Bachelor Reflections on the Road to Graduation

DREAMS. TRUTH. GROWING UP. GOING HOME.

Josh,

    It's with deep gratitude and joy that I welcome you to our team this year. I give this journal as a tool to use this year as an RA and in so many more ways. May it be a place of reflective thoughts and feelings. My hope is that it becomes a safe place where the Lord can move on your heart. May He search your life through these pages and display His goodness and kindness. Use this journal for your dreams, thoughts, visions, gratitude, memories, prayers, and everything in between. I'm praying for His Spirit to move mightily in you this year. May this journal help you slow down to listen.

- Alex

* * * * *

August 8, 2017

Genesis 40:7 - Joseph asks his fellow prisoners why they looked sad, revealing a steadfast and joyful heart in the midst of affliction. His drive is to do the right thing, to care for his neighbors wherever and whoever they are. That drive leads him to deep humiliation, but he does not allow immediate consequences to be the ultimate judge of what's worth doing.

The glory of Christ is seen in this narrative, the glory of a passionate and suffering love willing to be humbled before being exalted. It's a glory that does not endorse itself, but waits for its time. Even in the depths of weakness and shame it shines with persistence.


* * * * *

August 11, 2017

What is truth?

Truth is both what is and what should be. That means, in a sense, that the real is ideal, and the ideal is real.

In a fallen world, truth causes pain. Pain is antithetical to truth, and so is made manifest when met with truth, like how darkness only gains its name when it is distinguished from light. Truth is always good. Whenever pain is felt, there a truth is available for learning.


* * * * *

August 12, 2017

So much of my pain is traced back to guilt. So much of what I seek for is found in forgiveness. I often don't realize this.

I need forgiveness, but I don't want it, for that would necessitate that I be wrong, deeply and truly and irreversibly wrong. I would be in wrong in such a way that nothing I could do could make up for it. I would be a sinner.


* * * * *

August 18, 2017

Grief is necessary. What kind of people would we be if the whole of creation was groaning for the Second Coming and we were just fine? No, let's not be always happy now. There's a time for that, and it's not yet here. Now we sit together in silence and ride these waves of grief, these birthing pains. That's love.


* * * * *

August 24, 2017

There is freedom in daily repentance. I don't need every effort to be perfect, because forgiveness is available. In fact, it is this forgiveness that allows me to strive for perfection; the fear of failure is often a crippling one, keeping a person from performing at his best.


* * * * *

August 29, 2017

I had a very vivid dream last night. I was in the mountains. I don't remember seeing any buildings, but there was a stone path that went up the steep slope, made a turn, then came down the slope to circle back to the beginning. There were monks (I think) going around and around upon this path. They held banners and clanged cymbals—looking and sounding very much like the opening scene of the Curse of the Golden Flower. As I passed by, one of the people at the end of the procession declared: “耶稣是主！” (Jesus is Lord) I was surprised; it was a Chinese group of monks worshiping Yahweh.


* * * * *

August 30, 2017

I used to pray for God to mold me through suffering. I meant it, and God was faithful in granting my request, but only recently did I realize that I didn't mean all of it. I intended the suffering, but I did not intend the molding.

I'll have to explain: there is a proactiveness in sanctification that I increasingly realize I need. I want God's will to break into or to become manifest in my life, but I'm not actively seeking it. It's a kind of laziness, really.

In other words, my view of religion is a little too fatalistic. I neglect my duty to fear and to tread the path of life carefully, because of a faulty sense that God wouldn't hold me accountable for the mistakes he determined I would make anyway. But look at Moses; one error and he was kept from the Promised Land. The consequence was real and irreversible, all because Moses was careless. Like me, he surely meant well much of the time, but not well enough. He didn't know and didn't seek to know God's heart deeply enough.

Faith must involve an exercise of the will.


* * * * *

August 31, 2017

This morning I recalled a fond memory. Last year there was a humanities lecture given by Betty Douglas, in which she performed several jazz numbers. I had a Hebrew exam that day, and Dr. Curtis encouraged anyone who completed it to walk straight to the lecture hall, which was opposite our classroom.

So I did. At the end of the lecture, she sang "When All the Saints Go Marching In." Dr. Curtis and Dr. Meek became so excited that they started dancing down the aisles of John White Chapel. Unfortunately for me and my friend Shannon, Dr. Curtis had gotten the four of us to hold hands, and we paraded in front of a bewildered and bored class to the classic hymn. I wasn't even in that class.

For some reason, it struck me this morning that their dancing came from the heart, from a deep well of joy and knowledge and truth. They heard in the song a proclamation of eternal hope, and they could not help but sing and dance. How different is this from many young people, who sing and dance for attention, who express not an overflowing richness but poverty. How blessed I was to have experienced that overflow.

I remember Dr. Curtis laughing heartily at the end of it, embracing me and Shannon. I think his eyes were teary. It seemed for the briefest moment that he was already there in the eternal kingdom.


* * * * *

September 4, 2017

I've been listening to music as a way to block out voices, both from within and from without.

I walk through campus. Why do most people feel sad to me? Dinner at Alex's dining hall is like a great funeral feast. I am deeply grieved and filled with a sense of despair that, I think, is not my own.


* * * * *

September 8, 2017

I desire the day when I finally learn to want the things I already have.
---

The last six lines of a love sonnet by Dante Alighieri:

My wasted eyes I find I cannot keep
     From gazing at you ever and again.
     For by a tearful longing they are led.
     Beholding you then so augments their pain
     They are consumed by their desire to weep,
     Yet in your presence tears they cannot shed.


* * * * *

September 18, 2017

There are so many people in life for me to impress, but I came to you with nothing. You loved me before I was able to bear the slightest fruit of righteousness. There are so many people to please, and I am swayed left and right by their manifold opinions. But you know who I am.
---

What don't I understand, Cara? Please, help me out. What is it? Is it frustrating that you can't be with this person? That there's something keeping you apart? That there's something about this person that you can connect with? And whenever you're near this person, you don't know what to say, and you say everything that's in your mind and in your heart, and you know that if you could just be together, that this person would help you become the best possible version of yourself? 

—Dan in Real Life (2007)

* * * * *

September 20, 2017

God can do anything at any time. Yet it is not so much what he can do that's important, but what he does do. He does exactly what he wants at any given time. What is is what should be. Everything is on the trajectory towards his glory and our joy.

I must not fear the truth. I must not fear the reality that God unfolds before me, even when it dispels my own ideas and ideals. I need his truth, and he gives it to me every moment. I must cherish every moment, even the painful, fearful ones. I must cherish them in humility.


* * * * *

September 21, 2017

In the United States, conscience has been displaced by system, ethics replaced by power, spirit quenched by nature. The dream here is that we could arrive at a system so perfect that we don't need to be good people.

Tonight, Judge Stegall voiced an alternative: seeking a system so good that we don't need to be perfect.

The world asks, "What is the point of being good if you don't have the power to enforce that good?" Scripture flips that on its head and asks, "What good is it if a man gains the whole world and loses his soul?"


* * * * *

October 12, 2017

If somebody gave me this card, Mr. Vance, I would eat it. It's... these cards, and the movies and the pop songs; they're to blame for all the lies and the heartache, everything. We're responsible. I'm responsible. I think we do a bad thing here. People should be able to say how they feel—how they really feel—not, you know, some words that some stranger put in their mouths. Words like "love"... that don't mean anything. 

—(500) Days of Summer (2009)

* * * * *

October 24, 2017

Some thoughts:
- God's greatest power is applied in his self-control (an interpretation of Prov. 16:32)
- In the East you pretend to care. In the West you pretend to not care.
---

Dreams as Truth

What is truth? Truth is that highest principle which encompasses what is and what ought to be.

A dream is a vision birthed by longing and conceived by beauty. A dream is not a plan; a plan wrestles and compromises with reality, but a dream is free and unrestricted, outrageous and captivating. A dream explores the possibility of fully satisfying a longing.

The phrase "dream come true" implies that there is often distance between dreams and truth. Somehow false beauty can defile and distort longing, producing a dream that cannot come true. A dream that would come true must have been born by truth.

But is there redemption for false dreams and hopes? Do they all die in the abyss? Or can the Truth redeem and cleanse our distorted dreams? Can He take on the form of a fallen dream and be crucified in its stead?

What dreams did Jesus make true?


* * * * *

October 25, 2017

Some thoughts:
- When was the last time I told someone I was sorry?
- If I could exchange some of my GPA for investing in the edification and spiritual growth of my friends, how far would I go before it's too much?
- The man who cannot dream cannot pray. Dreams are not plans; dreams long for things without directly causing them. Prayer is the same.


* * * * *

October 31, 2017

Reform.

"Do I really love them?" Sometimes people come too close for this self-reflective question to be a safe one. Usually it's just much easier to have tangential relationships and to tell these friends how much you love them, though it's more likely that you only love an impression of them. With family and roommates (people you have constant contact with), time strips away all the facades, the polite words and affectionate gestures, and everyone is laid bare, appearing at once more familiar and more alien to each other. In such times, love loses its romance somewhat.

Why do I have such a distrust of home, such an eagerness to get away from the people I live with? Why am I so skeptical of the idea that the people who live with me know me best?


* * * * *

November 3, 2017

A human being's greatest need is worship.


* * * * *

November 16, 2017

We are aware of specific ideas that cultures manifest. But should we not also talk about attitudes and appetites, which influence us just as much, if not more?

If low culture is a necessary thing, what does its redemption in Christ look like?


* * * * *

December 25, 2017

As Augustine said, the eyes of sinful man reach only to bodies, and his mind to phantasms. On the one hand he is trapped by realism, the demands of the material world stifling the needs of his soul. On the other hand, his fear of reality (of truth) compels him to create mental worlds completely detached from the real world, as he attempts to partially satisfy his spiritual longings by guarding them securely within his daydreams, partitioned from his thoughts of "real life."

But unless a grain of dreams falls into the ground of reality and dies, it cannot truly live and grow. (cf. John 12:24) Courage and patience are required for this endeavor; checking our dreams against reality can be painful and humbling. But only by doing so can we produce new life and new dreams.

"Practice resurrection," wrote Wendell Berry.


* * * * *

January 16, 2018

How does God help us to talk to each other?


* * * * *

February 1, 2018

"Sell them their dreams," a woman radio announcer urged a convention of display men in 1923. "Sell them what they longed for and hoped for and almost despaired of having. Sell them hats by splashing sunlight across them. Sell them dreams – dreams of country clubs and proms and visions of what might happen if only. After all, people don't buy things to have things. They buy things to work for them. They buy hope – hope of what your merchandise will do for them. Sell them this hope and you won't have to worry about selling them goods." 

—William R. Leach, Land of Desire: Merchants, Power, and the Rise of a New American Culture

* * * * *

February 5, 2018

Insight from Dr. Troup:
Gossip is saying something behind someone's back that you would never say to his face.
Flattery is saying something to someone's face that you would never say behind his back.


* * * * *

February 14, 2018

Does growth involve death? Doesn't a sacrificial Christian ethic require that one give up on his own dreams for the sake of others? And does this not mean that we tell people not to dream at all?

Not quite. If there was no dream to begin with, there would be nothing to sacrifice, to deny, to bury. So one must dream, so that there would be something to sacrifice. The sacrifice is indispensable.

All terrestrial dreams will come to an end. It matters only how one approaches this. Will the dream die voluntarily, with love and courage? Or will it die in selfishness and isolation?


* * * * *

February 22, 2018

Media is dead, and can only be reanimated by personality.

The word that is written dies; when read, it lives again. The scholar lives and works among the dead, reviving the dead symbols and keeping them alive through memory. The scholar is a fool, choosing to bury himself in piles of corpses. But his loving foolishness is rewarded as, miraculously, the writings awaken and become his friends.

The mediator lives in death. Death is separation, and two things that require mediation should be understood to have a relationship—or more accurately, an un-relationship—of death. The mediator, then, stands in the gap, and in the very act of reuniting devotes himself to death. This also is foolish wisdom.


* * * * *

March 11, 2018

Do I study like I'm pursuing truth? Or do I study like I'm being pursued by Truth? How will the latter attitude change how I study? Would it not be a more grateful, resigned, and stress-free experience?


* * * * *

April 14, 2018

Lavish grace. The taste of it barely lingers in my memory. Rare are the moments that it comes into sharp focus, full of glory, diminishing everything else in my world. I used to have more of those moments, I believe. Those were moments when I felt like I had no problems because I knew that God was great. Those were moments of true rest, when I realized that nothing truly depended on me.

Is it too much to hope for such moments to become daily experiences? Too often I am alone, fighting to stay afloat, to make things right, and to keep my friends with me. My life is almost pure toil.

No, graceful living is not something I've mastered. It involves a kind of letting go—a surrendering of control, being okay with the loss of affection, bad grades, financial uncertainty, imperfect work, awkwardness—though also, far from a Buddhist emptying of the self into the "void," graceful living calls for immense energy and vitality, a power that can only come after one has pulled away all the boundaries of self-preservation. This kind of letting go, theoretically, pours more effort into work, relationships, etc.

How far from you am I? I would pour myself into you, but where are you? Everywhere and nowhere and in heaven. And in me.

Even as I toil, humble me that I might see your grace.


* * * * *

April 16, 2018

A haiku:

Fingers intertwine,
Ending a twenty-year wait.
Unbelievable.


* * * * *

August 9, 2018

There is a time (kairos) for the performance, and it will come and go, and you must have the courage to make the most of it.

What does it mean to play a character? Does it necessarily mean hypocrisy? Aren't the most convincing performances ones that come from the heart of the performer? In which case, the character is not an empty shell put on a person; the character is the person—drawn out, actualized, maximized, compelled to emerge by the moment, the crisis (krisis in Greek means the moment of decision). It's how people become mothers, teachers, soldiers, presidents—the role draws out the person, and the person becomes a character.

What about different personalities, in the Myers-Briggs sense? I don't know. But I am increasingly convinced that a sense of our personal limitations does not sanction the shirking of our duties.


* * * * *

August 14, 2018

I just can't shake this feeling that whatever being a man truly means, I don't understand it.

I think it has to do with my ineptitude in creating structure. I almost don't resist anything or anyone anymore. Because I include everyone, I don't really include anyone. Because I try to exclude no one, the space I offer seems unintentional and insincere. How can I change this?

In a way, maybe I just need to learn to care less how people feel... at least just to allow my own system of thought to emerge, instead of always endlessly stepping into other people's shoes.


* * * * *

August 21, 2018

It is the glory of God to conceal things.

I've always had a problem with trying to uncover things. It's a God-given impulse that I take to an extreme. I remember bugging some of my friends really hard for them to tell me secrets. I made myself an incredibly annoying person this way.

My ever-searching mind has been helpful in some ways in my walk with God. I have asked important questions and have been given important answers. But I sense a season coming where I have to learn to deny this thing that seems most essential to me, this impulse to watch, to take in information, and to turn ideas around in my head without ever really giving back, without ever dedicating myself to work, to performance.

The time is here. God has developed me as a thinker, but he doesn't want me to rely on that. He wants me to be ready to give it up.


* * * * *

September 28, 2018

All things were made good, and therefore:

Sin is not a "thing."
Lust is no thing.
Greed is no thing.
Pride is no thing.
Loneliness is no thing.
Sadness is no thing.
Hate is no thing.
Anxiety is no thing.
A void lies at the heart of the sinner, a self-imposed punishment.

Substance and order are one.
Substance is order; rocks, water, and air are only substances according to their kind because of internal, molecular order.
Order is substance: once several people are determined as father, mother, child, they are family, a real unit. The same applies to church, government, army, etc.

Love is to give and to arrange.

To be loved by God, bring your no-thing.


* * * * *

October 24, 2018

Two kinds of entitlement:
I'm awesome and the rest of you stink, so I deserve special treatment. Or,
I stink and the rest of you are awesome, so I deserve special treatment.


* * * * *

October 30, 2018

Two approaches to beauty:
One draws near in order to be filled, motivated by emptiness. It will seek to consume, possess.
The other comes with fullness and beauty in his or her soul. Identifying the perceived beauty with the internal beauty in the soul, the perceiver draws near for fellowship.


* * * * *

December 12, 2018

If there is such a thing as higher and lower affections, as Jonathan Edwards believed, is there such a thing as higher and lower reasoning? Is higher reasoning more capable of understanding paradoxes or something?

What is reason? What is the logos?

Similarly, what are affections? And what is the will, and how does it work?


* * * * *

Search me, O God, and know my heart!

Try me and know my thoughts!

24 

And see if there be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting!

(Psalm 139:23-24)

Haiku About Dating

TOGETHER, ALWAYS

I'm seeing new smiles,
Too bright, meant for someone else;
They love you through me.

A Journal Entry from Finals Week

REORIENTING

May 2, 2017

What do I want from you?

I want a meaningful life. This desire has driven me in two different directions: in the direction of work, and in the direction of relationships.

I often realize that I need both, but cannot have both as fully as I want to. When I put effort into work, I wonder, "Who is this for?" When I put effort into relationships, I ask: "What are we for?"

But either of these are but a glimpse of the true Meaning I seek. You, Lord, are that meaning, that purpose, that end. And I want to hear you speak to me again.

Oh, God, please talk to me. I need to hear your voice explain my life. I need your words to organize my chaos, just as your words organized the cosmos at the beginning of all things. I need you. Where did you go? Did I do something wrong?

Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
    the wormwood and the gall!
My soul continually remembers it
    and is bowed down within me.
But this I call to mind,
    and therefore I have hope:
The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases;
    his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.
(Lamentations 3:19-23)

A Poem of Victory I Wrote for Class

THE UNDYING

I never lose;

When I do, I refuse

to let my captors

be the only ones laughing;

(Heck) He’s the one who’s dragging

All this weight through the muck

As I gaze at the sky,

At the trees passing by,

And the birdies flying high:

They’re free like me, no

sweat, no fret, no debt to repay; I’m

Cruising through the pain. These

rocks, these thorns cut

flesh, draw blood, I draw

strength from every ribbon made.

I’m being re-made

into an image that’s invisible and powerful—

fit for the bliss that I’m going to.

To the Choir I Love

GENEVANS ON A BEACH IN GEORGIA

3/8/2017

At the world's End:

Strolling beside the tide,

Silhouettes on glassy sand,

Bathing in blue starlight

Singing to the King.

Mortals no more;

Here we are

At last

.

What Should We Remember?

JACQUES ELLUL'S PROPHETIC STATEMENT ON SEEING VS. HEARING

I came across this while preparing for a research paper. This excerpt is taken from The Humiliation of the Word, pages 122-124. Ellul may impress some people as just a hater of images in general; however, the intent of his book is not to attack the visual/imaginative, but to recover the lingual/auditory. Approach with an open mind and with patience.


* * * * *

When a person is concerned with taking pictures, however, he worries about the choice of scene to be preserved (an option that separates out one piece to be remembered from the overall scene). Thus we become locked entirely into the visual problem alone. We abandon any effort at overall impression; what might have been an authentic experience is reduced to mere spectacle. Furthermore, even if you are a specialist, you become preoccupied with manipulating and fussing with the camera; the lighting and the search for the best angle lock you into a technical exercise that radically blocks out any intellectual process or reflection, the offering of yourself to the wind, the sea, or the flow of people. Even more, these concerns prevent the surging of deep exaltation in the presence of something unique; if you are a Christian, you are prevented from thanking God. No, the camera is in command. You no longer really see anything; you look at and hunt for what you are going to photograph.

When the picture is finally taken, notice that all travelers suddenly lose interest in everything else: the job to be done has been taken care of. What else could they possibly do in the midst of the ruins of the Parthenon? Suddenly they wonder what they are doing there. Once the memory has been frozen on film, they are suddenly bored. The picture diminishes enormously the experience of a trip; it externalizes it, prevents internalization, and concentrates everything on the "visual souvenir."

Looking at the picture later recalls "memories": a certain gesture or word spoken. That is all there is. It recalls no deep perception. This is obvious when one listens to the talk and conversation of people who show slides of their trips. Everything is reduced to superficialities. Just as the process of picture taking hacked off one piece of the overall reality that was to be lived, in the same way the picture, once shown, obliterates the living memory.

Memory is part of my total life. It appears and disappears, depending on the transcription of a whole world which I have assimilated and which is part of me. It is not just a product of memorization, but a progression dependent on the basis of my relationship with the reality integrated into my culture and my total experience of life. Every memory is like a many-sided and multicolored cube in an enormous mosaic.

Pictures prohibit this movement and this return. They deal with the "picturesque," which will always be the most superficial. Here sensitivity is directed to a spectacular view and nothing else. And seeing it again causes the rebirth of false memories that are purely superficial and utterly useless. Such pictures serve no good purpose.

I can just hear the angry shouts: "You know perfectly well that you forget! Pictures serve to remind you... without pictures, you will forget that you went to..., that you saw the mural of La Parisienne at...." What an enormous error! What deserves to be remembered—whatever has been lived deeply—is engraved in my being and in my memory. It changed me and made me a new person.

What about all the things I've forgotten? For it is certainly true that I have forgotten thousands of places, faces, and paintings. The things I've forgotten are simply those that meant nothing to me, those I did not live, which were just empty curiosities that remained foreign to me. They offered me nothing of value, no truth. In this case, what good is it to preserve such things on scraps of paper? I was dumbfounded by the mountains on the horizon. What picture could do anything for me? And if all I saw was a spectacle, why bother to remember it? Pictures are just an effort to prove that we really went somewhere!—that we really made the trip.

Here we have reached an essential aspect of images: in the modern identity crisis, in the midst of technical change and dispersion, images give us some certainty that we exist. Pictures assure us of our past; leafing through a picture album makes me certain that I have lived. The picture becomes the substitute for something living, just as images always do. It is the elimination of the personal and existential relationship with the world, cutting oneself off from the milieu, from other people. And it is the means of not being subject to the impact of anything new. It is also the dreamed-of substitute in terms of a false, frozen reality that takes the place of the inability to face life.

This is very symptomatic of technique: it prevents us from living but gives us the strong impression that we are living, assuring us that we are really alive! "After all," they say, "look at these faces; look at your friends. Freeze up that happy, marvelous moment: the child playing, the child looking up at you. Rediscover the faces of your dear departed ones...." What a lie. Either you loved them and their faces are engraved in you, woven into your thought, your worldview, and your daily experience, or you did not love them. In that case, what good are pictures? What good is it to hang on to these faces from a given moment, these expressions on shiny paper or film, if you do not have their absence burning within you?

Their absence is neither filled up nor ensured by looking at this picture. No, let's not have pictures of dear ones who are no longer with us. We should say with the poet (whose name I won't mention, since he isn't in fashion!): "Since the game is over, put down the cards; throw them away." The picture of these faces is a lie I tell myself, believing that I cared about these people, whereas no trace of them is left in me. It is another lie based on something visual: an image. What could you say about these people you loved? What language would be appropriate? What truth did you live because of them? What did you go through together? What of that remains with you? If you remain silent, the picture is nothing but an illusion. And if you can talk about these things, the picture should be thrown away.


* * * * *

Again, it is easy to miss the point here and to think that Ellul is simply a cranky old man annoyed with modern visual culture. But the hyperbolic language (I don't actually think he's too adamant about throwing away pictures of departed loved ones) is meant to shake people out of stupor, to realize the attitudes underneath our frequent activities that we are unaware of. And in our age, it seems that we are losing more and more of the ability to hold important things in our hearts, to agonize over and to love without ceasing. 

Writing more than two decades before the advent of Facebook, Ellul's prophetic voice still rings relevant today.

Cryptic Update

INTO LIGHT OR SIN I PLUNGE

Naivety;
Hope;
Fear;
Love;
Pain;
Grit;
Reality;
Taken together, tortures
but awakens, liberates—
resurrects.

Third Semester Reflection

FORTITUDE IN FELLOWSHIP OR: HOW TO DEAL WITH THE PERENNIAL QUESTIONS

In the wake of my experiences in Agape Youth Fellowship and in National Service, my view on faithfulness became one that stressed humility, perceptiveness, and self-control. I was traumatized by the memory of myself as a prideful, hypocritical, idealistic, and detached leader of the youth fellowship, and was later baffled by the impracticality of my theology in the context of gangsters and gods at the military camp. Hence I reacted against my overly intellectual approach to faith, and began trying to learn the practical and aesthetic aspects of the Bible and of theology.

I also became extremely afraid of being assertive; I decided that I would rather be wronged than wrong. Dealing with the effects of other people's bad decisions seemed easier than dealing with guilt. And so I entered college, determined to be a friendly and gracious presence, a good listener.


First Semester - And the Word Became Flesh

I think I was a little too good at it, especially in a culture like America. The cultural landscape is beset with tensions: traditional versus progressive, conservative versus liberal, capitalist versus socialist, religious versus secular, "nobody should have guns" versus "everybody should have guns", #blacklivesmatter versus #alllivesmatter, cessationism versus continuationism, and—on a college campus—brains versus brawns versus beauts, to put it quite crudely.

Being the way I was at the time, I almost always took the effort to think about the subtext underlying such tensions. I knew what I would instinctively prefer in each case, but having learned to react against my reactions, I would ask, "What do I really want? What are the real reasons that people hold the opposing view? Is it possible to hold the opposing view out of good intentions?"

Although doing so was intellectually rewarding, taking me to depths in my thinking that I never dreamed existed, it was also the most emotionally exhausting discipline I ever knew. Because I not only tried to find common ground for different points of view on political and religious spectrums, I was trying to reconcile cultures (geographical and historical), philosophies, and even personality types. I kept finding myself "in-between," and it was especially hard in a land where I already had very little sense of belonging.

I found myself very lonely very quickly, not due to a lack of company but a lack of understanding. Which soul could I share myself with who could understand the same in-between-ness that I suffer? The only person I found was Dr. Miller, who understands both culture shock and growing up with a psychological disorder (stuttering for him, ASD for me). The few opportunities I had to speak to him were quite vital in keeping me sane for my first semester. But he was busy, and so was I, and times for heartfelt conversations were scarce.

Loneliness led to bitterness. I often felt like I was the only one trying to restore a fractured world, which, even if it were true (which it wasn't), would not really give me the right to blame those who weren't doing the same thing. The truth is, whatever virtue is present in this cosmos-embracing attitude of mine did not come from me. I was graced with it, awakened to it, given it. I was not always like this. Of course, this sometimes made me even more bitter; I felt like God intentionally put me in a difficult place, at the intersection of many tensions. "This is ridiculous," I thought, "Why am I trying so hard to please everyone?" But in my endeavor to see reality as it is, I knew that even the most laughable perspectives holds some kernel of God's truth, however twisted—and these kernels needed to be rescued. I saw no alternative.

It was timely that I kept hearing about the person of Christ that first semester. Our chaplain preached from John 1 a number of times. In Old Testament studies, we learned about the anguish of Christ's heart as seen in the Psalms, and his act of "standing in the gap" as seen in the prophetic books. In my humanities class, the example of Christ was the crux of the main themes. And one particular scene mentioned in that class stuck with me throughout the semester: Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, praying, "My father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will."

Jesus was truly in-between and truly alone, suspended between heaven and earth, caught between the wrath of men and the wrath of God, ready to be crushed—obedient, patient. Having such an image in my mind did not exactly alleviate the suffering and loneliness, but it provided a satisfactory explanation for it. It felt like I was losing everything, but I knew I was gaining Christ somehow.

Near the end of my first semester, I wrote this prayer in my journal:

Father, teach me
To be myself and to be a member,
To be present and to be everywhere and every time,
To be at rest and to be at war,
To strive and to wait patiently,
To be self-conscious and self-forgetful,
To be on earth and in heaven,
To be full of sorrow and full of joy,
To give and to receive,
To hold on and to let go,
To seek knowledge and to honor mystery,
To love and to hate,
To die and to live.
Amen.


Second Semester - Mystery in Meekness and Majesty

I was busier my second semester. I was taking a full 20 credits, singing in the choir, and working 10 hours a week in the cafeteria. Somehow I still decided to write and direct a short film with a friend.

Because of my workload and schedule, I slowly forgot how to reflect. I continued to write in my journal, but as the semester went by my entries became increasingly shorter, and the to-do lists following them became longer. I in fact became afraid of taking time to reflect on my life and faith, because I often found that I couldn't transition back into work-mode—especially whenever I remembered how lonely I felt. I couldn't afford to stop and think, because it was so hard to get going again.

I was aware of the slow death that was happening to my introspective tendencies, but I did not know what to do about it. Of course, this was the price I paid for trying to see all things as important and valid without a sense of priority. I wanted to get top grades, to thrive in social life, to excel in artistic endeavors, to make some kind of an impact on campus, and to actually learn and retain class content. But what of spiritual needs and duties? These suffered because they were not things I could do in work-mode.

Here is where fleshly pride and faithfulness met. For while I (to a degree) had control over grades, social standing, artistic excellence, and intellectual growth, before Scripture and in prayer I seemed to lose all control. What can I bring to God? What visible results could I bring forth through the spiritual disciplines? If I sat down for two hours and worked on an essay or a screenplay, or spent two hours with my friends, it's more than likely that there would be some kind of a result; I would have a couple of pages written, or I would have learned a little more about my friends.

But the spiritual disciplines? They threw me into complete turmoil almost every time. I would leave devotional time feeling like I knew less about God than before, that I was farther away from him, that I was worse of a person. What kind of a result is that? How do I explain it to other people? So my time in prayer and in meditating on the Word decreased gradually, so that I could continue to fulfill my mental image of a suffering messiah trying to do everything and save everyone. I became addicted to the feeling of pouring myself dry and feeling miserable about it and yet still hiding it from other people. It made me feel noble.

It was kind of disgusting. But it was simpler this way. Thus I continued to stretch my capacity for empathy, remaining steadfast in my in-between-ness.

My second semester led me to more interesting difficulties with the integration of all things, especially at the practical level. For while I prided myself on being a person of empathy, I realized that I had difficulty empathizing with indifference or hostility. In other words, I was hostile against hostile points of view. Was I still a person of empathy? There were many times when I caught myself viscerally reacting against other people's visceral reactions to things. "You judge too quickly," I would think, and then, "...but so did I."

As a Christian, clearly I understood the need for absoluteness and firmness to some degree; I'm not a relativist. But I was so traumatized by my own hostility as youth leader that I was ready for all hostility to disappear from human interaction—itself a hostile thought, really. Because of this I began to feel inconsistent, and began trying to wrap my mind around the paradoxical idea that, to be truly and wholly sympathetic, I must also be able to sympathize with a lack of sympathy.

I was stuck. This intellectual difficulty was reflected in the rest of my daily living. I was even more hesitant than before to assert anything, to judge anything. I realized that, even though other people weren't expending the same energy that I was at reconciliation, it didn't mean that their work in discerning the good from the bad had any less value. Suddenly, I had nothing to say about anything to anyone.

After a long search for answers, I found questions. I had discovered the mystery inherent in all things, and it baffled me. There seemed like no way I could win.

And so I lost. I let this "sacred doctrine" of mine come under scrutiny, this doctrine of messianic suffering and agonistic living (as in "agony"). I was right that things are never so simple, and that a Christlike sense of painful alienation was to be expected in the Christian life; however, life isn't as simple as constantly admitting that things aren't so simple, either, and the Christian life consists in more than just pure suffering. I finally began to relent before the Mystery, and in doing so I—strangely—found myself seeing more of the Truth.

Perhaps constantly being in-between wasn't always the best idea. But what alternative did I have?

When I flew back from Rome after my study trip, I walked into an empty apartment room. No homework assignments, no roommates, no social activities. I felt a violent relief—and proceeded to have a massive emotional meltdown.


Summer Break - The Kingdom Belongs to Such as These

Growing up is a strange thing. On the one hand, I want to become stronger and more mature. On the other hand, there is a kind of innocence and wildness that I feel a desire—even an obligation—to preserve. Because of college, I certainly learned much, matured much, became tougher. But where is the boy? Did I become a different person altogether, defeated by the pressures of the world? Who am I?

I not only succeeded in breaking out of my shell, I broke my shell. When I had nothing more to reconcile and integrate, no more professors and friends to please, suddenly I was not sure what to do. I had no comfort zone to return to, because I didn't even remember what I was comfortable with anymore. I was numb, and the numbness frustrated me.

In search of the missing boy, I dug into my hard drive and found some of my past creative works, including incomplete ones. What used to be attempts at self-expression became objects of historical interest; I studied the scripts and story ideas I wrote long ago, trying to find out what was important to little Josh. And as I mentioned in a previous post, my stories usually had themes of loneliness, fantasy, awakening, and purpose. The turning point of the story was almost never about the hero breaking through his obstacles; it was about him coming to a new perspective on things. I suppose that was little Josh's view on life: the happy ending comes with changing oneself, not changing the environment.

I also binge-played video games that summer. I revisited many of the old worlds that I used to spend hours exploring. Although I grew bored of most of them quickly, the experience was nostalgic and reminded me of the wonder that I used to feel in such worlds. I used to have a sense of adventure, a hope for a life defined by both purpose and freedom. Purpose and freedom. What bliss! How am I to attain both in this life? Could I possibly?

I became addicted to one particular game for the remainder of summer break, called Heroes of the Storm. Being of the MOBA genre, the game was intense and required much strategy and quick reactions; every match was sure to get my adrenaline going. But even as I was hooked on it, I became aware that I was looking for something more than just pure victory—I wanted to know how I best function as a person, in a setting where both teammates and enemies are dealt to me at random. Am I an initiator? A supporter? A tank? A damage-dealer? A specialist? Somehow it seemed very important for me to find out.

The more I played, however, the more I learned (through much frustration) that whatever character I selected and whatever strategy I developed beforehand, it was impossible to determine the game at the outset. Much of the game was about responding in real time to sudden changes, and for me that was particularly frustrating. Being an idealist, I hated uncertainty, mystery. But the all-or-nothing approach of idealists had no place in this game, and I slowly learned that, to have the best chance at defeating the enemy, I had to take things one step at a time. I had to make decisions in the moment without a complete certainty of whether it would work. And if it didn't work, I had to put aside my panic and think calmly about what else I could do. I had to make compromises. I had to apologize to my teammates, and not only own up to my mistakes but keep them from discouraging me in the fight.

And that's how the boy was preserved that summer, in the midst of growing pains. As I played, I also contemplated; and the result was that I was able to reconcile the dreams of youth with the demands of adulthood, to a large extent. The idealistic boy found a new ideal: the practical man.


Third Semester - Be Strong and Courageous

Thus my project came full circle—sympathy embracing a lack thereof. In this respect, I maintained my integrity; I did not give up on being sympathetic, but rather pushed the ideal to its fullest extent, reaching the far end of the spectrum, learning to be a tactical, practical thinker.

Hence this past semester I was determined to learn grit. My responsibilities certainly demanded it; I was taking four history classes in addition to Hebrew, and I was still in the choir. But most importantly, I was employed as a resident assistant.

The time demands of being a resident assistant were not as great as I thought they would be. But the position itself called for much attentiveness to various aspects of living. An RA is expected to be a decent student, a good communicator, firm in principles but gentle in method, a team player, and having some sign of a lively faith. Those are, at least, the expectations of the Residence Life department. Student expectations vary even more; some residents prefer a laissez-faire oversight from RA's, and others hope for greater involvement (of various kinds, depending on their interests). And the problem is that I would never know which method is preferred until I am affirmed or critiqued—with males, critique is usually more likely.

Personally, the most disturbing idea was that at the end of the school year, my residents would likely give me nothing more than a passing thought: good RA, bad RA, mediocre RA. I've heard similar comments about other RA's, and being in the position made me feel very vulnerable to critique. I certainly hoped to do my best, but I also knew the futility of trying to please everyone.

Thus I had to be gritty, because there seemed like few ways that an RA could be more annoying than to be unsure of what to do or why he has the job (which describes me to an extent). So I made clear at the beginning of the semester that I would try to do room checks every week, and that each room should expect me on a certain day of the week. Promising to do it made sure that I had no way out, and consequently I was able to put aside the awkwardness of the first few room checks. Eventually I found out that my residents generally thought I was okay, and that I was worrying too much about it.

I also tried to approach my relationships with a little more structure and predictability compared to freshman year, where I felt the need to ceaselessly explore new social opportunities, as if there was always some neglected soul out there for me to befriend. As a result I had conversations with less people overall, but with greater depth.

I said "no" to many opportunities for involvement, knowing my limits and priorities. Many times I had to contain my excitement, think about my workload, and finally realize that it would be safer not to do it. I was becoming more and more practical. My inner idealist was okay with it. So far so good.

My prayer life changed as well. What used to be infrequent and impassioned prayers became more consistent and calm. (I'm still not sure how wise of a tradeoff this was.) I learned to repress the idea that a prayer without passion is hardly a prayer. Instead I began to expect that God would hear me with seriousness despite my flawed attitude or scarcity of religious affections. My perception of the nature of grace has shifted.

This change toward stability was good for me, but something was still wrong. I was still stressed, but in a more subtle, dark way. Whereas during the previous two semesters I experienced stress as a sharp and sudden emotion, this semester I experienced it as a heavy, slow-building sensation that was even harder to release. I found it even harder to share my feelings with people, and had more of a tendency to tell people that I was all right. After all, my new way of dealing with problems was to solve them, not to seek for sympathy.

I powered through the rest of the semester, continuing to keep what seemed like a healthy balance of schoolwork, social interaction, leisure, and spiritual disciplines. During finals week, as I checked my residents out of the hall one by one, I was eager about the end of the semester. I made it, and I did well.

The day before I left, I checked out my last resident and completed hall clean-ups with the RA team. After a brief farewell meeting with the team, I went into my room and broke down.


Epilogue: Fortitude in Fellowship

What was wrong?

There was a pattern throughout the entire 16 months I was here that I did not notice as I was trying to deal with all my intellectual and emotional difficulties. There was a hidden pride driving my endeavors, and it can be detected in the fact that when I have a problem, I never really ask other people for help. I could not believe that other people have either the wisdom or the love required to meet my needs, and so I did not bother. Even when I was lonely, I would attempt to fix it by changing something about myself, instead of deciding to annoy my friends like any normal person would. I tried to be the independent one, the person who needed no one else. Again, I thought this was noble; in reality, it's somewhat conceited.

Throughout these three semesters, I learned to perceive faithfulness in various ways: as suffering, as reverence, and as self-discipline. But rarely did I think of communion as a way of faithfulness. I practiced it superficially, but I never clearly admitted to myself that I truly needed the people around me. I never admitted to myself how important these people were to me. Perhaps my pride wouldn't let me, or perhaps I was too afraid of losing them. Either way, this self-preoccupation was my ultimate flaw, the thorn in my flesh, my treasured sin. The consequence was that I never felt at home.

But it's true; I need my friends and family so much, despite the sense of independence I try to project. And before I learn to believe that, I will not only have difficulty receiving love, but it will show that I do not trust God enough. For he put these people in my life.

He established the church; yes, composed of sinners and weaklings and fools. But who am I to pretend that I'm any better? We're all in need of grace upon grace. This journey toward glory is meant for a community. The double task of integration and discernment is too great for any one person to bear. We must stumble through it together; God will lead. That is what I must learn to believe.

In Christ—connected with his members, my brothers and sisters—will I find strength.

Onto another semester. May God bless his people, as promised.

Monday, June 20, 2016

LATE UPDATE

I haven't written for almost two months.

I think I was afraid to. Afraid I wouldn't be able to figure out what mess goes on in my head. Yes, I truly have no desire to write. I don't even want to motivate myself to do so.

My reflective capacities have slowed down sharply because of a lack of Scripture. I'm also afraid to read Scripture. It will break me, in order to revive me.

I currently live in a room alone. I enjoy it. Finally, a time of solitude before I'm launched into a 6-person room with RA duties to boot.

I've indulged in my personal temperament too far these past two weeks. I watched more than 10 movies and reached combat level 36 on Runescape. Part of that was because I didn't go to work for a week due to a sprained wrist.

I haven't felt this empty in a while. I've lost my sense of purpose. Some comfort zone; I don't feel right whether I'm sleeping or awake, reading or on social media, watching movies or doing homework, with people or alone. I need God, but I am not willing to go to him.

I've been thinking a lot about my past and my future, trying to figure out who I am so that I can determine who I will be. Particularly, I thought about my past creative works. In my stories, I observe consistent themes of loneliness, fantasy, awakening, and purpose. I hated using narrators in my stories, because I felt that they ruined the mysteriousness of life. Except for my childhood works, my characters are never heroes; they are passive people flowing downstream until something alters their perception of the world and of life. My stories usually end in medias res—in the middle of things—with something to look forward to, usually so that my audience could finish the story with their own lives.

Threefold Mystery: the Spirit of God, of Man, and of the Universe

SOME REFLECTIONS

These are some of the things I've written down in the past few months. As my hectic college schedules have not allowed me to really organize my thoughts into a coherent system, these bits and pieces are the best I could do.

These may seem very obscure and incoherent. They may very well be. Understand this to be the process of building a philosophical perspective on life and everything.

Take everything written here with a grain of salt. A lot of this may turn out to be untrue or incorrect in some respects. I'm merely letting my mind run wild here.


* * * * *

December 3, 2015

In the modern world, time has become a tyrant, always pulling us forward away from the present, in essence dividing our souls from our bodies, our minds from the here and now.

I've always wondered whether man is meant to become more abstract or more concrete as he grows and learns. And now I know: the answer is yes (both). To pursue one without the other is to lose both, and to be filled with emptiness.

When a human being grows, he becomes more and more full, physically and spiritually. If growth is the continuation of creation, then in growth we must seek to be both dense and expansive, being fully grounded in the physical here and now while our minds and spirits reach for the heights and depths of unseen realms. How to do so is a mystery to me. But I suggest to myself a few places to start.

The first starting point is revelation from God, which comes down to earth from heaven, connecting the spiritual and the physical in an explosive connection of love that bursts outward with fruitfulness and glory. Revelation is found in creation (natural and artificial), providence, and especially Scripture. Fellow Christians contain all three aspects of revelation; cherish them.

The second starting point is worship, which goes up to heaven from earth, laying hold of revelation and filling the worshiper with spiritual and physical fullness. Worship is looking to God, reaching for His presence and glory, at once both committing to the world and abandoning it.

Think of the physical and the spiritual not as separate categories, but as the ends of a spectrum. Both comprise the mystery called life and being.

The physical is valuable for its uniqueness and ephemerality.

The spiritual is valuable for its commonality and immutability.

A prayer:
Father, teach me
To be myself and to be a member,
To be present and to be everywhere and every time,
To be at rest and to be at war,
To strive and to wait patiently,
To be self-conscious and self-forgetful,
To be on earth and in heaven,
To be full of sorrow and full of joy,
To give and to receive,
To hold on and to let go,
To seek knowledge and to honor mystery,
To love and to hate,
To die and to live.
Amen.

[Additional notes]:
Oh, the mysteries and paradoxes of life. Oh, the wonder of God.


* * * * *

December 7, 2015

After English class, I started reading chapter 2 of Ronald Dworkin's Religion without God, which I don't really like but which intrigues me with some interesting ideas, especially when he delves into motivations for physicists to seek out a single, unified explanation of the universe.

Why would physicists do that, if not out of some religious instinct? They have some deep assumption that somehow, there is something out there, at least an invisible natural law that they do not yet comprehend, which unifies the universe under its power. Therefore, Dworkin calls them "religious atheists".

I'm also reminded (ironically) of the importance of mystery in religion. There is no religion without mystery, and that is something I have to remember in my walk with God.


* * * * *

Modernism, the Loss of Wonder, and Being a Weirdo
(date written unknown)

The Kantian Divide made enormous waves in philosophical and cultural thinking when it divorced the natural from the supernatural. Science and technology began to rise in prominence, while things like religion and miracles were relegated to the realm of the mysterious. The mysterious eventually became the fictitious, and today these are but the stuff of movies and fantasy novels.

How does this affect everyday life? In societies that are "enlightened", God is almost completely shut out from the conversations of people. At least in pagan idol-worshiping societies, men could engage in discussions or even disputes that are based on the assumption of an existing god(s); they only need to figure out which is/are real and which are false. But the modernist naturalist mind dismisses any possibility of something that's otherworldly or supernatural. To such people, the mechanics of our world are all that exist, and if any irregularities are perceived, there has to be a scientific, natural explanation for it.

Thus, the craving for something that is beyond and transcendent has been suppressed, and we occasionally feed this desire by watching a Marvel superhero movie, for example. We have, in fact, lost a sense of belief and hope that there is a magical world that we could possibly come into contact with; such ideas are, for the most part, mocked today. (But of course, there is also the secular science version of mythology: aliens and UFOs.)

Certainly, we don't want to fall back into superstitious paganism, which diminishes and reduces God as much as modernism does. But we must not let the ideas of naturalism keep us from living with a bold strangeness, as Christians.

Because the truth is that there are, indeed, two worlds: heaven and earth. These two worlds that had been separated by sin are now reconciled because of the blood of Jesus Christ. The supernatural power of heaven has entered into our natural world, and the evidence of that is the Church, who still stands and proclaims the gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit.

We must not let our sense of awe be diminished. We must not be afraid of the people who would scorn us for believing in the resurrection of the soul and body, and in Christ coming down to earth again from the sky. We can be bold in our testimony because we have also come into that supernatural world, those of us who have experienced the regenerating power of the Spirit. We understand in our hearts that we belong to another world, and therefore it's only normal to be thought strange when we speak of God's gospel and act in selfless love towards men.

The cost of being Christian is to be a weirdo in the world. We must expect that, and not let modern standards of "normality" cause us to doubt ourselves. We must stand fully with Christ. We are right in doing so.

Let us speak boldly of the magical world of heaven, for we are not normal. We are the messengers of the divine.


* * * * *

December 19, 2015

Visited Dr. Miller Thursday afternoon for a chat to end my semester. He introduced me to an environmental vision of the world and of life. Perhaps "agrarian" would be a fitting term to use.

"Honor the land as a start," said Dr. Miller. Very interesting. But what is the concept of land? That's something I have to ask him next time.

When I was going to leave, he prayed for me and gave me "an American hug". Thank God for providing me with a professor who loves so deeply.

[Additional notes]:
It actually makes a lot of sense for Christians to have an environmentally-friendly perspective. Sometimes we focus too much on the sanctity and honor of human life that we forget the value of the rest of creation. I think as sinners we are more prone to devalue non-human life as a way to pretend that we are raising our respect for human life.
However, a correct vision of the world sees everything as connected. We are connected biologically and even spiritually. As Wendell Berry remarked, it is idiotic to say that a person can be "healthy" when he is standing in the midst of polluted air. At which point the air and his person coincide, the air is him and becomes him.
Do animals have souls? I used to adamantly say NO, but now my perspective has changed. I believe that animals do have souls, in a sense; not souls that have eternal individuality like humans do, to be sure. That should be uniquely human, I believe. But I think that even plants and rocks have a spiritual element to them. This is only consistent with my belief that it is by the Spirit of God that all things hold together. Nothing is purely physical. In fact, who is to say that the physical is not simply an aspect or a dimension of the spiritual? God is Spirit, and thus His creation cannot be void or independent of His Spirit. To say so would be idolatry.
Even with the preeminence of the human race, the way God structured the world shows us how much we are connected with the world and rely on the world. What could we do without the sun? What could we do without the soil? These things were set in place so we remember we are not gods.


* * * * *

December 20, 2015

Service today morning. As I walked into the hall, I immediately felt a strong contrast. There was definitely something different. I did not understand this until after the service.

I told Chi Xin that I felt something different between Chinese and white congregations. I hypothesized that the Chinese have more of a sense of fatalism, while Americans tend to believe more strongly that their choices can defy the impossible; such mindsets carry into relationships, I presume. Thus, Americans see friendship as a gradual process wrought by effort, while the Chinese have more of an all-or-nothing approach based upon the circumstances; if the circumstances are right, it seems more likely that Chinese people would "submit to fate" and accept whoever is before him as a friend, and even be candid about what they dislike about each other.


* * * * *

December 21, 2015

I read half of Francis Schaeffer's Mark of the Christian today. Pretty much reinforced my thoughts on love and apologetics. If I could combine the concepts with Wendell Berry's "Health is Membership", I would have an interesting theory for Christian apologetics.

A few important concepts I have at this point that I want to jot down:

1) Love as the most central quality of God; a supernatural thing;
2) Love is thus the ultimate apologetic, because it displays something that makes no sense (exceeds the natural) in a selfish, fallen world;
3) Love as the greatest health, bring together people who need each other and therefore making all things complete and whole;
4) Therefore, the need for love to pass through suffering (alienation & disintegration).


* * * * *

January 5, 2016

Something remarkable and full of grace happened today. I was praying, telling God, "I failed you, I failed you, I need your help..."

Somehow my thoughts led to the philosophy of the self, and in an instant, I was given the understanding of who I am. I am created in the spiritual image of God. We all are. That's why it is so hard to define a person by one thing or even multiple things. The soul of a man is infinitely multifaceted, because God's soul is.

Thus, as we dishonor God by reducing His person to one thing (idolatry), like the sun, or the trees, or the earth, or an abstract law, we also dishonor man when we seek to simplify human personalities into external appearances or mannerisms. We are more than that.

What a breathtaking duty: I reflect God's spiritual existence, in all my various intellectual perspectives and affections and volition and characteristics of soul, all too deep to comprehend at once.

I had a renewed sense of this just now as I read Scripture and prayed. I realized that I have been faking before God, and He is not pleased with that. I have become so used to trying to be cool and charming and witty in front of people that this has affected how I pray. A lot of the time I feel like I'm trying to touch God's heart. And I always feel like I fail.

Today I was given the understanding that God is God, and I should stop visualizing His responses in my head. That's idolatry. God is spirit, and His thoughts and feelings in response to my prayers isn't as simple as happy or angry. He is God. I will revere the mystery, and I will revere the truth that He takes the initiative in the covenant. I don't charm Him through prayer to do so. We are both not so simple. We are more. We are spirit.

From a physical perspective on the world, things are what they are. From a spiritual perspective on the world, things are more than what they seem. God is one and three, fire and water, meekness and majesty. God is Spirit.

Thank God. Now I can be myself, more and more.


* * * * *

January 26, 2016

Attended a memorial service for Nate Ferraco, who died in a car crash over the weekend. Sitting in the balcony of John White Chapel, seeing the soccer jersey that used to belong to him displayed on stage, watching his teammates huddle and sing and his girlfriend sob... reflecting on death and how vulnerable every single person is before its great power... it all really sobered me up.

For all the things we hate about life, it still seems a devastating thing when someone passes into the darkness.


* * * * *

February 2, 2016

Spent about 6 hours in total talking to friends and family over Skype this weekend. Really put a strain on my homework, but I feel like it's worth it.

The most important thing I got out of talking with my dad in particular is the idea of awesome holiness, and a renewed sense of the importance of reverence. I've been so soft. I need to hold fast to God's standards while remembering the mercy that has been shown me.

Whenever I feel like I have been wronged, rather than deny it in my "forgiving niceness", I must confess that I really have been wronged, and that I have wronged God in ways worse than that. Then I must remember that He has forgiven me for doing so; He paid the awful price for my hate towards Him. Then I will know how to treat others. I must demand perfection from all, and suffer the pain of their falling short. That's what Christ did.


* * * * *

February 4, 2016

The highlights of today was learning about society and economic systems, with an emphasis on the vices of capitalism. In society class today, Dr. Suhr led us in a discussion of the article about Marx that we read yesterday. Very insightful. I'm beginning to see more and more clearly how much capitalism has shaped us, and how much we as a society set it up as a god.

Also talked to Kara quite a bit tonight, which contributed significantly to my understanding of urban society versus rural society and to my envisioning of the agrarian life.

Agrarianism prizes freedom from reliance on others, self-sufficiency of local communities, commitment to a certain place and people, and historical existence.

Capitalism prizes individual self-sufficiency and liberty by (paradoxically) making every person in the system deeply interdependent. The city man is not tied to a place or community (only to the capitalist system), and his sense of identity is disconnected from his past, for it is his future successes that will establish who he is. He is the self-made man.

Interesting. Worth reflecting on more.


* * * * *

February 6, 2016

In times past, God called Israel to live out her faith in the arena of warfare. A nation of freed slaves, with no heritage of warfare, actually managed to conquer the Promised Land.

You too shall prevail. God has called you, a fool, into the arena of academia. Do not fear, but trust Him, and turn your heart not to idols lest He give you over to defeat.


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February 10, 2016

I had an interesting thought when reading for society class:

The books we read, the perspectives and systems of thought we absorb, etc. are meant to prepare us to learn people, no less the One Person from whom all peoples came. Study of inanimate objects or impersonal laws are not an end in itself. Love is the goal, to see people and to unite with them, seeing through their eyes.

The direction of eternal joy is from impersonal to personal, from death to life, from nothingness to fullness.

A complaint of the heart:
How far am I from You. The fire in my heart is not there. I've been entangled in many concerns of the world.
But know also, Father, that I do these things because You call me to.
I pay attention to people because they belong to You and need You.
I overload myself with work so that other people may be relieved of theirs.
I do it for You.
I am not running away like I used to. I'm in the fray.
Guard my mind and heart. Make me sensitive to my thoughts and attitudes. Fill me with the compassion and the righteous passion of Christ.
Please, Father, remember my faith.
When I resolve to forget myself, please remember me.

Now, let us fight sin. Onward! I fear no evil and no death.


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I've joined the school choir, and this is one of the awesome songs that we sing, called the Pilgrim's Hymn:

Even before we call on Your name
To ask You O God—
When we seek for the words to glorify You,
You hear our prayer.

Unceasing love, O unceasing love,
Surpassing all we know;
Glory to the Father and to the Son
And to the Holy Spirit.

Even with darkness sealing us in,
We breathe Your name;
And through all the days that follow so fast,
We trust in You.

Endless Your grace, O endless Your grace,
Beyond all mortal dream.
Both now and forever, and unto ages
And ages. Amen.