Love Came Down At Christmas (or A Nativity Dirge)

So is hope supposed to be found in you? Cause tonight, of all nights, I can't seem to find any.

Does that mean my connection is bad? Is my receiver broken? Why do I, tonight, of all nights, feel so lost and helpless and hopeless? Isn't Christmas Eve the beginning of Hope, the birth of Hope, the night we set aside to mark the coming of Hope into this world, with all the limitations of humanity, yet still with Power enough to change it?

If hope comes in You then am I not in You? If love came down at Christmas, why do I feel so unloved, so abandoned, still? So incapable of loving or ever being loved? How come even knowing that people love me doesn't seem to make any difference in how I feel?

I know my hope is not found in them, but tonight I had so many reminders of where I've failed at loving and being loved...I still can't think of Laura without getting depressed, let alone see her and hear others talk about how great she is...I equally love and hate being around Melissa once a year, tonight, of all nights, because I've always wanted to have the chance to like her...seeing Patricia and her mom and knowing that I wasn't strong enough to make that work...seeing Amanda and her parents, who looked at me with scorn and wouldn't acknowledge me when I tried to make eye contact with them, and knowing I was too particular to give that a shot...and one by one seeing people who have stepped into my life and I've stepped out of theirs and I realize, yet again...that I have no hope of ever being truly happy--that is if hope comes from Someone, or perhaps is something that just happens.

What good is a hope that is inaccessible cause I'm not good enough or smart enough (or dumb enough) or obedient enough or surrendered enough? What good is a hope that doesn't exist when I feel I need it most? Does how I feel even matter? Is hope or joy something that I'm responsible for conjuring up on my own? Is it just a different way of thinking? Is there some Secret about thinking positively and good things will happen?

Why does brokenness have to last so long? What am I supposed to learn in this? (Is that all this is for, so that I learn something a little new, or gain a new perspective? Is that the trade in all of this?) How do You expect me to trust when You seem so suspect? Why is my perspective not more like Job's or the three from the fiery furnace--that regardless the circumstance (or perhaps how I feel) I would never want to impugn your character or call into question your faithfulness?

Or is this what hope is supposed to feel like? Am I just too quick to call it despair? Do You just allow me to feel this way or are you the cause, the very source, of it?

What's with the nagging stomachache that stalks me? Is this just my new normal, or should I expect more from you, believe that you can heal and restore and love and forgive? Am i to just learn to live with these ominous storm clouds and nebulous, swirling thoughts, or is there ever hope of silver-lined clouds and sunsets? When can I feel again all that is not pain?

If love came down at Christmas, if tonight is the night that you chose to visit earth, could you please visit me? I sure feel like I could use that right about now.

Hosana

So, anyone who has been around me long enough knows that I'm a little gay about Andrew Peterson. The quote at the top of this blog is from him. He just had a new album come out titled, Resurrection Letters, Vol. II. The reason for volume 2 coming out before volume 1 is because this album is about resurrection in our own lives:

These songs are bound together by the theme of resurrection in our lives and in the world around us. It wasn't until we were recording the album that I knew I wanted to tell a bigger story, and that this would be part two. Part one is Christ's resurrection, which made a way for ours; it was the turning point in the Great Story.

The first half is absolutely amazing. I'm still working through the middle portion of the album. After reading Tim's post, I though his song, "Hosanna," would be appropriate (actually, so would "All You'll Ever Need").

I am tangled up in contradiction.
I am strangled by my own two hands.
I am hunted by the hounds of addiction.
Hosanna!
I have lied to everyone who trusts me.
I have tried to fall when I could stand.
I have only loved the one who loved me.
Hosanna!

O Hosanna!
See the long awaited king come to set his people free.
We cry O Hosanna!
Come and tear the temple down. Raise it up on holy ground.
Hosanna!

I have struggled to remove the raiment,
tried to hide every shimmering strand.
I contend with these ghosts and these hosts of bright angels.
Hosanna!
I have cursed the man that you have made me.
I have nursed the beast that bays for my blood.
Oh, I have run from the one who would save me.
Save me, Hosanna!

O Hosanna!
See the long awaited king, come to set his people free.
We cry O Hosanna!
Come and tear the temple down. Raise it up on holy ground.
Hosanna!

We cry for blood, and we take your life.
Hosanna!
We cry for blood, and we take your life.
It is blood, it is life that you have given.

You have crushed beneath your heel the vile serpent.
You have carried to the grave the black stain.
You have torn apart the temple's holy curtain.
You have beaten Death at Death's own game.
Hosanna!

O Hosanna!
Hail the long awaited king, come to set his people free.
We cry O Hosanna!
Won't you tear this temple down, raise it up on holy ground.
O Hosanna!
I will lift my voice and sing: you have come and washed me clean. Hosanna.

If you have a chance to see his Christmas show, "Behold the Lamb of God," I highly recommend it. Phenomenal musicians. Last year he had Ron Block of Union Station, and a couple of years ago he had Alison Krauss. Plus, hammer dulcimer.

now you are giving me the freak out.

so i get freaked out, ok?

I also pass out when i get blood taken. It's a completely involuntary response...I know the needle doesn't hurt...I don't even really mind that feeling of the blood leaving my arm. A couple weeks ago when I had my blood screened at work I tried my hardest not to pass out, but I was gone even before she had put the needle in my arm. It's the weirdest thing. The weirdest feeling to feel all your blood leave your extremities and to still be somewhat conscious that all your organs are shutting down. It's painful, but you're scarcely aware of it happening, yet still somehow completely aware. (maybe you've never fainted and don't have this problem--i guess you'll just have to take my word for it)

I've got another involuntary response, and I can't seem to gain any control over it. I get freaked out in relationships. The thought of things being serious or moving toward seriousness causes me to shut down completely. It's the weirdest thing. The weirdest feeling to have all your insecurities and past failures flood in at the same time and overwhelm you. It's fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of mistake. Fear of not being enough. It's shame. Shame for past failures. Shame for present shortcomings. Shame of the current insecurities which I should've moved past long ago. It's Lies. Lies that consistently plague and haunt and run through the corridors of my mind infiltrating every room with their stench.

Luckily that's not what the gospel is all about. Unfortunately (or more accurately, fortunately) I am still learning how the gospel really applies to life, to me. What it means to be transformed by the renewing of your mind, to take captive every thought. Understanding that conceptually isn't too hard, but the practice of it is quite different altogether. I live in my mind, in a world of hypotheticals, in a world of solving problems even if they don't exist, in a world of unconscious thinking. It's one of my biggest struggles to regulate my brain and how it thinks--and I've just started to realize recently how big of a difference what you think makes.

In a couple weeks I'm attending a seminar called Discovery, with the intent and purpose of looking at the ways I show up in life, the thoughts and emotions that are behind those actions, and then at the core what beliefs guide those thoughts and actions (think of three concentric circles with what you believe at the center). I've realized for a long time that I often don't show up in life the way that I would want to, and too often diagnosed that specifically as the problem...i.e. if I could just quit doing this then that would fall into place, not willing to admit that the problem is really deeper. The past several years for me has been a journey into the heart (and severely hard). I am starting to see some of the deeper thought/emotion issues behind the actions, but still have yet to connect those thoughts to the things I believe that just simply aren't true. What's hard is those beliefs have been shaped through 27 years of people and experience and reinforcement that they're pretty strongly rooted there. Like do I believe that a strong and healthy marriage is possible? I know it should be, but I don't really believe it. I haven't seen it intimately enough in my own life (other than glimpses into some of my friends) to really believe it's something I could achieve. The example of my parents outweighs everything else I've ever seen, mostly because I know it's their blood that courses through my veins. How many things like that do I believe deep down in my core that affect my thoughts and emotions and actions? That cause me to freak out all the time? That trigger the involuntary responses that I wish I could just simply mentally control and move past?

I'm in a study at work about the life of transformation through the gospel. It's been really good for me after the first two sessions, and one of the phrases that I've resonated with is 'learning to preach the gospel to ourselves.' I have to continually be preaching to myself that what God says about me, what the Bible says about me, is true. That grace steps in where I fail and where I succeed. That we do not have a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind. That I am forgiven. That I am a child of the God of the Universe. That love covers a multitude of sins. That I cannot EVER be good enough, and to think that I can is perhaps the biggest LIE that I can ever believe. That His LOVE is STRONG.

"why should i worry?
why do i freak out?
God knows what i need..."
-Jon Foreman "Your Love is Strong"

"The devil is preaching
The song of the redeemed
That I am cursed and gone astray
I cannot gain salvation...
...Hallelujah, he's right"
-Shanes "Embracing Accusation"

ultimate drummer

you gotta wait about 45 seconds, but this is pretty rad.

just came across this band...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFCRMonf7lI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBTUAHGpQqE

me like.

sweet mother

earth

man hug

Want to know how to give a manly hug and do all sorts of other things manly?