Love My Life: Small World

So, a few weeks ago, or many be it was a month or so ago, this guy writes me and asks if he can paint a picture from one of my photo’s I took at our beach cabin. Tonight, on my way home from Portland, Kathy and I met at Aquila & Priscilla’s to have a local brew and hear Tyler Fortier sing. The guy, Chuck North, who wanted to use my picture just happened to be there also and happened to have the painting he did of my picture with him in the car. I love how God connects people.

Open The Window: Occupy This.

Yesterday morning as I sat in my chair asking God some not-so-deep questions, I felt a rush of wind and got a huge breath of fresh air.

The world didn’t stop turning and my problems didn’t fly out the window but something in my perspective moved just a bit.

God is an active father. He didn’t create us to blindly walk this earth obeying the guy next to us or modeling our behavior after social norms.

He works through us therefore He needs us to be participants in His Kingdom. He calls us to obedience and that is the problem. I can’t look at you and follow your ways because obedience between you and God may look quite different for Yahweh and me.

God and Rick had a little chat to set me straight. I need to actively participate in His call on my life. This does not mean I look for some ministry or club to belong to. It does not mean I have to go to a church to fulfill His dreams for my life. It means I must pray for you, for me, for those around me and not in some haughty self-righteous attempt to get my way or see my kingdom come. I must clear my mind of my goals and instead listen to God and pray as He directs me.

My prayer is that that window, that rushing wind will continue to blow away the religiousness that sometimes finds its way into my soul. I pray that instead of judging that which I don’t understand I can idle my tongue and listen to the only one who really knows anything anyway (and that’s not you.)

I hear so much criticism of the “Occupy” movement and am reminded that we hate change. We don’t really want our lives adjusted and when threatened the easiest thing to do is try to smash the interruption.

I hear people using Jesus and God to put down this movement and I get angered. God works in amazing ways and this may be one of them.

Excuse me I’m heading to Portland for the day to do some interviews on the Hatfield Project. I need to hit the shower and pry my window open just a little further.

Thanks God.

Problem Free Life: Wrong Goal

Do you ever have those mornings when you feel like you are sitting on Gods lap and He whispers a truth in your ear that you’d never thought about before?

I haven’t had one of those moments in a long time.

Anyway, I’ll try to make this brief and non-preachy because I HATE PREACHY.

I’m going to use the term “We” instead of “I” because I hope this has more to do with “Us” that it does just “Me.” Besides, I’m so bored with being concerned with “Me” I could puke.

We are temped to get “Through” life rather than live it out. We long to resolve or unload our problems rather than work them out.

Here’s the best part; we want to be freed from our problems so we can get on with living our pleasures.

I think if we could just learn to accept that problems will arise today and tomorrow and even the next day but they won’t consume us, that life would be a lot easier to live.

I realize how much I try to avoid problems instead of just plowing right into them. When the problems of my day outnumber my successes I call it a bad day.

It’s almost like walking with a sliver in your foot. I fail to take strong, purposeful steps because I don’t want to feel any pain.

What would happen if I just accepted the sliver, understood it might hurt as I walk and then put my foot down good and hard and walked with purpose?

We’d probably find that the pain is not as bad as we thought and that our journey is much more interesting when unprotected and open to whatever.

Dig Your Heels In

What if you are wrong? What if your opinions on Global Warming, Occupy Wall Street or heaven forbid, what God is up to are simply off base?

I was talking with a guy yesterday and he said, “If the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street could get together and listen to each other, we might get something done in this country.”

That statement shocked me for a minute and then I thought about it and had to smile. But some of you aren’t smiling right now. In fact, what you will do is dig your heels in deeper, allow your “Great” knowledge and commitment to being correct to run your thoughts and you will litter my blog with why that will or should not ever happen.

Some of you write on my Face Book that Occupy Wall Street is the end of the world. I think that’s what people thought during the revolutionary war. I bet when Jesus walked the earth the message managers used all sorts of propaganda to try and quiet the people and control the message.

Frustrations are high in this country. People are tired of higher taxes, an unfair tax system, unemployment and an economy that is in the tank. No one really knows how to get us out of this despite what the parties like to preach or the talk show hosts like to say. Remember, they are protecting their territory and their livelihood.

One of the problems is we’ve heard the political types and the “Experts” spew their words for so long we don’t believe them anymore. People twist facts to benefit their beliefs and the public just isn’t buying anymore.

Perhaps if everyone took a deep breath and let this thing play out a bit we can see where it goes. I don’t think either extreme has the answer but often times in history answers are found when extremes meet in the middle.

But that can’t happen if we allow the rhetoric to prevail.

My Boat: Your Swell

There are times I feel I’m sitting in the middle of a body of water in a boat with no oar, no map or no compass.

There are others in boats around me paddling in circles, shouting out directions, acting as though they know exactly where to go and how to get there.

Some days I fall for their words and suggestions but more often these days their words are like sails with no wind to back them up. Many times their directions are distractions because they don’t know where they are going they are simply following the group not the captain.

My lack of response is sometimes seen as ignorance or worse arrogance but I don’t work for them. I am like them, simply a sailor waiting for direction for the admiral.

On occasion, I look up and see the captain smile and know I am doing what I was designed to do. Those moments come less and less as faith becomes my oar and trust my compass.

For me this is what it feels like to be a Follower of Christ. It is not a group sport or a group hug but it does involve other people. However the real journey is just Rick in my boat with God at the helm looking forward waiting on Him for direction.