The Unworthy Saint

I rehearse almost all conversations of any weight. Any time I have something specific I need or want to say to someone, I rehearse the conversation in my head, in the car, sometimes even out loud – I even do this with the conversations I’m going to have with God.

“The Gospel is not only the most important message in all of history, it is the only essential message in all of history.”
-Jerry Bridges

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Which makes me think, if it’s the only essential message in history, shouldn’t I do whatever it takes to understand it more? Paul, a leader at my church talked this weekend about traveling alone and how God revealed to him, through that experience, what it’s like to be living in a foreign land – something the bible talks about very much. So I’m wondering, if understanding the gospel is really that important, should we not become poor – if only for a time? Should we not be a foreigner – if only for a time? Should we not be homeless – if only for a time? On and on I could go… certainly God has given us certain things that are right and good, and we shouldn’t deny those gifts, but perhaps we hold onto those things too tightly – so tightly that we don’t really understand the Gospel, when if we emptied ourselves of those things, much would become clear.

I can still remember when the trees were so vivid, so green, so perfect.
And I can remember when the path was so soft, so straight and so clear.
I can remember when the only whispers in my ear seemed to be your sweet voice.
I can remember the fog lifting and the rays of sunlight cutting through the trees, spotlighting each and ever step.
I can remember the bread being so tasty and the water so fresh.
I can remember the light steps, the singing and whistling, hopping and skipping.
I can remember dreams light and joyful.
But life sometimes takes a turn for the worse and…
My dreams try to kill me and they steal from my sleep.
My feet are heavy, legs weak and brittle as twigs.
The food I have left is stale and clean water is scarce.
The fog never quite lifts and darkness masks the trail.
The only whispers I hear speak of melancholy and despair.
The path is littered with potholes and sharp rocks that dig into my heals.
The trees are gnarled and twisted, ripping my clothing and scratching my skin.
So I masturbate again.

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Disclaimer: This isn’t an account of my day, but of a time of my life.

Let’s bind our broken hearts together
With tape and twig for crutch we’ll stagger
Through the maze of darkness’ forest
Where death doth sing in siren’s chorus
“Despair young children, you’ve lost your way”
Friend rest on me, let’s hope and pray

For my friends.

Why would we not date the Godliest man/woman we know? Is it our depravity that ranks physical attraction as high or higher than Godliness? Will the Godly woman or man not become our very definition of sexy if they are our lover?

Proverbs 31:30 says: “Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.”

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I have to say, I am dating the woman I am because 1) I thought she was cute and 2) because I thought she was Godly… not the other way around. My asking this question is spawned from a conversation and it’s not to say that there’s anyone I’d rather be with – there isn’t, my girlfriend is on the same level of the other Godly women I respect. It just struck me for the first time – why was this not my outlook? Why was my primary concern not “is she Godly?” I know that I wouldn’t be dating my girlfriend if she wasn’t Godly, but it wasn’t my first concern (if I’m really being honest) – and I kinda feel ashamed for it.

I’m not trying to say that physical attraction is bad, I think it helps. And I’m not trying to say that we shouldn’t find someone we “click with” in conversation, that’s helpful too. Ultimately I believe you should be with the person God wants you with – you should pray for His will. I’m just wondering if my eyes deceive me, if I would be better off basing my attraction off spiritual than physical or emotional.

So… I became a wedding photographer yesterday due to the horrific weather. I was a little nervous because of the lighting – or lack there of. I bought a sweet lens last year that allows me to not use a flash in low light situations which really saved me – but I realize now that I really need to get a decent flash for my camera. I also need to learn to slow down, make sure I get the focus, pay attention to my surroundings, etc (just as I would if I were out shooting somewhere else with less pressure – like Asia). But in the end, I think I got some good shots, got to help some friends out, and it was a great learning experience.

Here are a few of my favorite shots – I don’t want to show everything before the bride and groom get to see. The one of the bride and groom kinda defines what I think of when I think of them… enjoy.

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After the fact I decided to post this one – I just love the moment captured here. It makes me laugh.

“Many years ago in England, a criminal named Charles Peace was arrested. He was a burglar, a forger, and he was guilty of double murder. He was condemned to death for his crimes. As he was making his way to the gallows on the day of his execution, a chaplain walked by his side. This minister was simply “going through the motions,” speaking coldly of the importance of faith and belief. In the course of his oft-repeated speech, the minister mentioned the power of Jesus Christ to save from sin.”

Suddenly the criminal spun around, looked the chaplain in the eye, and exclaimed, ‘Do you believe that? Do you really believe that? If I believed that, I would willingly crawl across England on broken glass to tell men it was true.’”

Thomas A Kempis, in his book “Imitation of Christ,” first published in 1418, wrote the following words:

“If there is good in you, see more good in others, so that you may remain humble. It does no harm to esteem yourself less than anyone else, but it is very harmful to think yourself better than even one.”

It feels funny to argue with a man who’s nearly 600 years old, who wrote one of the most widely read spiritual book in history – I feel somewhat inferior, like I shouldn’t know as much about truth as he does – and yet, I don’t agree with him. This is my reasoning:

My main problem is in his statement of “This is how you (remain/are) humble: When you think yourself good, go look at others and see the good in them.” No, the way to obtain/retain humility is to look at God, how you were bought in the cross of Christ, and to pray for humility. That’s the only way to get true humility. If we pridefully compare ourselves to another human and think ourselves better, should we then in turn humble ourselves through comparison, albeit different, but still a comparing of two humans? I’m not sure that’s the answer – either way we’re dodging God’s giving us our true identity and basing our self image on another person. The easiest way to fake humility (to yourself and those around you) is self deprecation in the company of other people. But I think humility is really, simply, just the realization of your true place under Christ.

When I think of humility, I think of John the Baptist, the woman at Jesus feet, the apostle Paul, Simon Peter, Isaiah and the like. Here are some scripture verses:

Luke 5:8
When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!”

Mark 1:7
And this was his (John the Baptist) message: “After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.

Isaiah 6:5
“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.”

These words, to me, convey true humility – and they all involve the person evaluating their position in relation to God (and Christ).

I’m not sure how you could come to a position of humility by realizing the good in anyone but Christ – it’s our brokenness at Jesus’ feet that brings humility, the fact that we are all sinful and need a savior. And ultimately, the fallout should be that you see no one as better or worse than you are, all humans sinners who’ve fallen short of God’s glory and in need of grace. With that perspective you should obey the bible, putting others before you, serving the poor, etc etc… That’s true humility.

Here’s a statement I wrote in the care that kind of sums everything up:

Pride has more to do with thinking oneself as generally “good” and less to do with thinking oneself as “better.” Along the same lines, humility has more to do with one’s standing in Christ and less to do with one’s standing among men, or how one thinks about oneself among men.

Despite popular opinion (being that Jesus hung out with the common people, the crooks, the prostitutes, the drunks, etc), if you really look into the scriptures you’ll discover that Jesus really only hung out with famous people from the bible.

What if we gave of our time, our money and our selves, through service and discipleship, so much that instead of relying on a 401k plan or a large amassment of savings for retirement, we relied on the provision of God and the generosity of the generations we discipled? What if we gave so much of our selves (feeding and clothing the poor, teaching and discipling the children, etc) that we became so poor that our only hope for survival was that the next generations would mimic the way we lived?