Brokenness

Brokenness
8/25/13

I felt like I needed to make this confession of an area of brokenness in my life. I've noticed that an area of my life where I struggle is in my feelings towards most women in general. Maybe due to manipulation in my family I have had a annoyance towards women in their efforts at subliminal communication (think non-direct body language or intonations) since it feels underhanded. I hate it when men talk about being ball and chained to their wives and are told by the culture that they should just agree with their wives on everything to have a happy life. I dislike watching t.v. shows where the wives dictate their husbands moves through their emotions. I can read body language and often pick up some of the signals given by women on how they want your attention or some action but I often blatantly ignore it because I feel like they are to afraid to just gently but directly ask me for that. It feels underhanded not necessarily in a malevolent way but it is just unhealthy and unclear. You might screw up because you didn't meet some need of theirs because you didn't listen close enough to their subliminal messages. In many ways it mirrors my desire to please God and I have from time to time taken that same mindset and applied it there. What if I'm not listening to God close enough and I screw up? What if He says something testing to see if I'll go through emotional contortions to try to make sure I heard Him right and I just can't do it? Maybe the brokenness of the women around me has caused me to see God in an unhealthy way.

The truth though is that I desire with all my heart to be the man of God that I am being formed to be. I don't want a false macho attitude where flowers and the arts and so many other things I enjoy are viewed with scorn as feminine and "soft". On the other hand I will not back down from a fight and it is part of my being to go to war (whether I enjoy it or not - its just in me). In every way I want to reflect the fullness of heaven and of my Jesus. I just don't fit molds. So many people are either afraid of being viewed as gay or they misunderstand certain characteristics that they possess and end up deciding that they must be gay. I want nothing to do with either view. I'm just going to follow Jesus and be made like Him. In being like Him I want this brokenness in my feelings towards women to be healed. I don't want to be a push over only moved by the desires of women nor do I want to have this annoyance. I want to be able to serve the women in my life with grace and strength. I don't think that this area is totally healed in me but I think that sharing this is part of that healing process. I also hope that any men out there struggling with this will be able to find healing in Christ.

The Fragrance of Now

The Fragrance of Now

8/4/13

Here is the oil of right now

The fragrance of tomorrow no better

This is how:

He does not mature me to make a sweeter tea

He does not mold me to make a sharper cheese

To an infinite God

From a finite man

A mark on the measuring rod

Is a portion of His beautiful plan

An alabaster jar finds its ultimate worth

Not in scars gained in keeping it but in its moment of birth

I cannot ever look back on the now and despise what I gave

Every moment a unique sacrifice from birth to grave.  

I wrote this poem to go along with a few conversations I've had and what God has been doing in my life for the past couple of years culminating to the now. I had a conversation with a friend where he was asking how he could emulate the joy that he saw in a child experiencing something new while blackberry picking a few days before. It came to my mind that my friend's joy of seeing the child's joy is just as valid though it came in a different form. I think that we can easily fall into erroneously thinking that we have less to give than if we we're innocent like a child or more mature and full like we will be one day. The only true sacrifice we can give is to give God everything you have at that moment. 

For me I know that due to tough circumstances and emotional hardships over the last couple of years I have held back from giving everything to the ministry God has put before me. I have not done nothing but I have not given my fullest simply because there is emotional pain to give when you feel you have nothing left to give. Don't get me wrong, God feels our pain with us and comforts us and weeps with us but there is still a point where we have to put everything in His hands and just trust Him. For me I know that God has promised me a mate and while experiencing pain it is easy to hold back and wait for that promise in order to go full ahead. I want to give Him my all though and I have only this moment, this alabaster jar, to give to Him. How can I expect to give Him it all in the future if I hold back now?

Matthew 26:6-12
  6Now when Jesus was in Bethany, at the home of Simon the leper,7a woman came to Him with an alabaster vial of very costly perfume, and she poured it on His head as He reclined at the table.8But the disciples were indignant when they saw this,and said, “Why this waste?9“For this perfume might have been sold for a high price and the money given to the poor.”10But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you bother the woman? For she has done a good deed to Me.11“For you always have the poor with you; but you do not always have Me.12“For when she poured this perfume on My body, she did it to prepare Me for burial.13“Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be spoken of in memory of her.”