Nostalgic Night

Hello Blogging World -

I seem to be feeling nostalgic tonight as I try to figure out specifics of the next steps I am taking in my life.  That's where the nostalgia begins...At one point in time, I was absolutely certain of where I was headed.  In fact, last night, I dreamed of being in a small, old practice room on the bottom floor of Ellis Hall, where I began my college journey.  In high school, I determined that I was going to school to be a music educator and that was that.  I devoted every spare and waking moment to pursuing that goal.  I spent several weeks where I put over 300 hours into my music.  I practiced the flute until my hands were beyond repair and my eyes darted to and fro reading music.  I would go to school early to practice and stay after school late to practice and then go home and practice and practiced again around 11:30pm, which was a given practice time-every night.  Regardless.  I was certain and I devoted myself to it.  Now, I can't even remember the last time I spent an hour practicing my flute though there have been a few times where I have picked it up or played a tune for my guys.  I just can't hardly believe that I devoted myself to it to the extent I did and now I do nothing for it.  I am quickly reminded why I miss it so much!

I had an absolutely amazing band teacher for two years of high school.  The very first time she challenged me with a piece for contest, it was certainly a challenge not because of the technicality of the piece but because of the story the piece had to portray.  Every piece has a story.  Whether it is a story you give it or that you must portray through it, the music takes all you've got for those 3 minutes.  From that point on, I poured all of who I was into the music.  The music shaped who I was and I shaped the music.  Not only that, but my faith, my religion, my belief in God was poured through the music that came from the instruments I played.  And inadvertently, part of who I was got left behind when I left the music program at Missouri State University.  Crazy enough, I didn't even find it when I went to the music program at Lindenwood University.

I have God for sure.  Thankfully, He never left me.  But I remember why I love music.  I communicated not only to the world through music but also to God.  I communicated to myself the pain I felt and the craziness of life.  I found comfort and excitement through playing music and listening and evaluating the story behind the music.

So, where does this take me tonight?  I'm not sure.  I'm still positive that I'm not meant to be a music teacher.  But I do know that for the sake of my humanity, I ought to keep my talent alive because it kept me alive.  I used to be good at playing the flute.  I'm not sure I'm so great now because I have devoted the time to it.  But perhaps some day I can manage to be awesome at it again.  That is....as long as I remember the goodness of music and the language it has deep within the soul....my soul.

Nostalgia can be detrimental.  If we begin to look and focus on the past so much that we forget we have a future that we can help create ahead of us, it is then that looking back can be harmful.  However, if we use it as a propeller and motivator for our future, then so be the good in it.  If we think about it, the Israelite were often nostalgic, with some good and some bad. Thinking about "how good it was back in Egypt in slavery" was not at the top of the list of precious moments in Israelite history.  However, the lessons they learned and the ways God had blessed them are remembered every single morning and evening as they recite the Shema and other prayers.  As they read the scrolls, they read them as though it is their history of their grandparents, as it is....plus a few generations or so.

Remember but don't dwell.  Remember and be thankful.

Musically Yours -

Reclaimed.

Big God, Big Vision - Pt 1

This has been laying on my heart deeply lately, so I figured I would try to put into words how BIG our God is and how BIG our vision should be.  This will be done in parts, so this is section 1 of 8.  Read, comment, whatever!  But know that I love and appreciate feedback/discussion!
1.      Dream Big
2.      Have Hope that God is FOR YOU!
3.      Stand in the face of Opposition
4.      Reality of following/trusting God
5.      Needing God beyond heaven and hell
6.      Denying yourself and your will
7.      Exchanging Your Desires for His Desires
8.      Getting Excited to Live

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SECTION ONE: DREAM BIG

“Look at the nations, and watch –

And be utterly amazed.

For I am going to do something in your days

that you would not believe, even if you were told.”

Habakkuk 1:5 (NIV)

            Be EXCITED!  You cannot even imagine what God is doing or His Master Plan!  You can’t even piece together what heaven is going to look like or even what is going to happen in the future of your marriage, kids, career, church, or the world around you.  So much of Scripture talks about an omnipresent God.  It talks about a God who is all-knowing, all-loving, and all-powerful.  Yet, we limit ourselves.

            When we pray we ask for little things like, “Lord, give comfort to Billy Joe.  It’s just a really hard time for him.  Be with him, Lord.”  DUH!  God is already going to be with poor Billy Joe and God could do SOOOO much more if we widened our view of God.  Now, I am not saying this is a “Name It, Claim It” philosophy which is often looked upon in a negative light.  But I am saying we limit God by believing he can do so little for us.  Think about it, when did you actually ask and believe that God was going to do something huge and impossible?  In reality, we treat God as if He is small and honestly – BORING!  If we truly want to learn how to create a vision for ourselves and our church, then we need to attempt to visualize how big our God is!  We cannot get into a rut of little prayers accomplishing little things with little belief that our God can do more. 

            Job got a nice long speech about how big our God is.  He hit a rough patch in life.  It was tragic really.  He lost everything.  He lost his crops and livestock, his belongings, his career, and his family to the very last relative.  All of it was dead because God allowed Satan to test him to see if God was right about Job being righteous before God.  Not only did he lose his family and belongings, he also lost his health.  He got these sores that oozed out puss and yet he didn’t curse God as tempted, but rather Job sat in ashes, scrapping his wounds with a piece of broken pottery. 

            I admire Job at this point in the story.  When I got sick, I was not so quick to just sit around and wait for God’s work to finish.  Instead, I got angry.  I got so angry that I stopped going to church and believing that God really cared about us humans.  I was a perfectly healthy 19-year old college student who was headed for greatness, or so I thought!  I was going to get my bachelor’s degree in less than four years and head to graduate school for my dream career!  Well, I was going to do all of that until I was in a fender bender that traumatized my body into full-time, constant, chronic pain.  Day and night, 24 hours a day, 7 days a wee, my body writhed in pain.  Doctors thought I had gone mentally crazy.  Doctor after doctor, medical bill after medical bill, I strived for an answer.  But I longed for an answer far more than a diagnosis could bring.  I wanted to know why.  Why me?  Why was I cursed to live with this pain as long as my body had life?  With the pain came far more than an achy body.  Friends left quickly.  Many didn’t believe me as it was not a disease of the outside, but rather an inner aching pain that begins attacking a body where no infection lies.  Lupus SLE was the diagnosis, but it didn’t answer why I was being forced to live in constant pain.  The people who stuck around me gave all sorts of advice as to why it might be happening to me. 

            Job faced the same thing.  As he sat in ashes, friends came and sat by him.  I imagine he liked when they sat merely in silence, mourning his loss with him, until finally, they spoke.  They told him the age-old stories of why he had to go through all of this pain.  But, as you can imagine, not many words can calm someone when you are dealing with that kind of pain.  Eventually, after many days, Job is pushed to the breaking point.  In Job 29, he merely reflects on the way things were before disaster came, but by chapter 30, Job is brewing up a storm.  He complains and considers himself a righteous man, undeserving of what has come to him.  In Job 38, after another long speech from a friend, God answers Job.  I assure you, I would not have wanted this rebuke from God which went on four chapters thereafter. 

            What you need to know, and I encourage you to read it for yourself, is that God is truly all-powerful!  He takes care of the rising and setting of the sun and the tides and where the moon sits in the sky.  He controls the weather and the animals.  He is the ONLY righteous being!  He is BIG!  He is “large and in charge!” Yet, we deny that He could do more for us than bring a little peace and comfort.  We give in to the idea that it bothers God or that it is wrong to ask for more than what could be considered “politically correct” to have.  In fact, I think it bothers God when we ask for so little.  How can we truly trust and follow a God whom we allow to do so little in our lives? 

Jesus tells this parable in Luke 7:41-43, 47 (NIV).

“Two men owed money to a certain moneylender.  One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.  Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both.  Now which of them will love him more?”

                        Simon replied, “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled.”

                        “You have judged correctly,” Jesus said…

“Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven – for she loved much.  But he who has been forgiven little loves little.”

            I love this parable. It falls just in the middle of Jesus being anointed by a sinful woman.  Imagine Jesus eating dinner with the Pharisees and a woman who was known by the entire town as a sinful woman entered the house with an alabaster jar of perfume.  Imagine the woman coming and sitting at Jesus’ feet allowing her tears to cover Jesus’ feet so much that she was able to wipe them clean.  This woman’s hair was long and probably tied back, but she sat at Jesus’ feet, undoing her hair, and wiping his feet with her hair.  She bent down kissing them and pouring perfume on them.  Now, imagine you are the Pharisee who allowed Jesus into your home believing He was a great prophet.  The thoughts that roamed in the Pharisee’s mind were probably along the lines of disgust.  He felt disgusted that Jesus, a great prophet, would allow such a sinful woman to touch him.  Jesus subtly addresses these thoughts in this conversation with Simon Peter. 

            “He who has been forgiven loves little,” verse 47.  We forget that we ourselves are sinners and are in need of that forgiveness.  But more than that, I believe we forget that those who have been pulled out of a life of such turmoil love Jesus much more than we can imagine.  Why?  Because they came expecting that healing, that forgiveness, that anointing, knowing that nothing else on this earth can give it to them.  They knew that no one would be so forgiving and so powerful that they could allow such mercy EXCEPT for Jesus.  They knew His power.  They were able to dream that there was life beyond “that” sin or “that” mistake. 

            I am sure you can remember back when you were a kid when it was “that” thing that was so bad that you were gonna get a good whoopin’ for that one.  Or you can remember that time when you did something so bad that no one could ever forgive you.  Or early on in school when you did something so wrong that now your best friend was never ever going to trust you ever again!  I think we’ve forgotten that we still do this today.

            When I got my driver’s license at age 16, I thought I was pretty cool.  I was a year behind all of my classmates because I was almost a year younger than everyone, but I was awesome.  Two weeks after I got it, the first week of my junior year of high school, I totaled my mom’s van.  After I got back behind the wheel, in January, less than 5 months after getting my license, I slid on a patch of black ice, rolled down a hill, and by the grace of God a tree line stopped us.  Both accidents no one was hurt, but I totaled another van.  That January morning, the cell phone tower was out.  My brother, who is 18 months younger than I am, ran to a nearby house and called my parents.  I was TERRIFIED!  I didn’t think my parents were ever going to forgive me because I screwed up not only once but twice.  I had my siblings with me both times as well as a friend.  Of course, my parents forgave me but let’s just say, it took a long time for me to get behind the wheel again!  This story may seem silly to you, but it completely adjusted my way of thinking about the parable on forgiveness. 

            The great thing about God is that if we confess and truly seek to change our ways, He will forgive us.  Over and over again, He will forgive.  When I think about my parents’ forgiveness toward me and how I thought I was never going to be forgiven, I am amazed at how God works in our lives.  It took a long time for God to help me release that burden that I carried.  I wasn’t sure God was going to forgive me even if my earthly parents already had.  But God’s love is far more than what we can even imagine. 

            If God’s love is that large, imagine what He wants to be able to do for us as long as we are willing to ask and believe that He can achieve such impossibility!  Ephesians 3:20 (NIV) says, “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us...” That’s right!  He can do more than all we could ask or imagine, so why do we limit Him by limiting our prayers?  Why do we plan out our entire life knowing that God could do so much more if we allowed Him?  If we truly place our lives in His hands, we can have a vision of the future like no one else!  We can rely on His promises.  We can count on His faithfulness.  We can attempt to imagine how awesome our lives can be! 

            Those who have been forgiven much know His Power!  They know they can dream BIG because they have a big God!  A God of the impossible who can do more than we can imagine! 

            Dream BIG!  It’s worth it!  

Where Good Must Win

I try to write something interesting.  Something that will appeal to others and take them on a whirlwind adventure, yet I still remain unsuccessful.  I imagine a world with exciting characters who embark on daring journeys only to cease midway because I cannot finish their end.  It is like I stop existing merely because my characters come to a conflict.  They reach a conflict in the story and we cannot push our way through it.  As if something might judge their choice, judge the author, and never finish the book, although the book still remains unfinished and off the shelves.

I fear completing a book I am proud of only for it to be rejected by editor after editor, publisher after publisher.  Or, the fear overwhelms me of printing a book only for it to remain on the shops' shelves never to be read by an innocent teen or adult. For one to read the cover and place it back on the shelf.  For one to read the book and for no impact to be had.  Life for the individual has been made no better or worse by letting the book come into existence.  No thought having been provoked or an idea challenged.  This is what I fear and it ceases my writing.

The fear causes boring characters and insignificant plot twists or rather none at all.  It causes me to imagine a far away land, but not be able to put it into words in order for it to come close to home.  Ideas are stunted under the weight of the world's judgment and yet I write to await the world that lies before me.  I write to escape the land I know now to a land which seems sweeter and brighter.  Yet even the utopias of stories must have conflict.  The rise and fall of people and their beliefs must exist in a good plot.  Right versus wrong.  Good versus evil.  It all seems the same in comparison.  Happy endings are a must, even sad ones must be happy.  Never does bad win.  To have an evil ending is considered a bad one.  To let love lose may be considered a crime in a novel.  Yet people face conflict in reality and contrary to popular belief, good does not always win.

Heart breaks and heart-failures occur every day.  Where do we go to deal with it?  No, not to books, but rather to others who sympathize and put their hand on our shoulder saying, "You will get through this," though rarely believing they will get through their own life's circumstances.  Crime happens daily, yet we want the good to win in books.  Divorces are finalized every day, yet love must win.  Death comes daily, yet life is to go on.  Cancer and chronic diseases persist, yet we desire healing to emerge without some supernatural being we cannot see intervening.  We live in a world of hurt and pain yet we ask to escape into a book full of conflict so we can relate only for the book to lie, telling us that good, life, and love always win.  Too often we ignore the Higher Power we rely on in life, yet we want our books, news, government, and schools to be free of such mystery.  Why do we not seek to uncover these mysteries?  Why do we believe good, life, and love naturally win when without a god in our lives, chaos remains?  Why do we insist on our lives being free from God when we inwardly hunger for good, life, and love to win as they must in books and movies?
We call the spiritual people too religious or a freak or just naive, yet we expect good to win in our world.  What kind of God does this truly depict?

I do not believe people really know what they want, or rather what their inner being wants.  Why do we insist upon good winning out over any conflict?  Does it truly exist in our reality or do we only believe it must appear in our books?  Do we really desire a Utopian world where good, life, and love win over every conflict, crime, and marriage?  Do we really believe we can create this for ourselves?  Or do all of us secretly believe that someone higher than ourselves helps to restore good, yet cannot admit it because of the judgment of the world around us?  Yet the writer in me wonders.

Do the words of a daring adventure that wins with good and with a little romance suffice our need for good to exist?  For love to win over the heart breaks we face.  For one to be able to dream of being a part of an out-of-reach reality where good always wins?  Is this what we expect of our authors?  For the authors to create a world in which we cannot life in because we insist upon ignoring that we do trust in God.  That He will cause good, life, love, and hope to win over everything we deal with on a daily basis?

So I do fear that the readers have lost touch with the world they live in at this moment.  Where one can only find peace and happiness in made up lands and happy endings.  Where the bad guy is always punished justly and the love story continues after conflict pursues its end.  And where religion is ignored in fear of admitting that we may not be a self-sufficient people.  A book where every loop of an author's pen creates another twist or another turn that may lead to God being the only way out of the mess of conflict we live in today.

Do we desire for good to win, because if so, we may need supernatural help that we cannot see...The kind that doesn't take the form of a ghost, witch, vampire, etc.  We may need a God who is all-powerful, all-knowing, and most of all, all-loving.  But, do we want to admit it?