There are so many things in life that will give us drive, direction, motivation, etc. For me there is none more powerful then the yearning to connect. A connection that is so deep and gripping that many fail to properly explain the painful nature that it is. Once, a glimmer is tasted, the sensation haunts you and lingers in your heart, waiting for you to enact upon it, make a drive for it, sacrifice yourself for it. The feeling rips you up inside and the desire continues to burn, through all the obstacles and abstract thoughts you may have that try to take your mind away from it.
Music, has a way of doing this to me. There are many great musicians, many great songs, but only a few are able to convey through sound the feelings of the heart, the soul, and gripping emotion of the moment. Sound, pure and simple in design. A stimuli that effects us at it's deepest levels, upon which I believe light can only be an accompaniment to. A masterfully combine grouping of sounds can bring me back in time, create a new memory, show me a possible future, take me to a place that has always been in my dreams, endless possibilites. The heartbeat of my thoughts and the fuel for my creativity and passions in life. Music fills me with so much joy, yet it's only just the beginning.
My heart continues to yearn for more, a never ending desire to connect. At one point in life I believed this to be a desire of the flesh. To experience life on a physical level, to feel the intimacy of the flesh with another person, the touch and physical contact of skin. To feel the warmth of another body, and the embrace of another person to feel a sense of security, trust, and understanding. Stories past will tell of the magnificence that is the connection we feel of the flesh. Raw and natural, free of the bounderies that dictate how we are to view the world. The only thing left being the revealed self, in a moment of unashamed sensation. Two becoming one, mutually yearning to connect. To know that the one you share this moment with is also wanting to connect, make the sensation that much more achingly yearning, painful almost. Hearts crying out to connect, in the hopes of feeling a sense of completion through the physical embrace of the other. A brushing touch of bare skin. The glance of eyes for a momentary connection that stop time. The grasp of the hands you yearn for, an embrace of arms and body that bring a gentle soothing and fluttering of the heart. Palpitations that wave through each other and cause us to wonder and question, 'Is this the way to the connection that I seek?'
The connection that can be gained from the physical can only take one so far. The relationship of that person needs to be a key element....
Sleep beckons me, perhaps more next time. g'nite brain
-peace
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Social Dynamics and the Church today.
This is a subject that I've been pondering for some time now, and by the providence of God, Conversation of the topic came up within the pass several weeks in my cell church meetings. The church that I attend, is primarily a cell church or small group based presbyterian church. Started out not as such, but is now. The idea being that each cell church acts as a smaller church in the body of a whole. Seems to be okay, but problems are floating to the surface and my views on this model are slowly changing. Given there are many positive spins that can be place with a ministry model as such, but are we as people whom have fallen to sin, capable of such compartmentalized worship of the Lord, let alone, be true to our faith in complete sacrifice. What makes a cell church less likely to develop social cliques within the body of believers versus just having one body? It's original intent to sort of allow for the prevention of such cliques by introducing new people in the church as well as old to others in the body, of whom one would not have naturally conversed with. However, I feel that by means of introducing new members and existing congregants to each other quite effectively, is still creating a manufactured clique. Groups spend and unset time together of somewheres up to 2 years and develop bonds, friendships, and connections. Then at a given day, all cell churches are expected to spit up in to totally new groups and start all over again, the process of developing bonds, friendships, and connections.
To me this has slowly become a heartbreaking event rather than a new oppurtunity to meet new people. The previous groups folks that I've 'connected' with, I had believed to be true friends, that even with the separation of cell churches, would still be in contact, hang out, or even just say hello. This is not the case. To put it bluntly, I've been with this congregation for some time now, and to this very day, I still feel like an 'outsider in my own family.' There are a few that I am now very close with, albeit my current cell church, but just so happened to be a good majority of folks that also experience the same feelings about the congregation at whole. Is it just that the congregants whom were with this church since childhood, have had such a long history together that an inheirent clique pre-existed, and that outsiders are not an integral part of the church family? I feel that there is a flaw with this. Is not to be a Christian to love and be open to all those in the world? So why the exclusivity within it's own believers? If not especially within it's own body of believers. And what is this insatiable need to belong, to be a part of something, a yearning if you will, to be wanted and needed? Christ should be all that matters, the please of the Lord God, Almighty. Yet my own sin, still causes me to ask for more in this life. As well as many others.
I know I believe in Christ, and that he is my saviour, but why still the need for more? Just pawning it all off on sin and testing just doesn't seem like enough of a satisfying answer. Yet, who are we to judge, no. Perhaps the flaws that exist in the social dynamics of the church are there to not only remind us of our sin and short comings, but also to nurture, grow, test, and allow a drawing of our own eyes to the one that makes everything alright. I want to believe that leaving it at that will satisfy my need to be satisfied with such an answer. Perhaps, I'm not believing in the idea enough, if there is even some measurability to the thing.Perhaps the suffering is a nessacary process of sacrifice for a christian. Is this one of the sacrifice and difficulties that are to be seen by followers of Christ according to the Gospels? not just the physical and tangible but the unforseeable and Psychological. Perhaps the change of heart that one feels as a christian is more than just the emotional, but the pain that follows, as well as the realization of things that were not as important to a person before they believed.
For me I would love for a fellow believer to be honest with me and tell me to my face, without the 'christian-ese' that they don't have the answer, and that they too are struggling with the same devices and in adequecies of the human design. The Bible, God's word shows me this everyday, as well as the beauty that is in the intricate details of the supremely inadequate, yet elegantly designed, human form. Yet, I don't care to hear these same things from my fellow brothers and sisters, I care to listen to the reality that is faced with the Christian on a daily basis. Such things as the pressures that believers feel about that fact that over 80% of the world if not more, have some thing to say negatively about christians, let alone hate us. The Fact that the world at a whole, automatically make assumptions about how we should live 'our lives' based solely on the fact that they have seen us pray for our food. The Struggles that all fellow brothers and sisters struggle with the same exact sins as anyone eles in the dark world we live in, sex, drugs, greed, revenge, etc.
However, a good many believers that I encounter, never own up to anything. They either lay all of it on their faith, not Chirst, their faith, or just let things fall off of them and passively take the abuse in the hopes that the action of passivity will show some form of love or in the case of more Christians, show the image of Christ. A pastor told me once, that we christians are no good to God if were dead. I wondered about that statement, what it meant, what does it directly effect as a christian, what does it mean to my life. There are so many ways to look at that statement, but for the now, I think it means, How can God's will be done if there are no believers to stand up and fight. We can't all just stand in front of the barrel of a gun and just take the bullet. Then theoratically, there won't be any christians left. Sure the image may be left, but who will be there to continue spreading the Gospel? If all of us were to be martyrs then who eles left will carry the name and deeds of Christ till the second coming?
Given I know that all believers have different gifts and different talents that God calls them for, but perhaps the idea of Christianity is too tame, perhaps we're too comfortable. Maybe, it's because of the country we live in, America is great, yet how many of us can honestly say that we really understand what it's like outside the US. We have AC, internet, plumbing & running freaking water that is to some relativity safe to drink, and FAST FOOD!!!! Some third world countries can't even grow food let alone FAST! In this world we live in, the US, how can we possible hope to really understand how much the World needs God, Needs Christ, and Needs to feel loved. When we have everything that we could possible ever need. Yes, there are people in need here in America as well, but let's look at the reality and compare. A good many homeless in NYC for example, are able to find food and shelter in different legal and illegal locations. Medical aid to these folks are an issue yes, but that's just it, and issue, meaning that there are solutions, and means to help, just that how hasn't efficiently be discovered with out pleasing those whom have and control the drugs and money. Yet, outside of the US, for many, there are no shelters, no food, & no medicine. Sure we donate alittle bit, but for most of the time, countries like Ghana and places like mogadishu, the supplies never reach the people, yet help their warlords or whom ever it is that is trying to kill the people.
Can you see the problem...there are so many other things that we need to be worried and praying about, and taking action, but here I am a Christian, and I'm concerned about the issues of why I don't like my churches cell church system. Am i pleasing my Lord God? Am I truly making an impact with the struggles that I feel on such a smaller scale of things. I don't know, perhaps I will never know until I die, but what I do know is that I feel that I am not a good believer, and that perhaps I need to give more of myself to God, to Christ and my faith. Will that provide the answers that I seek? I don't know. My will I know is not my own, My heart I pray daily be filled with the Holy Spirit and Christ so that my eyes and ear will hear God's voice daily. Perhaps that is all that I can do now, until God calls me or when my time is up.
-Peace
To me this has slowly become a heartbreaking event rather than a new oppurtunity to meet new people. The previous groups folks that I've 'connected' with, I had believed to be true friends, that even with the separation of cell churches, would still be in contact, hang out, or even just say hello. This is not the case. To put it bluntly, I've been with this congregation for some time now, and to this very day, I still feel like an 'outsider in my own family.' There are a few that I am now very close with, albeit my current cell church, but just so happened to be a good majority of folks that also experience the same feelings about the congregation at whole. Is it just that the congregants whom were with this church since childhood, have had such a long history together that an inheirent clique pre-existed, and that outsiders are not an integral part of the church family? I feel that there is a flaw with this. Is not to be a Christian to love and be open to all those in the world? So why the exclusivity within it's own believers? If not especially within it's own body of believers. And what is this insatiable need to belong, to be a part of something, a yearning if you will, to be wanted and needed? Christ should be all that matters, the please of the Lord God, Almighty. Yet my own sin, still causes me to ask for more in this life. As well as many others.
I know I believe in Christ, and that he is my saviour, but why still the need for more? Just pawning it all off on sin and testing just doesn't seem like enough of a satisfying answer. Yet, who are we to judge, no. Perhaps the flaws that exist in the social dynamics of the church are there to not only remind us of our sin and short comings, but also to nurture, grow, test, and allow a drawing of our own eyes to the one that makes everything alright. I want to believe that leaving it at that will satisfy my need to be satisfied with such an answer. Perhaps, I'm not believing in the idea enough, if there is even some measurability to the thing.Perhaps the suffering is a nessacary process of sacrifice for a christian. Is this one of the sacrifice and difficulties that are to be seen by followers of Christ according to the Gospels? not just the physical and tangible but the unforseeable and Psychological. Perhaps the change of heart that one feels as a christian is more than just the emotional, but the pain that follows, as well as the realization of things that were not as important to a person before they believed.
For me I would love for a fellow believer to be honest with me and tell me to my face, without the 'christian-ese' that they don't have the answer, and that they too are struggling with the same devices and in adequecies of the human design. The Bible, God's word shows me this everyday, as well as the beauty that is in the intricate details of the supremely inadequate, yet elegantly designed, human form. Yet, I don't care to hear these same things from my fellow brothers and sisters, I care to listen to the reality that is faced with the Christian on a daily basis. Such things as the pressures that believers feel about that fact that over 80% of the world if not more, have some thing to say negatively about christians, let alone hate us. The Fact that the world at a whole, automatically make assumptions about how we should live 'our lives' based solely on the fact that they have seen us pray for our food. The Struggles that all fellow brothers and sisters struggle with the same exact sins as anyone eles in the dark world we live in, sex, drugs, greed, revenge, etc.
However, a good many believers that I encounter, never own up to anything. They either lay all of it on their faith, not Chirst, their faith, or just let things fall off of them and passively take the abuse in the hopes that the action of passivity will show some form of love or in the case of more Christians, show the image of Christ. A pastor told me once, that we christians are no good to God if were dead. I wondered about that statement, what it meant, what does it directly effect as a christian, what does it mean to my life. There are so many ways to look at that statement, but for the now, I think it means, How can God's will be done if there are no believers to stand up and fight. We can't all just stand in front of the barrel of a gun and just take the bullet. Then theoratically, there won't be any christians left. Sure the image may be left, but who will be there to continue spreading the Gospel? If all of us were to be martyrs then who eles left will carry the name and deeds of Christ till the second coming?
Given I know that all believers have different gifts and different talents that God calls them for, but perhaps the idea of Christianity is too tame, perhaps we're too comfortable. Maybe, it's because of the country we live in, America is great, yet how many of us can honestly say that we really understand what it's like outside the US. We have AC, internet, plumbing & running freaking water that is to some relativity safe to drink, and FAST FOOD!!!! Some third world countries can't even grow food let alone FAST! In this world we live in, the US, how can we possible hope to really understand how much the World needs God, Needs Christ, and Needs to feel loved. When we have everything that we could possible ever need. Yes, there are people in need here in America as well, but let's look at the reality and compare. A good many homeless in NYC for example, are able to find food and shelter in different legal and illegal locations. Medical aid to these folks are an issue yes, but that's just it, and issue, meaning that there are solutions, and means to help, just that how hasn't efficiently be discovered with out pleasing those whom have and control the drugs and money. Yet, outside of the US, for many, there are no shelters, no food, & no medicine. Sure we donate alittle bit, but for most of the time, countries like Ghana and places like mogadishu, the supplies never reach the people, yet help their warlords or whom ever it is that is trying to kill the people.
Can you see the problem...there are so many other things that we need to be worried and praying about, and taking action, but here I am a Christian, and I'm concerned about the issues of why I don't like my churches cell church system. Am i pleasing my Lord God? Am I truly making an impact with the struggles that I feel on such a smaller scale of things. I don't know, perhaps I will never know until I die, but what I do know is that I feel that I am not a good believer, and that perhaps I need to give more of myself to God, to Christ and my faith. Will that provide the answers that I seek? I don't know. My will I know is not my own, My heart I pray daily be filled with the Holy Spirit and Christ so that my eyes and ear will hear God's voice daily. Perhaps that is all that I can do now, until God calls me or when my time is up.
-Peace
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Learning about Puer
I've been diving, head first into the world of Puer tea lately and learning much ^^
I've just finished doing a tasting of a 06' Raw puehr and I felt that it was quite amazing. With what I can precieve as having great potential for growth. I feel that there is a slight green astringency not that much different from a young white sauvignon wine. Perhaps that is why I have such a great affinity for Puer tea.
After learning much about Chinese Medicine, wine and beer tastings are now to become things of rarity in my life due to the overall constitution of myself. So upon this discovery and the dissapointing news of my teachers and peers, that Alcohol may not be the best things for more. More rather I'm to some degree allergic to alcohol in an Oriental Medicine Sense. My heart had broken, into not many small pieces, no no no, but into dust. Wine a beer tastings had been such a love for me for so many years. The ability to descern tastes, smells, and even with the great ones, the envisionment of where the brewmaster or wine maker wanted one to feel when drinking something. Okay, maybe that's alittle farfetched but that's what I feel sometimes when I taste something mind blowing. It's alittle bit like Pixar's Ratatouille's Remy, When he eats something, there is a fanciful world that literally Explodes around him, The blend and sexually melding of flavors and smells, The Foreplay on the tongue of the vast limitless combinations and concoctions of ingredients.
When the film came out, I was truly in love. Not because it was a great film, but because it spoke the same language to me. As if finally someone in the media verse had grasped the idea of what is so truly a emotional and yet deeply visceral sensation such that is taste. Absolutely wonderful. So can you imagine the heartbreak that I had when I was told that Alcohol should most indefinatly be removed from my diet?!? I thought Preposturous, You must be insane. To me it was the equivalent of telling a Fish that they were allergic to water!!!
So what did I do the day that I was told the bad news.
I had a drink ^^ I had a 03' Australian Railroad Shiraz, That was given to me as a gift along with a Ribeye that I marinaded in Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Rosemary, Oregano and Salt & Pepper. Let sit for about 1 hour and sprinkled some of the wine on the meat. Put it through a spit and let it rotisserie for about 30 mins at about 450 degrees F. Made a side of saffron and garlic sauted spinich with a dash of aged balsamic vinegar, and some korean kimchee. I reveled in that meal as if it was my last. Let's just say that, in that moment when i smelled the wine, smelled the aroma of roasted ribeye, the glistening sight of the fat and oils with the textured rough coarse ness of herbs and the herbally aromatic scents of saffron with Spinich, and the pungency of pickled cabbage. Yea, oh yea, let's just say that I have yet to have another meal that rivaled the one on that day. Not because it was the ingredients, nor the fact that everything was made and prepared to perfection, no. It was because I dove into that plate as if it were my last and final true tasting of food. My last stand against all that was against me from tasting anything enjoyable again. It was my Alamo.
Months passed after my last stand, Life had become stagnant. I preoccupied my mind with other things, such as studying and movies. I was told that I could still have the occasional wine and beer here and there, but it just wasn't the same anymore. The Honeymoon I suppose one could say was over. What eles could there possible be for an ex chef to yearn for on his veteran tongue. What eles could stimulate my mind and an exercise of thought, taste, smell, and imagination? I did just about everything to be able to practice the skill that I had so long honed for so many years in Kitchens and Restaurants all up and down the eastern seaboard and abroad. I tried with powdered herbs in the pharmacy at school, even the archaic old raw herbs, even though I was advised not to. I tried exotic fruits, and other rare ingredients. But alas, there was nothing in the world as complex and diverse as the world that I had so begrudgingly left behind. I felt that perhaps I should move on, let go, maybe try my hand at the coffee trade while sipping on a cup of 02' CNNP Meng hai Seven Sons Puer. Coffee is okay, there is some degree of complexity there too, although I'll probably become all that I hate (Starbucks) Yet it isn't all that bad to be come a java snob.
Lychee....Why am I tasting Lychee in my Tea? I love Lychee, what the nasty, what is this that I'm tasting?!?!?!?! I've been drinking this tea now for almost 2 years and i'm tasting odd things that I never took the time to notice. Lychee, limes, mohagony, cherry and oak woods, Plums, cinammon, even a smoky chardonnay. Holy crap, this is more complex than wine.!!! I loved Tea, I always have loved tea. Yet this is something different, something new, a new kind of love, a love that I soon discovered had been there almost all my life but I took for granted. It equated to a Jane Austin novel-like experience where the main Heroine was in love the the dashingly handsome Duke that everyone knew and loved, they had a whirlwind romance and then the war took him away. All the while her best friend, since childhood, had always been with her, secretly loving her and supporting her, all from behind the scenes. Then one day, in her dull and passionless life, she takes a glance at her childhood friend and he looks upon her from a distance, with a passion that has always been gazed upon herself since the beginning, in the dire hopes that she will recognize the deeply rooted devotion of everything that is her. Wind blowing upon her back to coax her from her place to move in the direction of her beloved. Her Heart feeling a fire and light that radiates from her inner being, a sensation all to familiar yet, as if a dream unknown to her and new and fresh.
Okay, Okay, that's enough of that Crap!!! You get the point.
K I need some tea now ^^
-Peace
I've just finished doing a tasting of a 06' Raw puehr and I felt that it was quite amazing. With what I can precieve as having great potential for growth. I feel that there is a slight green astringency not that much different from a young white sauvignon wine. Perhaps that is why I have such a great affinity for Puer tea.
After learning much about Chinese Medicine, wine and beer tastings are now to become things of rarity in my life due to the overall constitution of myself. So upon this discovery and the dissapointing news of my teachers and peers, that Alcohol may not be the best things for more. More rather I'm to some degree allergic to alcohol in an Oriental Medicine Sense. My heart had broken, into not many small pieces, no no no, but into dust. Wine a beer tastings had been such a love for me for so many years. The ability to descern tastes, smells, and even with the great ones, the envisionment of where the brewmaster or wine maker wanted one to feel when drinking something. Okay, maybe that's alittle farfetched but that's what I feel sometimes when I taste something mind blowing. It's alittle bit like Pixar's Ratatouille's Remy, When he eats something, there is a fanciful world that literally Explodes around him, The blend and sexually melding of flavors and smells, The Foreplay on the tongue of the vast limitless combinations and concoctions of ingredients.
When the film came out, I was truly in love. Not because it was a great film, but because it spoke the same language to me. As if finally someone in the media verse had grasped the idea of what is so truly a emotional and yet deeply visceral sensation such that is taste. Absolutely wonderful. So can you imagine the heartbreak that I had when I was told that Alcohol should most indefinatly be removed from my diet?!? I thought Preposturous, You must be insane. To me it was the equivalent of telling a Fish that they were allergic to water!!!
So what did I do the day that I was told the bad news.
I had a drink ^^ I had a 03' Australian Railroad Shiraz, That was given to me as a gift along with a Ribeye that I marinaded in Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Rosemary, Oregano and Salt & Pepper. Let sit for about 1 hour and sprinkled some of the wine on the meat. Put it through a spit and let it rotisserie for about 30 mins at about 450 degrees F. Made a side of saffron and garlic sauted spinich with a dash of aged balsamic vinegar, and some korean kimchee. I reveled in that meal as if it was my last. Let's just say that, in that moment when i smelled the wine, smelled the aroma of roasted ribeye, the glistening sight of the fat and oils with the textured rough coarse ness of herbs and the herbally aromatic scents of saffron with Spinich, and the pungency of pickled cabbage. Yea, oh yea, let's just say that I have yet to have another meal that rivaled the one on that day. Not because it was the ingredients, nor the fact that everything was made and prepared to perfection, no. It was because I dove into that plate as if it were my last and final true tasting of food. My last stand against all that was against me from tasting anything enjoyable again. It was my Alamo.
Months passed after my last stand, Life had become stagnant. I preoccupied my mind with other things, such as studying and movies. I was told that I could still have the occasional wine and beer here and there, but it just wasn't the same anymore. The Honeymoon I suppose one could say was over. What eles could there possible be for an ex chef to yearn for on his veteran tongue. What eles could stimulate my mind and an exercise of thought, taste, smell, and imagination? I did just about everything to be able to practice the skill that I had so long honed for so many years in Kitchens and Restaurants all up and down the eastern seaboard and abroad. I tried with powdered herbs in the pharmacy at school, even the archaic old raw herbs, even though I was advised not to. I tried exotic fruits, and other rare ingredients. But alas, there was nothing in the world as complex and diverse as the world that I had so begrudgingly left behind. I felt that perhaps I should move on, let go, maybe try my hand at the coffee trade while sipping on a cup of 02' CNNP Meng hai Seven Sons Puer. Coffee is okay, there is some degree of complexity there too, although I'll probably become all that I hate (Starbucks) Yet it isn't all that bad to be come a java snob.
Lychee....Why am I tasting Lychee in my Tea? I love Lychee, what the nasty, what is this that I'm tasting?!?!?!?! I've been drinking this tea now for almost 2 years and i'm tasting odd things that I never took the time to notice. Lychee, limes, mohagony, cherry and oak woods, Plums, cinammon, even a smoky chardonnay. Holy crap, this is more complex than wine.!!! I loved Tea, I always have loved tea. Yet this is something different, something new, a new kind of love, a love that I soon discovered had been there almost all my life but I took for granted. It equated to a Jane Austin novel-like experience where the main Heroine was in love the the dashingly handsome Duke that everyone knew and loved, they had a whirlwind romance and then the war took him away. All the while her best friend, since childhood, had always been with her, secretly loving her and supporting her, all from behind the scenes. Then one day, in her dull and passionless life, she takes a glance at her childhood friend and he looks upon her from a distance, with a passion that has always been gazed upon herself since the beginning, in the dire hopes that she will recognize the deeply rooted devotion of everything that is her. Wind blowing upon her back to coax her from her place to move in the direction of her beloved. Her Heart feeling a fire and light that radiates from her inner being, a sensation all to familiar yet, as if a dream unknown to her and new and fresh.
Okay, Okay, that's enough of that Crap!!! You get the point.
K I need some tea now ^^
-Peace
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
The Emergent Church, Clint Eastwood, & Gran Torino
Post modernism...
Modernity...
Religion...
Anti - Religion...
Coexistence Theology...
I was speaking with my wife the other night about the emergent Church, because she is taking a class on it and would like some insight as to what I thought about it. Well, I told her to be honest, I don't know much about it but I'll tell you what I know and what I think.
So, to discuss about it, i had done some investigating on the subject, not in depth, but some overall broad spectrum understanding of it. The best description I got was from a pastor friend of mine who stated in a nutshell, that first the emerging church and the emergent church is in fact two different things, even though for the most part they are associated as the same thing. Mostly due to superficial reasons in the way the two churches would look on the outside. However, the core of it is quite different. The emergent church of which is getting more buzz, is based on a more emotionally based ideology, dash of facts, and a generalized pinch of the Gospel. Main focus claiming to be the christ centered model but in a more 21st century, emo - mtv style mode. Instead of worship, it's more like a discussion and debate about the efficacy of Christ and the Church, and is seemingly designed to be a open door policy to allow parishiners the freedom to be right in their own right. Sort of like, trying not to step on anyones toes as to the fear that non - christians will have a bad taste in their mouths and in turn make up stonewalled choices about the followers of Christ. The emerging church, on the other hand, is more about a Gospel centered, free understanding, inclusive idea with 21st century formats. Less about offending, more about worshipping, and deeper believing in the idea that it's not about being politically correct, but more about being truly Christ - centered.
Now, this is my very general understanding of the differences, but there may be more to it than that. Yet, from what I hear of the two, from the pastors, wiki's, forums, and laypeoples, the story seems to be the same. It's a church that is trying to be more hip, in, and of the times. Less about being a church and more about the church breaking societal norms and preconceived notions of Christianity. Bottom line, a 'religion' that is more easily swallowable, and acceptible in a world that is more well informed and 'intelligent.'
So, I began running into an issue with this whole thing. If Christ, God, and the Church are supposed to be blessed, in a world that is cast in darkness, than why the need for the essential catering of the masses to allow God's precepts to be palatable? Are people so sensitive to the matters of faith that we now have to tip toe around such subjects? Have we as a peoples become so in tune with the 'universe' that we rationalize that all religions must be the same, because they all seem to preach about the same things?
This questioning in my own right brought me to a conversation I had with a close friend about the film Gran Torino directed by Clint Eastwood. Crass, in your face, quintessential Eastwood. Brother told me that in a nutshell, the film was about how the world had gone soft, that no one has the capability to take cynacism and insults like they used to. Why would a movie such as this be needed? How many of you out there that are reading this noticed the trend in favorite movies being that the subjects of revenge, Righteous anger, leveling the playing field under insurmountable odds, being the most watched. Everyone, in my opinion, have indeed become soft, and I catch myself in this mode as well at times. Being politically correct and sensitive to emotions as become paramount to society than I dare say health itself. Yet, impressing on the masses the ideologies of Love, Hope, & sometimes Faith are now, no longer sacred nor necassary, but rather what you just say (without spiritual underpinnings.) Some one is down right pissed off at the current predicament, and what do people tell you now, 'aw~ it's okay, it'll all be okay, I will sympathize with you, I will share your pain, I will do my best to let you know that I will 'love' on you.' Now, this sounds like the humane thing to do, right? Yet, is it still right. Can a person truly feel the pain of another, and except all that comes with it. The baggage, the yelling inside, the yelling outside, the rage, the pain, and the endless tissues that will make a person raw in the nasal orifices to the point of a leperous - like deformation. Are we willing to make the sacrifices that entail such a task as sharing in the pain of someone that we care about? Then from another point of view are we dumbing ourselves, of our spirituality by allowing others the oppurtunity to even make a relativly empty statement such as the above? Has human kind become so left in the dark of the world that we forget that there is an almighty God, that once and technically still is ruling over the know understanding of the presence and plain we live in.
We are so stuck in the idea that we can't harm, and also so quick as to love, yet without the full understanding of what it means to love. Love as now be brought down to the level of just something that we are supposed to do because that's what we as a people are supposed to do. Being 'PC' about things as become the main religion of the masses. The most prolific and fastest growing religion in my opinion today, is the church of atheism and apathy with non Christian spritualist coming in at a close 2nd.
So what is a church to do now that the world hates the Christians? Oh, I guess now we just fall in line with the rest of the world and make Christ more politically correct, afterall, the bible was written couple thousands of years ago, and the cultures of the times were so much more different back then. This is what I hear from the mouths of my fellow believers and non believers as well. The justification of the Gospel, becoming p.c. is that the gospel is antiquated?!?! So, now churches are moving in a direction to make Christ kool with a K. Next thing you know, I'll start seeing new modern translations of the new testament with Jesus spelled alittle more like this:
j35U2
We are doomed as a society, when we begin to water down and modernify the things that we once held as sacred. Sacred in today's world to some degree has become nothing more than a phrase uttered in a museum that hold sacred artifacts of past religions. I believe that the people of the world today have become soft, are afraid of the impacts that one's own faith will have on the environment around them, and are weakened by the effects of mass media and the rampant rise of over spirituality that is to some degree very reminescent of the late 60's.
Love of course being it's main focus. A universal idea indeed but having the ability to permeate and be used in so many levels. Both beautiful and frightning at the same time. 'The devil's best trick is to persuade you that he doesn't exist.' - Baudelarie Yes, I know that the Usual Suspects movie made it popular again, but the phrase was taken for the poet above. C.S. Lewis wrote a book called the Screwtape Letters, being about a series of letters written by a lower ranking deamon to it's mentor deamon. The goes in depth in the wily was that the engine of sin is used, and the tools that the deamon utilizes in the best of people to further pull the eyes of man away from God, even using God himself. So perhaps Love is what's being used again to further pull the eyes of the world away from God. Because love is so grand, it's soft, pretty and fluffy like a cat. >.< Well, perhaps it's time that people stopped looking into the looking glass and started taking a look at the world for the way it really is.
So Here is my bold statement to the world. This is not my preaching for those who are sensitive to the ways of the Christian world with aberration. I am a Christian, a follower of Christ. I believe with all my heart, mind and soul that Jesus Christ is in fact the son of God, and died for my sins, and the sins of the world. This is the way it is, this is the way it will be, and that's what I will be. So at the risk of being 'emergent' (like my overuse of quotes) I am not preaching to you reader, I am not trying to subversively brainwash you into the world of Christ, nor am I a deceiver of religion, I am plain, and out there, take it or leave, I have no worries if you don't accept and I don't mind if you don't agree, That choice is yours to make not mine, if anything I have no power, the true power is in God almighty and I am but a mere servant and follower of his way. If you think I'm rude, sorry, but in the world that I live in I try to be a real as possible, I fail at times like most of you, and at times I succeed in the day. So, I suppose that best that we can do is hope for the best, stick to our guns, and have true faith. So be happy that you are alive today, why shouldn't it be the best day of your life, since God allowed you to have another day ^^
- Peace
Modernity...
Religion...
Anti - Religion...
Coexistence Theology...
I was speaking with my wife the other night about the emergent Church, because she is taking a class on it and would like some insight as to what I thought about it. Well, I told her to be honest, I don't know much about it but I'll tell you what I know and what I think.
So, to discuss about it, i had done some investigating on the subject, not in depth, but some overall broad spectrum understanding of it. The best description I got was from a pastor friend of mine who stated in a nutshell, that first the emerging church and the emergent church is in fact two different things, even though for the most part they are associated as the same thing. Mostly due to superficial reasons in the way the two churches would look on the outside. However, the core of it is quite different. The emergent church of which is getting more buzz, is based on a more emotionally based ideology, dash of facts, and a generalized pinch of the Gospel. Main focus claiming to be the christ centered model but in a more 21st century, emo - mtv style mode. Instead of worship, it's more like a discussion and debate about the efficacy of Christ and the Church, and is seemingly designed to be a open door policy to allow parishiners the freedom to be right in their own right. Sort of like, trying not to step on anyones toes as to the fear that non - christians will have a bad taste in their mouths and in turn make up stonewalled choices about the followers of Christ. The emerging church, on the other hand, is more about a Gospel centered, free understanding, inclusive idea with 21st century formats. Less about offending, more about worshipping, and deeper believing in the idea that it's not about being politically correct, but more about being truly Christ - centered.
Now, this is my very general understanding of the differences, but there may be more to it than that. Yet, from what I hear of the two, from the pastors, wiki's, forums, and laypeoples, the story seems to be the same. It's a church that is trying to be more hip, in, and of the times. Less about being a church and more about the church breaking societal norms and preconceived notions of Christianity. Bottom line, a 'religion' that is more easily swallowable, and acceptible in a world that is more well informed and 'intelligent.'
So, I began running into an issue with this whole thing. If Christ, God, and the Church are supposed to be blessed, in a world that is cast in darkness, than why the need for the essential catering of the masses to allow God's precepts to be palatable? Are people so sensitive to the matters of faith that we now have to tip toe around such subjects? Have we as a peoples become so in tune with the 'universe' that we rationalize that all religions must be the same, because they all seem to preach about the same things?
This questioning in my own right brought me to a conversation I had with a close friend about the film Gran Torino directed by Clint Eastwood. Crass, in your face, quintessential Eastwood. Brother told me that in a nutshell, the film was about how the world had gone soft, that no one has the capability to take cynacism and insults like they used to. Why would a movie such as this be needed? How many of you out there that are reading this noticed the trend in favorite movies being that the subjects of revenge, Righteous anger, leveling the playing field under insurmountable odds, being the most watched. Everyone, in my opinion, have indeed become soft, and I catch myself in this mode as well at times. Being politically correct and sensitive to emotions as become paramount to society than I dare say health itself. Yet, impressing on the masses the ideologies of Love, Hope, & sometimes Faith are now, no longer sacred nor necassary, but rather what you just say (without spiritual underpinnings.) Some one is down right pissed off at the current predicament, and what do people tell you now, 'aw~ it's okay, it'll all be okay, I will sympathize with you, I will share your pain, I will do my best to let you know that I will 'love' on you.' Now, this sounds like the humane thing to do, right? Yet, is it still right. Can a person truly feel the pain of another, and except all that comes with it. The baggage, the yelling inside, the yelling outside, the rage, the pain, and the endless tissues that will make a person raw in the nasal orifices to the point of a leperous - like deformation. Are we willing to make the sacrifices that entail such a task as sharing in the pain of someone that we care about? Then from another point of view are we dumbing ourselves, of our spirituality by allowing others the oppurtunity to even make a relativly empty statement such as the above? Has human kind become so left in the dark of the world that we forget that there is an almighty God, that once and technically still is ruling over the know understanding of the presence and plain we live in.
We are so stuck in the idea that we can't harm, and also so quick as to love, yet without the full understanding of what it means to love. Love as now be brought down to the level of just something that we are supposed to do because that's what we as a people are supposed to do. Being 'PC' about things as become the main religion of the masses. The most prolific and fastest growing religion in my opinion today, is the church of atheism and apathy with non Christian spritualist coming in at a close 2nd.
So what is a church to do now that the world hates the Christians? Oh, I guess now we just fall in line with the rest of the world and make Christ more politically correct, afterall, the bible was written couple thousands of years ago, and the cultures of the times were so much more different back then. This is what I hear from the mouths of my fellow believers and non believers as well. The justification of the Gospel, becoming p.c. is that the gospel is antiquated?!?! So, now churches are moving in a direction to make Christ kool with a K. Next thing you know, I'll start seeing new modern translations of the new testament with Jesus spelled alittle more like this:
j35U2
We are doomed as a society, when we begin to water down and modernify the things that we once held as sacred. Sacred in today's world to some degree has become nothing more than a phrase uttered in a museum that hold sacred artifacts of past religions. I believe that the people of the world today have become soft, are afraid of the impacts that one's own faith will have on the environment around them, and are weakened by the effects of mass media and the rampant rise of over spirituality that is to some degree very reminescent of the late 60's.
Love of course being it's main focus. A universal idea indeed but having the ability to permeate and be used in so many levels. Both beautiful and frightning at the same time. 'The devil's best trick is to persuade you that he doesn't exist.' - Baudelarie Yes, I know that the Usual Suspects movie made it popular again, but the phrase was taken for the poet above. C.S. Lewis wrote a book called the Screwtape Letters, being about a series of letters written by a lower ranking deamon to it's mentor deamon. The goes in depth in the wily was that the engine of sin is used, and the tools that the deamon utilizes in the best of people to further pull the eyes of man away from God, even using God himself. So perhaps Love is what's being used again to further pull the eyes of the world away from God. Because love is so grand, it's soft, pretty and fluffy like a cat. >.< Well, perhaps it's time that people stopped looking into the looking glass and started taking a look at the world for the way it really is.
So Here is my bold statement to the world. This is not my preaching for those who are sensitive to the ways of the Christian world with aberration. I am a Christian, a follower of Christ. I believe with all my heart, mind and soul that Jesus Christ is in fact the son of God, and died for my sins, and the sins of the world. This is the way it is, this is the way it will be, and that's what I will be. So at the risk of being 'emergent' (like my overuse of quotes) I am not preaching to you reader, I am not trying to subversively brainwash you into the world of Christ, nor am I a deceiver of religion, I am plain, and out there, take it or leave, I have no worries if you don't accept and I don't mind if you don't agree, That choice is yours to make not mine, if anything I have no power, the true power is in God almighty and I am but a mere servant and follower of his way. If you think I'm rude, sorry, but in the world that I live in I try to be a real as possible, I fail at times like most of you, and at times I succeed in the day. So, I suppose that best that we can do is hope for the best, stick to our guns, and have true faith. So be happy that you are alive today, why shouldn't it be the best day of your life, since God allowed you to have another day ^^
- Peace
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
God, Oriental Medicine, & Aikido
I went back to Aikido last night after almost of year of being outside the dojo. Sensei called me and my friend up a week ago saying that we need to come back so that he can formally give us our 5th kyu certificates and yukyusha card, that way we can officially be a part of the Aikido federation. It was really great to be back and painful at the same time. I had started running daily 1 week before the class so that helped in the cardio department, but not in the stretching and muscle strength department.
Overall, there was lots of pain, but in a good way. More than that though, sensei really gave us some true pearls of Aikido wisdom. Particularly in the area of the concept to be 'one' with oneself and 'one' with your attacker. Diving into ideas of meditation and biblical theology, the aikido concept of this very common idea, became that much more clear. The most impactful image that he gave was, as an aikidoka, if I were to be attacked, and in turn I had a lapse of judgment and caused my attack harm, when I in turn am striving to be one with my attacker, who is it that I really hurt? This sort of thinking is not the norm of the martial arts world, but an idea that is in it's foundations of all martial arts. How is it that these ideas have been forgotten to the point that we read them, hear them and yet not be able to feel them. Has society gone so deep into it's post - modern state that our thoughts are now too complicated with the ways of the world?
Stillness was the other area that sensei had talked about last night. That in everything we do today, there is no sense of singularity in thought but a complex stream of concerns, worries, and trepidations that again take us away from the truth that is supposed to be paramount in our thoughts. That truth being what it is that we are supposed to be focused on at any given time. "How many times have we tried to study a book, read it, read it again, and wonder, how many periods and commas were in the text, let alone ponder upon why the author chose to pick the words and place them in the page as he or she has done so. " Our thoughts are always being bombarded with multiple thoughts even when we try to be in a meditative state of concentration. I know that I myself fall victim to this daily as I'm sure that many other students do, the struggle of calming my mind in order to concentrate on the task that is given to me. Countless number of times that I've read a chapter in it's entirety, only to find that i have to read it again, because I was thinking about how I would cook that piece of venison that is cryo - bagged in my Freezer. The Calming stillness of one's mind is something that everyone yearns for and innately understands it's importance, but in an age of modernity have lost the ability to truly focus ones mind to such a still state that it's physical appearance would be that of a calm ripple - less lake. Biblically, these extra collateral thoughts are supposed to be satan trying to take us away from the truth of God's Universe so as that our minds can remain in the temptuousness of the world that satan rules over. How important than in a world that is a fully fortified battery of temptations in sexy sin, is it that we pray, meditate, and consume upon, with great hunger, the words of the righteous and holy?
The balance game that we play on a daily basis, is truly something to chew on some more before swollowing. TCM, as far as I've heard so far states that the balance of yin and yang is paramount importance in the treatment and well being of the human creature. The upsetting part is that due to the changes in chinese socitey, this idea has been taken to a new level of misunderstanging, by means of removing the spiritual importance of the two. Just as how 21 century Protestants in America have slowly removed the spiritual aspect or worship, TCM has also done so to a certain degree. Judeo Christian thoughts idea on the Spirit makes so much sense in the CCM sense that the focus of healing should be on the spirit and the functional aspect of the being rather than the physical body itself. So, what are these things? Working diligently, living a life of discipline, hungering for the word of God, meditation upon the world of God, Fellowship with brothers and sisters, Loving all those that live on the earth, Taking rest when it is time to rest, and sureing up ones self when it is time to regain. This to me sounds like a pretty darn busy schedule in anyones daily life. Here's something interesting, the bible also states that the physically body that we have on earth is nothing more than a shell for our true selves (spirit).
-Peace
Overall, there was lots of pain, but in a good way. More than that though, sensei really gave us some true pearls of Aikido wisdom. Particularly in the area of the concept to be 'one' with oneself and 'one' with your attacker. Diving into ideas of meditation and biblical theology, the aikido concept of this very common idea, became that much more clear. The most impactful image that he gave was, as an aikidoka, if I were to be attacked, and in turn I had a lapse of judgment and caused my attack harm, when I in turn am striving to be one with my attacker, who is it that I really hurt? This sort of thinking is not the norm of the martial arts world, but an idea that is in it's foundations of all martial arts. How is it that these ideas have been forgotten to the point that we read them, hear them and yet not be able to feel them. Has society gone so deep into it's post - modern state that our thoughts are now too complicated with the ways of the world?
Stillness was the other area that sensei had talked about last night. That in everything we do today, there is no sense of singularity in thought but a complex stream of concerns, worries, and trepidations that again take us away from the truth that is supposed to be paramount in our thoughts. That truth being what it is that we are supposed to be focused on at any given time. "How many times have we tried to study a book, read it, read it again, and wonder, how many periods and commas were in the text, let alone ponder upon why the author chose to pick the words and place them in the page as he or she has done so. " Our thoughts are always being bombarded with multiple thoughts even when we try to be in a meditative state of concentration. I know that I myself fall victim to this daily as I'm sure that many other students do, the struggle of calming my mind in order to concentrate on the task that is given to me. Countless number of times that I've read a chapter in it's entirety, only to find that i have to read it again, because I was thinking about how I would cook that piece of venison that is cryo - bagged in my Freezer. The Calming stillness of one's mind is something that everyone yearns for and innately understands it's importance, but in an age of modernity have lost the ability to truly focus ones mind to such a still state that it's physical appearance would be that of a calm ripple - less lake. Biblically, these extra collateral thoughts are supposed to be satan trying to take us away from the truth of God's Universe so as that our minds can remain in the temptuousness of the world that satan rules over. How important than in a world that is a fully fortified battery of temptations in sexy sin, is it that we pray, meditate, and consume upon, with great hunger, the words of the righteous and holy?
The balance game that we play on a daily basis, is truly something to chew on some more before swollowing. TCM, as far as I've heard so far states that the balance of yin and yang is paramount importance in the treatment and well being of the human creature. The upsetting part is that due to the changes in chinese socitey, this idea has been taken to a new level of misunderstanging, by means of removing the spiritual importance of the two. Just as how 21 century Protestants in America have slowly removed the spiritual aspect or worship, TCM has also done so to a certain degree. Judeo Christian thoughts idea on the Spirit makes so much sense in the CCM sense that the focus of healing should be on the spirit and the functional aspect of the being rather than the physical body itself. So, what are these things? Working diligently, living a life of discipline, hungering for the word of God, meditation upon the world of God, Fellowship with brothers and sisters, Loving all those that live on the earth, Taking rest when it is time to rest, and sureing up ones self when it is time to regain. This to me sounds like a pretty darn busy schedule in anyones daily life. Here's something interesting, the bible also states that the physically body that we have on earth is nothing more than a shell for our true selves (spirit).
-Peace
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Okay Let's try this again
I've been an avid blogger for sometime...however for sometime I have not be a participating blogger. Don't know why but trying to see what I can do about that. Perhaps it is due to the massive amount of lifestyle changes in my life recently that has something to do with this latest state of me.
I"m married, I'm a grad student, a med student non the less, Finding out about my current health and the fact that so many other experts have misdiagnosed me for so long, and the recent therapy that Ive been recieveing for my chronically old shoulder injury.
Well, Now i need to start writing again. Why because I love the stuff. It helps me to release where i can' release otherwise and gives me the oppurtunity to exercise my brain. So Here's the first port I hope you like
- Peace
I"m married, I'm a grad student, a med student non the less, Finding out about my current health and the fact that so many other experts have misdiagnosed me for so long, and the recent therapy that Ive been recieveing for my chronically old shoulder injury.
Well, Now i need to start writing again. Why because I love the stuff. It helps me to release where i can' release otherwise and gives me the oppurtunity to exercise my brain. So Here's the first port I hope you like
- Peace
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