I Watched Someone Love Something...

I was thinking this morning again about the opening author's note in Donald Miller's Blue Like Jazz. It reads:

I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn't resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes.

After that I liked jazz music.

Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself. It is as if they are showing you the way.

I used to not like God because God didn't resolve. But that was before any of this happened.

I was thinking about this passage this morning, particularly that second last paragraph, about watching someone love something before you can love it yourself, and realized again the truth in that statement.

I spent almost two years watching people around me love God in a way that I'd never seen before, and then, suddenly, one night, sitting in a friend's car, and still watching him love God, and invite me to that too, I started to get it. All of the different friends in my life showed me the way.

And I was thinking about that this morning, because they're still doing it. They're still modeling for me what it means to experience God on a deeper and deeper level. I saw it last night at church, and sitting around a picnic table at Peter's Drive In last night, and standing in a parking lot as a witness of what God was doing as two friends prayed for another friend. Every time I see these people they teach me something new about God - they incite a desire for deeper and greater things.

Unexpected Excitement and Joy

So my extraordinarily busy day had an interesting twist at it's ending. I picked my friend up from the airport, and as we grabbed dinner and caught up on the last week and a bit in each other's lives, we became amazed at a number of coinciding events that happened completely separately, over the last week and over the last several months, that we'd never shared with each other, and yet seemed to closely parallel each other's hearts.

Suffice it to say that over the next weeks and months we are going to be lifting a big decision before God both together and separately, seeking counsel from Godly people that we trust to speak wisdom and truth into our lives, and waiting for further direction from God. We have a potentially huge decision to make, and we're both filled with joy and excitement at the prospect, and at the way God seems to have been working to lead us to the point where we had the conversation that seems to indicate we need to pray and consider this opportunity.

I am being deliberately vague, as we as of yet have shared it only with each other, and it's not something we're ready to share with the whole world. We spent a chunk of time sitting in my car and praying over it together, inviting God to lead as we consider it further, and I've sent off the first of a couple emails to friends seeking counsel. As things become clearer, and possibilities take on firm shape, I'll share more, but in the meantime I'd like to ask you to pray with us over this next while as we're seeking God, and if God reveals anything to you as you pray, feel free to email me at the address in my profile, or leave a comment here on the blog.

Ezekiel and a busy day

I thought I'd better pop in here so you don't all dessert me for fairer pastures and more regular bloggers!

I have the busiest day I've had in a long time planned tomorrow. I have two job interviews scheduled - one at 8 and one at 10, then I work from 11-7, after which I'm headed to the airport to pick up a friend and probably spend a chunk of the evening with her, before delivering her to where she parked her car for the week she's been away.

I have to be honest - days with back to back scheduling like this stress me out a little. I don't do as well on days that don't give me enough down time and alone time - and there will only be alone time in my car between appointments - which would be great except that I don't particularly like driving, especially to new places. I mostly drive because it is far more convenient, less crowded and less full of slightly odd and smelly people than public transit. But, I'm looking forward to tomorrow evening and catching up with my friend again.

I've been reading the book of Ezekiel this week. I always feel slightly odd admitting that it is one of my favorite chunks of scripture. I fell in love with it for reasons I can't even name somewhere in 1998 or 1999, when I read through the entire Bible for the first time. I was mocked a couple of times for professing my love for Ezekiel, and I mostly didn't pay it any attention for the following several years, with the notable exception of the dry bones chapter which seems to figure rather prominently and come up regularly in the circles I've been hanging around in.

Anyway, for the last while I've had this inner thought (prompting?) that I should go back and read Ezekiel again. And, as I was struggling with a number of things this week, I felt like it would be a good place to start reading. I'm falling in love with it again - for reasons I still can't quite explain. I think I love how extreme it is. Ezekiel lays on his side for all those days, a human object lesson of Israel's sin, and when God wants Ezekiel to internalize his message, he literally feeds it to him. And then there's the fact that God never lets Ezekiel forget his humanity. He never has a chance to get a big head about the whole "prophet speaking for God" aspect of his life. Every time God addresses him, he is reminded of his humanity - "Son of Man." And yet, it's an interesting parallel that "Son of Man" is also the name by which Jesus was called and identified... mmm... loving this book!

And with that I'm off to read in bed for a little while, and hopefully turn my lights out a bit early tonight. I need to get up quite a bit earlier than normal to make it to the 8am interview, and I know that the day will be long and draining.

Nothing to Report

Well, a job offer that had seemed likely didn't arrive, and so I'm spending a chunk of my only day off this week searching the web for job listings in the fields I'm interested in, and emailing resumes to prospective employers. Not too exciting.

Our home is quiet right now. My brothers are at work, and my parents are away for a couple of weeks. It's surprising how slow life in our home becomes when my parents are gone. Because they both work out of our house, we have a fairly continual flow of people through our doors. It's a bit disconcerting how quiet and empty the house feels without the action.

Here's a couple of blog posts, on rather different topics that caught me today:

Renee
and
Brian

Two very different topics, but both posts grabbed me.

a wannabe intellectual?

I've been avoiding my computer screen, or at least this blogger create a new post screen all weekend. I've wandered around my house, trying desperately to convince myself of a number of things, and to avoid thinking about a number of other things. It's funny in that odd coincidence sort of way that I almost always discover things about myself when my parents leave town and my house is empty of most of the tension that exists over the course of a normal day or week.

This week I've found myself wondering if anything I write, anything I do, really matters? I mean, do you really care that I made chicken with pesto for dinner on Friday night, that I painted my toenails twice over the course of the weekend, that I watched a couple of movies, went to the Stampede to do rides with friends, and went to an awesome concert last night with my baby brother? (and just as an aside - it was a Christian concert, and my brother and I decided that Christians really don't "rock out" very well. The band did, and some of the crowd, but the band had to work pretty hard to get the crowd into it. Too bad, 'cause the concert really was amazing, well worth the price of the ticket!) If I was one of those people who smoothly managed to find a "spiritual" reason, or a tie-in to faith in everything, if I somehow made each episode of my life an object lesson, would that add significance where it feels as if there isn't any? Or is life really only about the mundane occurrences, with the occasional moment where faith and spirituality springs to prominence?

Don't get me wrong, life has actually been fairly good lately, with a few marked discouragements or challenges, but I feel odd to even mention or complain about those, because they're insignificant in comparison to the things I faced over the course of five years of depression.

And I discovered something about myself over the course of the weekend. I hide, even in writing where I tend to be most honest, bits and pieces of myself. I have a burning desire to be accepted as an intellectual - as a bright, intelligent person with something of substance to contribute to the world. And yet, most days I feel inadequate. I hide the parts of myself that I have associated with a lack of substance. For instance, I love to read fiction - not weighty, intellectual classics, but historical fiction, romantic stories, anything light and fluffy. I read probably 4 or 5 novels of this sort a week on average. I bought the latest issue of Oprah's magazine last week. (Now you need to understand that I realize that most of the world thinks of Oprah as a woman of substance, but I grew up in a home where my dad poo-pooed anything in the talk show or reality television format, and so I am predisposed to be embarrassed at purchasing something like a magazine with her name on the cover.) I bought the magazine because it had an article written by one of my favorite non-fiction writers (Anne Lamott) - plus, it was the summer reading issue and I thought I might pick up a few recommendations on some good novels to read. Lamott's article was great - what I hesitate to admit because I fear it will taint the perception of myself as intelligent is that I just as eagerly read the article on "How men really feel about breast implants," the article that tells you how to best deal with curly hair in the midst of summer's heat and humidity, the article on how a variety of writers display their libraries, and the article with pictures of the best outfits for under $300.

I recently picked up my diploma from the university, and, in a moment of pride as I came home, showed it to my dad. He studied it for a moment, and said, in a tone that I'm sure was attended to be joking, but was instead cutting and hurtful, "where's the magna cum laude or suma cum laude?" So much for enjoying my moment of accomplishment. Maybe it isn't the rest of the world that I want to recognize my intelligence - maybe it's just my dad.