because he was afraid of the journey. He literally gave up a chance of a lifetime.

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Sometimes, we are placed in these predicaments. More often than we realize, we are given an opportunity, a chance, but how we take it is in our choice. A dream like Chance’s is great but if we are placed face to face with chance, how will we act upon it? Dreams and passions are beautiful, and I believe God gave us both in order to hope, in order to glance at a future that is beyond our comprehension. We all have dreams and passions, but some of us have a harder journey finding our passions in life. Within our passions, we are going to be given a chance to live for them. Passions are separate from dreams. Passions carry our hearts, while dreams carry our minds. It’s benefitial for every human to have both. But if we simply think about our passions and dreams, and never act upon them, then what’s the use of having either? We are all going to be called to act, and how we act on chance will influence our lives forever.
The character Chance in our story was given his own name: chance. It seemed small to him in the moment, but isn’t that how we characterize each chance given to us? Insignificant? Trifling? Casual?
But what would have happened if Chance acted on his chance? A different world would have opened up. His passions and dreams would have been fulfilled. Chance, in his childhood, was willing to do anything to fulfill his passions, yet in his adolescence, he looked over his opportunity to fulfill the greatest dream he ever had. And I think that is often a common attribute of all people. We forget what our real passions are because we have “grown up” too much. We are sucked into this world of “work” and not enough “play” or even not enough “serving.” If Chance was a child and asked the same question by Evan, he wouldn’t have hesitated. He would have taken the opportunity on the spot. But this is what we do as adults, as individuals who have forgotten the passions that God Himself has laid on our hearts. We worry about the future and how we are going to get back to where we are once God lays before us an odd possibilty. Let me tell you something, God isn’t worried about getting you back to where you already are. He’s worried about progression, prosperity, and growth into the human being He originally created you to be. He desires for you to be this human of hope, of dreams, of passions, of glory, of love, of forgiveness, of mercy, and of beauty. His truest desire is for you to become more like Him. When God gives us a chance, we can’t worry about the future, because He already has it all planned out for us. So forget about worry, forget about doubt, because He’s going to take care of you no matter where you are because He is worried about your soul’s progression and prosperity.
So why do we second guess chance? I believe it is because we are stable in our little world. The reason we’re afraid of chance is because chance often leads to change, and the world is terrified of change, even when it’s for the best. And like Chance, when we fail to act on chance, our bodies produce a feeling called regret. The funny thing about regret is that sometimes we fail to learn from them. We even continue to not only make more bad choices but more regrets.
Chance is an opportunity. It’s a probablilty that believes the glass is either half-full or half-empty. And depending on our mindset of being either optimistic or pessimistic greatly effects the outcome of chance. When we give attention to chance, we are not only effecting ourselves but the entire world as well. The world works off of rules. Rules are somewhat reliable, meaning they are fixed. For instance, gravity will always effect us, and rain will always be falling somewhere. The world is full of cause and effect. The rules of earth can’t be broken, but with God, they can be bent.
There is no chance with God, but with hope and faith, there is always perfect will. Sometimes we allow chance to take its own path; we wait until it has done its damage, then we sit back and say, “It was destined to happen.” But what if it was within our power to step in and make sure that whatever did happen not happen? We can change the outcome of chance. If we act from God’s command, there will never be a statistic for some scientist to record, there will be perfection.
Chance has this bad reputation of being an opportunity of little hope. When in reality, chance is based on the effort of an ideal. What I mean is that if we really wish to allow the world to run its path, and permit chance to be exactly what we expected of it, then all effort is gone to exactly what we wished to happen. If we desire for chance to be fate, then the outcome reflects our efforts. Just like the saying, what you sow is what you reap.
Chance is an option, but more than this, it is a test of what we believe in. How we act upon chance mirrors the person we are or the person we are becoming. How we act on chance even reflects our relationship with the world and God. It is an opportunity to reflect God’s heart and the will He has for the world. In every right action from chance, we are developing into who God inevitably made us to be. We are perpetually being transformed into the the care-giver, the burden bearer, the humble, the lowly in Spirit to serve those who need love the most, and we are even being transformed into Christ Himself.
After each thump of your heart, God is reminding you that He gave you a heart to change the world, regardless if the world is willing to change. Don’t get me wrong, I believe God loves chance. It gives Him the opportunity to use us in order to show the world that the glass in neither half-full nor half-empty, but rather with Him, it is always overflowing.

Fear

“Never be afraid…
An amateur built the Ark and professionals built the Titanic.”

I’ve had this overwhelming fear of heights. I hate them. I have had many experiences when I’ve been on what seemed an “unsturdy bridge” in my mind, while hovering a hundred or so feet in the air. Or it may be near the railing of a level (above three floors) that makes my butt-hole pucker. And the crazy thing is is that I only fear heights when I’m standing on something that is man-made. Bridges. Near railings of a level higher than the second floor, or maybe the third, depending on my fear level for the day. And I can’t forget ropes. I don’t know why I climb to a great height on a rope and then forget that I’m some sixty feet in the air then freak out. My fear problem has never been a threat when I’m hiking. The trail I’m on may come to a cliff and I will look over it, carefully, but still I’m not terrified as much as I would be standing on a bridge at the same height. I’m a very adventurous guy, so I’m always hiking, climbing, and camping. I’ve never been subject to my fear of heights when I was hiking. I guess what it all boils down to is that I trust God’s sturdy earth and rock underneath my feet versus a man-made walking bridge of rope and wood. I mean, the Titanic sank, right? So whoever says the bridge isn’t going to break is an idiot.
I realized one day that I don’t have a fear of heights. What I have a fear of is the fall from a great height. I love heights. There are greater views of God’s earth from a higher altitude, and I love hiking to a peak and soaking in God’s glory with my eyes, body, and soul. And so, I understand now that what people really fear is really the deeper concept within their fears, just like mine. For example, some individuals don’t have a fear of elevators; they have a fear of the cable snapping, and while they are in the tin box, they’re afraid of the plummet to the bottom of the shaft to their death. Or they may fear the small area in an elevator, as if they are contained or trapped, but they don’t fear the elevator itself. Our fears are commonly misunderstood even by ourselves.
Fear itself is powerful. It has the power to stop us in our tracks, sometimes literally! Fear can bring so much torture to one person that it can paralyze them from moving. Also, fear can be the greatest exhilaration for his/her body. Some individuals feed off of fear. It becomes their excitement and adrenaline rush in whatever act that they are doing. I don’t think people that parachute from planes really enjoy the fall from 10,000 feet, as much as the endorphins that are being released into their body from the fear they are experiencing.
People of the Christian faith have really misinterpreted and misunderstood what it means to fear God. The beginning of my journey with God began with a pastor illustrating an easily disturbed God waiting to tear my life apart if I wasn’t obedient every second of my life. So, yeah, this is how I spent my Sundays in a Southern Baptist church for three years. And yes, we had hell fire and brimstones to keep the place warm in the winter. My pastor was presenting the congregation a God of supreme power that was willing to impair His creation because He had the power to do so. I would attend church every Sunday and have many questions about all of this God stuff, but I never opened my mouth to ask them because I was too terrified of God, and also the stupid looks from the person I was questioning. I came to know Christ because I was frightened that God would hurt me in some way if I didn’t accept Christ before it was too late. I now call my step into the faith “conversion by concusssion.” I was scared into
unconsciousness in order to follow God according to their rules. So, I’m not sure if I actually accepted Christ fully at that moment because I was unconscious. I hate that I was shown the faith in this manner, but now I’m joyful that I know that Christ is in my life but with a much different perspective of Whom God really is. I definitely do not wish for anyone to come to know Christ through this way, because I know now that my God is a God of infinite compassion, a God of Love, and a God that is so awesome beyond measures. So why do people still represent God as a Spirit to be feared as we fear things on earth?
As I said earlier, fearing God is one of the most misunderstood meanings of the Bible. When we hear the word fear, we think automatically of what we would say respectively to a seven year-old tricker treater at our door on Halloween: “Oh, you’re so scary! You’re making me tremble and afraid of your terrifying-looking face.” Scary. Tremble. Afraid. But the word fear in “fear God” or “fearing God” has a much different meaning. The Hebrew word for fear is yir’a, meaning reverence and obedience for God, and to hate all that is evil. There are instances in the Bible of fear as we fear a spider or in my case, heights, but this fear is correlated to fear of men and earthly terrors. I have failed to come across a verse that calls people of faith to fear God in trembling or in a terrified manner. I’m not exactly sure as to why pastors and churches continue to teach about a God Who we should fear for our life over, especially when our God is not a God of hatred but a God of love (1 John 4).
We have pastors teaching about this God Who is out to condemn us if we don’t obey Him, and this is a major problem for those who know God, because
they become paralyzed from fearing a God of terror. Trepidation is the word to define how we act when we are presented with terror or fear. Trepidation means trembling or hesitancy. If we are teaching generations to fear God with trembling, then how can we expect them to go out and preach His word when they are too afraid to move? How can this way of teaching further the kingdom of God if he/she is sitting still? Jesus in Matthew 28 commanded His disciples to “Go and make disciples of all the nations,” so how can a person be told to tremble before God and ‘go and make disciples’ at the same time? It’s impossible. It’s two different commands that are polar opposites. In the act of trembling, we are sitting still and immobile, and physically, it’s pretty hard to tremble while moving.
Fear, as we are to understand its true identity, is reverence. It is obedience. It is the hatred of all that is evil. When we fear God, we are positioning ourselves with God. I’m not saying that we are raising ourselves up to His majesty or above His own head, but rather, I’m illustrating that we are aligning ourselves with our Creator. Remember fear is also a hating and shunning of evil; therefore, we are aligning ourselves and seeing through God’s eyes.
I love this definition of alignment that I came across recently, and I believe it speaks to the alignment we long for with God: The process of adjusting parts so that they are in proper relative position. When we are aligning ourselves with God, we are adjusting parts so that they may be connected with God. Fearing God is a commandment given to us by many stewards and prophets of God, and also by God Himself; but in fearing God, we are called to be stewards, men and women of action to fear God. God reminds us that He placed fear into the hearts of his people, so that they may not turn from Him (Jeremiah 32:40), but also, it is a call for us, His people, to fear God (Ecc. 12:13). We must put effort in fearing God because so often His fear is forgotten and covered by our earthly worries and doubts.
Followers of Jesus can have a fear of God, which means they are scared to death of Him, and they can also fear God, which, like we said earlier, is a reverence for Him. When followers have a fear of God, but do not fear God, they’re stagnate in their faith, because they are afraid to act. They hear His voice, yet they can’t clearly determine what to do once they’ve heard it because they’re scared. When we are afraid to act, whether we don’t know if it is right or wrong, we become fixed and motionless. When followers of Christ have a fear of God, it reflects either a continuance of life full of sin, or that they have never been taught about the infinite compassion of God.
Also, some Christians often translate the phrase fear God as fear His wrath. For instance, my phobia of heights isn’t actually a fear of heights but rather a fear of falling from heights. It’s my misunderstanding of what I really fear, and like many Christians do, we translate fear God as fear His wrath. Again, we are being told to fear what we should not fear in the first place.
Misunderstanding fear has a great effect on our spiritual life. When we fear what we shouldn’t, then our souls become lethargic and concern free. When wholly, our souls were meant to be stirred and stirring in the world. We are to become energetic and enthusiastic for the expansion of God’s glory and also, God’s concerns should be our concerns as well.
There is a great quote that I have no clue who said it but it speaks of fear. It states, “What you fear is what you are subject to.” Well, what are your fears? Spiders? Dogs? Ghosts? Clowns? People? The color yellow? Whatever the fear may be, you are subject to them whether you choose to be or not. Whether I like it or not, I’m subject to falling from heights, and always will be because I’m not sure if I can overcome my fear. But more than my fear of falling, I fear God. Therefore, I am subject to Him, and I will always succumb to His being. And in 1 John 4:18, the Bible says that “there is no fear in love but perfect love casts out fear.” The word love in this verse is God, because we are told in the verse preceding that “God is love” (v. 17). Once we learn from our hearts that we already fear God (Jer. 32:40), then we will no longer fear anything, not of this world or any other, because God casts out earthly fear from His perfect love. I mean, when we are subject to God, then who or what can frighten us, because we have an amazing God on our side, profiting the world, through us, with His abundance of love, passions, and even His hate of evil. Never be afraid, because an amateur built the Ark and professionals built the Titanic.

The Weight of Life

So, how much does human life weigh? I am not asking for your weight or size, but the serious question…how much does life weigh? Is it even measurable? or for the fact of reality, physical enough for us to place it on a scale? We are amongst a world of logic. There is always an inquiry as to what a substance is, what it is composed of, how many carbon atoms it encompasses, how many elements it has, and so on and so forth. Scientists, as well as ourselves, are incessantly attempting to break down reality into comprehensible matters. Like I said, we are a world sucked into logic, but don’t worry, the world has always been this way. Life in so much more interesting and intrensic when we feel within our gut that there is meaning to life. On the contrary, when we feel amiss, then there seems to be a different judgement within the gut…this feeling is one of fear and panic. The face of this belief is that the guise of the world is the only reality to people. Appearance is reality, therefore this is the answer and dread of their daily routine.
It’s hard for me to understand this idea of the world. I can’t look at the existence before my eyes and say to myself, “Well, here it all is and there’s nothing more!” When in fact, knowing deep within my soul, there is so much more, at it’s core, there are unfathomable meanings we may never understand, and in other cases, the reality that is understood is so beautiful that the soul smiles. When I look upon the reality before me I think, “God, you’re one amazing Being that put us on earth for us to play, to worship You, to smile, to laugh, to cry, to see the good in all people, and not to measure the beauty before us, but to admire each creation that is perfectly positioned on this Green Rock.” This is how I feel about the world that flows around me.
A few days ago, we had the first taste of spring here in Middle Tennessee. That night, knowing that it was calling for showers, I wrapped my Columbia jacket around my body and decided to take Eli for a walk. The time was around 11:30 and the moon was masked every few minutes by the quickly passing clouds. The air was warm, perfect for a spring rain to fall, and we began walking around the property of my apartment complex. Eli, as usual, was pulliing me around so that he could pee on every pole and tree we passed. Five minutes into the walk, it began to rain, not a hard rain or drizzle, but a gentle shower like the weatherman predicted (which is unusual because they tend to get everything a little wrong!). But the rain didn’t hurry my trip. I was soaking in the moment. I lifted my head high as the raindrops fell into my eyes and on my face and body. I was experincing one of those moments that are extraordinary, as if you know God is right beside you, whispering in your ear, “I’m here with you.” I had little bodies of energy run up and down my back and legs. These are some of the significant instances that beautify this present life. I didn’t care about getting wet or catching a sickness, but my soul was sharing time with God; I whispering my imperfections, telling Him what’s going on in my life, and He responding with a soft and educated voice, “It’s ok my child, I still love you.”
Don’t think I’m some lunatic that escaped from the loony bin, but I know God was there in that walk with me. This was as if He took a break within His hectic day to spend time with His creation, a one on one experience with me. These occurrences are magnified by the soul and I believe we truly understand in these experiences that God takes care of us, that He is always willing to talk to us if we’re eager to listen. But more importantly, this is valued forever, until our last minutes on earth.
Can you remember or take from your mind an experience like this? I’m sure you can because I believe everyone is involved with moments such as these. Think for a second about the memory and close your eyes in order to truly capture the moment. It’s amazing huh? It’s hard, or should I say impossible, to erase from our minds these connections with God. This is a value of life. To live from the soul is a value of life, to include God within your life is a value, to drink in the moments He endows to you is a value of life, and I could go on and on. As Erwin McManus beautifully states, “At your core you are a spiritual being of infinite value. To be human is a gift. You are created by God, and you have immeasurable value to him.”
When was the last time you measured the value of your life? It’s important to believe that you’re not worth a million dollars, but the fact that you’re priceless.

The Power of Weakness

I’ve never been able to comprehend how the men competing in the World’s Strongest Man lift five hundred pounds of weights or seven hundred and fifty pounds of beer kegs without breaking a bone or tearing a number of muscles in their body. With the aid of steroids, these men become extraordinarily strong.
While watching the show one afternoon, I noticed how each of them walks. It is absolutely hilarious. They are like waddling ducks with no hair and boasting massive veins. They are literally trying to move around the swollen masses attached to their own bodies. Then, I began to wonder: what would these large, testosterone-induced men look like minus the steroids, the protein, and the years of weight-lifting? Would we notice them or would we pass by them like the average Joe walking down the street? Would they still have this Hercules-like strength or have normal strength like you or me? I’m not sure of the answers to my questions but I do know that I still prefer the body I’m in. The somewhat normal 5’, 10 ½”, 145 pound body that gets me around this world just fine and dandy. These extra-muscled men might find myself as weak and little (which I kind of am), but I find great power in weakness.
I was reading a now favorite author of mine a couple of days ago. I came across some great lines written by the man himself, Brennan Manning, in his book, The Ragamuffin Gospel. He is expounding on the idea of understanding our inner-being; the kind of person we know we are but once we find another small aspect of our own life, we continue to gain knowledge about the person we are or are not. In other words, we are perpetually mastering the self.
He writes, “(A)s you go through life, if you acquire any self-awareness, any kind of honest insight into your own personality, you know pretty well what your weaknesses are” (176).
A few chapters earlier of this quote, Manning provides his definition of honesty. He states, “(H)onesty simply asks if we are open, willing, and able to acknowledge our truth” (143). Therefore, once we gain a true, open, and willing acknowledgement of our self, we will lift the veil that covers our weaknesses. When we are able to confess our weaknesses, we can gain and grow toward a stronger, more integrated being. Hence, we gain power once we understand our feebleness.
Jesus teaches us about weakness in Matthew 26. We read in this chapter that He is scolding Peter for his inability to stay awake while He is agonizingly praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. His statement is a powerful message to those who live in a material world (which this includes pretty much everybody). While Peter and the disciples lie in the Garden dozing into another world, Jesus confronts Peter. He states, “What! Could you not watch with Me one hour? Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matt. 26:40-41). The Spirit willing yet the flesh weak.
The Greek term, pneuma, is translated as spirit. Spirit, according to the Greeks, is actually interpreted as “wind” or “breath.” Their language denotes so much more than the basic words of our everyday English usage. Latin is much more developed and dynamic. Put into context in Matthew 26:41, Spirit (pneuma) could be defined as the seat of perception, feeling, or state of mind, or as we inveterate English speaking people understand: this is the ego, the personality, or the character inside each one of us.
Jesus is illustrating that the pneuma or the ego is steadfast and active while the flesh, the body, will always have an unsatisfied hunger. The flesh is puny and temporary, never able to be fully complete no matter how much we yearn to fulfill its desires and wants. We can’t trust what the body wants but we can listen to the pneuma, the “Breath” whispering to us the certainty of life, the Truth before us, and the guarantee of what is greater to come.
So next time you are having problems with the ever-chaotic world, be sure to watch, pray, and be eager to listen to Him and the “wind” that feeds the fire to your heart and soul.

Middle of the Road

The memory is so vivid that is seems like yesterday. I was given a somewhat new red, Ford Ranger. Like most teenagers at this moment, they think they rule the world (or should I say the ‘rule the road’). It was perfect for the person I was: a mediocre country boy with the liking to dress up every once in a while. It could be rugged so I could take it through a muddy field or I could clean it up to shine under a Friday moon. I loved it. I was blessed enough to have my step-father pay for it at the dealership and I would pay him back as I made a little money (and hopefully I will pay him back the full amount one day).
Unfortunately, there was a drawback to this wonderful moment. The truck was a five-speed and I had absolutely no clue how to drive such a machine. It didn’t seem too complicated but I had to learn because it was now ‘my truck.’ So, being the wonderful mother she is, she offered to teach me how to drive the truck. I hopped into the driver side and she into the passenger side. I am not sure to this day but I think she had nerve pills slipped into her purse for emergency purposes. She guided me through the steps: holding in the clutch in order to start the truck, always having it out of gear when I started it, and pulling the emergency brake before I took it down the road. Once it was started she explained the concept of the clutch and gas and how I must slowly release the clutch and slowly press down the gas; this is the most difficult aspect of driving a five-speed for the first time, no matter who you are. If you have experienced driving a clutch and you didn’t cut the engine off because you released the clutch too quickly, then I commend you, but I doubt there is such a person. Long story short, I learned how to drive my truck within hours and I still have it to this day.
But I’m not writing an instruction manual on ‘how to drive a stick-shift’ but rather set up a story that each one of us were or are or going to be apart of. It is truly human to face this problem. If you have not met this situation then I hope I enlighten you in some way to cope or handle the situation when you stumble upon it. I know without a doubt that each person has or is stumbling on the subject I am about to present: Our Life and God.
It seems like a funny thing to say sometimes but I tended to stray from the most important Person in my life: God. And there are many reasons why I do so. You can ask yourself the question, “why do I not serve God with all my strength?;” and you might find many humiliating answers…I do. Like every human on earth, I focused my attention on the most important person I know: ME. The #1, I, not you but ME, the self, and you can name myriads of answers to show how much we love ourselves. Don’t get me wrong, we should love ourselves and be confident in our bodies but I tended to be in love with myself, only persuing what I wanted and not what God wanted. I am not preaching to you at all, because I was that person and too often, I feel like I slip back into him.
I will give an example of what I am speaking about. Yesterday, I was on my way to Nashville to meet a friend when I noticed a hitchhiker on the side of the road before my exit to get on the interstate. And what did I do? Kept driving. I saw his thumb pointing towards the sky and his arm lifted, his bag, his worn clothes, but I kept driving. It seemed like I ran into an invisible wall that he was holding up with his arm. As soon as I hit his wall my mood quickly altered to guilt and sorrow. I was not being the Christian Jesus has taught me to be. And you know what my reason was why I didn’t give him a lift? Because I was afraid I would have been late for my appointment. Not because I was afraid of him killing me (as many think about when picking up a stranger) and not because I didn’t want to talk to someone. I was simply thinking about myself and my appointment.
In this country, we drive on the right side of the road, but often I find myself in the left lane dodging oncoming cars or sliding out of conrol in the rocks that border the road itself. (This is figurative writing, so don’t think I literally am a bad driver.)
In my junior year of high school, I was out of control. Not many people know of this past of mine. Like the world historically had its Dark Ages, well, this year of my life was my Dark Age. I literally fell off the precipice of Life and not many people knew or know.
I had a good friend that was the motivation for my actions, not the cause. I believe it was my own fault for the acts I did and it was my choice to either be apart of the option or be the alternative. I chose to do them in effect to be “one with the crowd.”
Imagine this: You are looking at a silver, shiny ball on the ground. So bright you can’t help but notice it. You approach the ball and notice the light reflecting off of its side into your eye. Every movement you make around the ball creates the light to bounce off of that particular side into your eye, but no matter the point you stand at, there will always be a side to the ball that retains darkness. The sun’s light can not reflect over the entire ball. This ball is me during my Dark Age. The people around me saw the light, which was the good, honest, and polite Michael, not knowing there was somebody else on the other side.
My darkness involved drugs, alcohol, deception, foul language, and the sinuous list could fill up the rest of this book. I was at the point where I would drink beer every Saturday night with my friends, not socially, but enough that it was probably in my system until the next weekend. Many days before school, I would leave earlier than usual to smoke a joint before the long day. But marijuana wasn’t the drug that I think governed my life, it was cocaine.
I was around a few friends one afternoon after school, and one of them pulled out this bag that resembled flour. My brain hesitated for a second and then I realized what the substance was. Cocaine. I had never seen it before in my life except on television when a cop would bust some crackhead walking down the street. But there it was before my eyes. My conscience was already telling me, “don’t do it!” I had done marijuana previously and plenty of times but I knew that this drug was something harder and it ruined many people’s lives. As my friend chopped up the drug and seperated it in perfect lines on a mirror, I knew I wasn’t going to snort one. I just couldn’t. I was afraid of what it would do to me, my life, my future. So as everybody quickly inhaled their share into their lungs, it was passed to me. I told them, “not today, I don’t feel like it.” That was my way of acting macho enough to brush it off so I didn’t have to snort my portion. A friend scolded me, “Ah! Your afraid of it, aren’t you? It isn’t any worse than that stuff you smoke all the time!” But I quickly told him no again and pushed the mirror from my face hoping he would pull it away and snort the line himself. He continued to aggitate me about the situation and quickly breathed in the cocaine himself. But that wasn’t it. He said to me next, “if you aren’t going to do a line, then lick the bag that it was in and see if you like it.” Figuring that it was less potent than the drug, I didn’t hesitate. I grabbed the bag and shoved it into my mouth to roll it around my toungue. It was very bitter, like nothing I had ever tasted before. They all laughed and pointed while watching me chew on the bag like it was my last dinner before I was going to the electric chair. It made my mouth numb to the taste as well as any feeling in my mouth. This was my first experience with the drug and certainly not my last.
I started to get braver and was doing lines with a straw rather than chewing on the paper it came in. I even had my own personal straw. It wasn’t actually a straw, it was the cover to a pen. We would gut the pen of its ink and conceal the “straw” in our back pockets for convenient use. I could not even begin to count how many times I did cocaine but it was very few, especially compared to those who did it at the time. Why do I consider it the drug that ruled my life, even though it wasn’t a daily routine? Because of the effects and affects it continues to have on my life to this day. I haven’t touched the drug since that year and if I think about the substance for more than a second, my mouth begins to water. This is a sign of addiction and I know that it could rule my life if I allowed it.
Today, I have a greater Ruler in my life, Christ. He is my Savior that has opened another road for me to travel so that I don’t have be apart of my Dark Age. As Robert Frost writes in his poem, The Road Not Taken:
“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could…
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim…
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back…
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
Frost writes of himself traveling down a path and he comes to a fork. He hesitates about which one he should travel but he decides on his second choice never knowing if it is “as just as fair”…but he belives it is the “better claim.” His conclusion speaks to my soul. He took the path “less traveled,” but this choice has “made all the difference.” He never knew where the other road would have taken him in life but he, like myself, believes, from the present life we are surrounded by, that it was the correct selection.
Even though I may veer to the left or to the right in life, I must remember to allow God to steer my soul, heart, and life; I should not use my own strength and steer where I see my future. He will keep me on the right side and guide my life in places I thought I would have never been; For example, lending a ride for a hitchhiker or possibly helping a kid with his drug addiction. I never captured my life as one who would struggle with drugs, with love, with hope, with fear, with happiness. Through Christ I have been given another chance at this life, and the sins that I believed never could have been washed away…well, they are.

Little Vegas

I’m laying on my twenty five dollar bed. That’s half of the price I split for this small, yet luxorious room. My bed is a single that I paid for for a night in the Holiday Inn in Gatlinburg, Tennesssee. My friend Ben and I decided to stay a night in the city that most consider as the “Tourist Trap of Tennessee.” I prefer to call it “little Vegas.” Gatlinburg is carved into a valley between two major hills, according to the locals, even though they aren’t very tall, they are called mountains not hills. There is one main street that splits one side of the city from the other. Millions of little twinkling lights fill the city as if Clark Griswold decorated it. Souveneir shops, candy stores, and eateries are squeezed into the smallest possible space in order for their name to be seen as the thousands of people walk the strip each day. Fun lines every corner and there is never enough money and time to experience everything in one trip.
But tonight, I’m not outside with the glow of lights against my face or in the middle of the thousands that came to see the extravagent city. Rather, I’m warm in my twenty five dollar bed with my good friend to my right and my Dalmatian, Eli, at my feet asleep.
Let me tell you a little about Ben. First off, he is a great guy. Very understanding, athletic, and willing to help a guy whenever he asks for it. His stature is pretty massive. He’s built like Lurch from the series, The Munsters, and I believe somebody actually gave him that nickname sometime in high school. He is a little lower than the heavens, about 6’ 5” to be exact. Very strong body, not someone I’d say the wrong thing to. At first glance, you would figure he was clumsly, not athletic, and never knew what a razor was. I glance over at him, only to notice my eyes hanging low as my mind wonders wild. I can only imagine the views my eyes will see as we hike tomorrow, and especially, the pain my body will endure. The beauty God lays on my eyes will make me only wish and want more.
As time passes in this hotel, Ben and I only inch closer and closer toward the Appalachian Trail in the Great Smoky Mountains. We are like two twins counting down to their birthday. I absolutely love the mountains. Every aspect of them brings me much worry and pleasure. They can be terrifying, because of their great mass, their power, and their mysteriousness. Within their beauty and dangerousness, they have claimed the lives of Indians, early settlers, and adventurers; many hoping for a better life and a more stable future. Some were even killed to escape a brutal past, or a soul itching to catch a beautiful view on a vista. This country of mountains can be suffocating to one’s life, especially to those who don’t respect it.
Metaphorically, I plan to be one of these people. I hope that she kills a piece of me while I adventure her hills, trails, crevices, streams, and trees; I wish to leave a little piece of me there when I leave. A piece that is tearing my mind into thousands of pieces, a small piece that is terrorizing me. This terror is my future. “Woah!” You might say. “How can you leave the future in the past?” I’m not literally doing so. I’m trying to depart from the questions like: What does God have planned for me? Where will I be in one year? Ten years?
The constant, agonizing questions that fill my feeble and lonesome mind. I pray God will help me in this adventure, to bring my life before my eyes to show me how I can be a better servant for Him, a more faithful Christian. A new year just began, and I plan to glorify God greater than I ever have before. This trip is a trip to find my true self. This is a trip of the verse Matthew 7:7…

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“We were made to do this--not to sit in a mental or spiritual cave. Man’s destiny is to strive, to seek, and to find, and not to yield.” -Tristan Jones ( Adventurist)

I was made for this trip, a search for a deeper part of my soul that has been recently lost due to a less than Christian life. This trip is an asking, a seeking, and a knocking for God to be more developed in my life, for me to be more devoted to my Father in Heaven.
This adventure is a desire to forget past problems, to erase them from my life like Grace given to the sinner by God. God, with His grace, will cleanse my spirit, with His beautiful paint strokes upon His earth; He will show me the man He is perpetually making, the man He loves, and the greater man within myself that is needed. This escape from reality is a salvation that I’m in great need of. As a Christian, as a sinner, I am searching for only God knows what. I feel Him constantly touching my soul, and I believe He is telling me I am in need of this trip. He is leading me to this place where I know He will show me where I’m traveling in life, where I will soon discover a little piece of the person He desires for me to be.
I will make sure that I will be a personification of Matthew 7:7. I will pray, and not yield, for God to show me more, allow me to become a greater person, better Christian, a more loving individual. The verse I will continue to meditate on is Matthew 7:7...”If you ask, you will be given what you ask for. If you seek, you will find. And if you knock, it will be opened to you.”

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A little shift here. I wrote the past five and a half pages before my trip as you can tell from the great anticipation I had. The pages developed from little ideas I wrote down in a journal. From here on, I am writing in a somewhat past tense, because the trip is over, it has been finished. God has revealed Matthew to me.
The morning after our hotel stay in ‘Little Vegas,’ Ben and I loaded up the Jeep and headed thirty miles Southeast for our adventure. We finally found the Ranger Station where we were supposed to park and leave the vehicle for the amount of time that we would hike. We grabbed the backpacks from the rear of the Jeep, and not until then did we really become aware of the massive weight that would be on our backs for miles upon miles throughout the days to come. We walked one hundred feet to Chestnut Branch Trail, this is the trail that would lead us to the Appalachian Trail. In the fifty steps to the Chestnut Branch Trail, I started to realize the pain that was already shocking my body. My lower back and legs were heating up only to remind myself that I’m human. I was thinking, “Oh great! I haven’t even started the hike and my body is already aching!” As soon as we reached Chestnut Branch Trail, I said a prayer for God to deliver to Ben and me the strength to endure this journey. Matthew 7:7 constantly rang in my head. I made sure I was aware and waiting patiently for God to reveal His plans for me.
We hiked an agonizing two miles up Chestnut Branch Trail. My body has never felt or been exposed to such a challenging time in my life. I’ve been a pretty athletic guy all my life but this two mile climb, not hike but a climb, straight up was very testing, emotionally and physically. As much complaining as I’m doing, I’ll be honest: I loved it! We were in the middle of God’s country, as if we were within the vicinity of Eden and living like a couple of Davy Crocketts. Finally, we made it to Appalachian Trail. We dropped, or should I say threw, our packs to the ground to rest muscles we had never known we had. A little water and a tree stump made the perfect rest stop.
Ben said exaustingly, “I hope the Appalachian Trail isn’t as bad as what we just came up.” I nodded my head in agreement as a sucked water from my camelback.
I told him, “Even though that trip was hard, I think it was worth every step. We saw so many beautiful views.”
He laughed and said, “Yeah, but those steps hurt!”
I chuckled as a pushed this sentence my lungs, “Yeah, wait till tomorrow, the steps will really be hurting.”
He answered, “Yep they will,” knowing about the imminent pain.
We sat around for ten minutes more and decided to pick up our packs and head down the long-awaited Trail. We started the A.T. noticing that this Trail was much easier, less inclined, and overall, better for our bodies. We weaved around the sides of mountains, only resting once every two to three miles. We would grab a snack for energy, a little water to wet our dry mouths, take a few pictures, record the views on a camcorder, and then we’d pick up and go further down the Trail.
Not expecting a sudden change in direction, Ben and I managed to somewhat get lost along the way. The Trail is distinct, and there are abundant white markers on trees to guide the hiker throughout the A.T.. But we followed the Trail, only to find ourselves at a dead end. We followed the markers to the edge of nature which led to a paved road. We completely stepped out of God’s beauty and back into man-made reality. We looked around, searching for another marker but there wasn’t one. So we decided to backtrack to a place we thought would be great for our tent to stay the night, and we’d figure things out in the morning. We set up camp and made supper, finding ourselves exausted and starving from the intense exercise.
We ate our Cambell’s soup and hopped in the tent. We snuggled ourselves in our sleeping bags to take a little nap as the sun was descending past the mountain, leaving us in the cool valley for the night.
After an hour of rest, I sat up in my sleeping bag with a terrible pain in my stomach. The thoughts of me in the wilderness without medicine truly terrified me.
Ben sat up and looked at me as I cringed in pain. He asked, “What’s the matter?” in a raspy, morning voice tone.
I answered, “I have this terrible pain in my stomach and I’m not sure what to do about it.”
He laid back down, keeping his eyes open and talking to me about the situation. The feeling I had was nauseating, and I wondered if the pain would ebb. It became stronger and worry began to fill my mind. I kept asking myself, “What should I do? We already have camp set up for the night, and it might be too dark to hike back to the vehicle.”
The day’s hike, according to the map, was pretty much three-quarters of a circle. The road we ran into once we got lost was the main road we came through in order to park at the Ranger Station. So, we hiked ten miles to where we were, and we knew we were only two miles from the Ranger Station. So this information for me was a plus in a negative circumstance. I knew if I left, I wouldn’t have to hike ten miles back, but rather, just two miles down the paved road to the Jeep.
The pain became unbearable. I told Ben to start packing everything, and that we were heading down the road to the Jeep, and then we would drive ten miles to the nearest town for some medicine. He politely agreed, and asked if we were going to take down the tent. I told him that we would leave it for the night and come tomorrow to get it. So we gathered all of our things (in the dark), I clipped Eli’s leash to his harness, and we started looking for the trail markers on the nearest trees. After a couple of minutes we found one. Once on the path, I had absolutely no clue where I was going. I knew the general direction to the road, but I wasn’t certain if we were walking on the path or not. Eli, thank God, was our guide and leader. I’ve seen a few unbelievable things in my life, and this act only added to the list. He was using his nose to steer Ben and me down the Trail to the road. There was only one trail that led to the road, and he knew the path with ease. He had his head down, only sniffing the dark yet invisible route that laid before all three of us. Thankfully, because of Eli and God, they led us out of the Trail safely onto the road.
I bought my medicine in the nearest town and came to the decision that we should probably stay the night in a hotel. Which was a great choice because I was still in pain, and the temperatures, which we didn’t know at the time, were supposed to drop into the high twenties. We checked into the hotel, watched the much anticipated and dissapointing National Championship Game. Florida beat Ohio State 41-14.
I apologized to Ben for what happened in the past couple of hours. He laughed and said, “Man, you can’t do anything about that. We can’t help getting sick in this world.”
“I know,” I agreed, “but I had this whole trip built up and it literally blew up in our faces.”
He understandingly answered, “I promise you man, it’s fine. We can’t control situations such as these. They just happen.”
Ben is right. But there was a reason I started feeling sick. I believe God placed that feeling within my stomach, as a warning for something, or possibly to show that He is the One in charge of this adventure called life, and not me.
We ended up waking the next morning, going to the Trail to get the tent, and traveling back to Murfreesboro. I still felt somewhat sick, and I wasn’t attempting to push myself further up the Trail. That was it. It was a very shortened trip of two days, which was planned to be six. But as each minute passes since the trip, I unravel a new lesson God has taught me and continues to instruct me about.
I thought to myself, “What if that was all I was supposed to experience? What if the trip was only supposed to be a couple of days long? Even though I asked God to instruct me, teach me, and present my future in a way I could understand while on the trip, therefore, in my mind, I expected God to show me these things on the trip, but He was presenting them to me outside the trip. He led me away from what my ideal place to find God would be, and said, ‘Hey, you can find Me anywhere you are! You don’t have to travel 400 miles, camp in a beautiful place I created, and expect Me to speak to you about the Truth! I am here, there, and everywhere you go. Wherever you are, I am there too!’”
This knowledge that God was giving me was mind blowing. It was absolutely idiotic for me to even think that I needed 40 pounds of food and clothes on my back, hike twelve to thirteen miles a day with torturing pain in order for God to explain His plans to me. As Homer Simpson would say, “DOH!”
As I continue to dig deep and listen to the lessons God taught and is teaching me since the trip, I have found within these revelations that the answers are incessant; they literally will not stop flowing into my mind and spirit.
Here’s another revelation: Remember that feeling I had in my stomach? Well, I think it was placed there by God. He was telling me to get up, buy some medicine, and watch Ohio State get raped by Florida. Even though this didn’t sound as fun to me as staying within Nature, I had to leave; the longer I sat in that tent, the more intense the pain became. At each second guess of staying, it was as if God was throwing punches into my abdomen.
While on the trip back to Murfreesboro, Ben and I heard on the radio that Southeast Tennessee, which was the area we were hiking in, was expecting many inches of snow and plummeting temperatures. A few drastic changes in the weather had occurred since I watched the weather the day before we left for the big trip. Maybe God was also telling me, “Hey, I’m fixing to make it cold, so you better get your butt outta here! You can’t stay here any longer!” Maybe God did initiate the ache, only He knows, huh?
Continuing on with my prayer of Matthew 7:7. I understand that I made this trip to be a search and discovery of this verse. What can I say besides I’m human? I did what everyone else does; you know…make your own plans, run your own life, those sorts of things. One aspect I should have changed, is the fact that I can’t run my life without God. He has more input than me. But I guess I thought I could outwit God, you know, truly be more clever than Him. I would have been better off trying to explain to Einstein that he had this whole idea of Relativity wrong.
I also comprehend the fact that I did have my prayer answered. I did find out my future, but God didn’t give me the power to see fourteen days ahead, which would be awesome. God only presents the now to me, and I must take this information and create the best decision possible, with Him always being included in the choice. The Matthew 7:7 prayer was answered, yet in a much different way that I imagined. But isn’t this the way most prayers are answered?