always leaving

Always leaving. Leaving has become my staying while hellos, introductions, hugs, and handshakes have all the unspoken spirit of a quiet goodbye. If there was ever a place for me to stay would I know it? Or would I simply strap up my boots and get to walking? Perhaps I find excuses to leave always looking for something to cover the tracks of my restlessness. If I found what it is my heart so desperately seeks would I know it or simply pass it up like so many other beautiful moments I only tasted ever so tentatively? Am I ever to know? Will I ever find peace?

The true reality of sin

"The sense of sin is something deeper and more existential. It is not merely a sense of guilt referred to the authority of God. It is a sense of evil in myself. Not because I have violated a law outside myself, but because I have violated the inmost laws of my own being, which are, at the same time, the laws of God Who dwells within me. The sense of sin is the sense of having been deeply and deliberately false to my own inmost reality, my likeness to God....The sens of sin is, then, something ontological and immediate which does not spring from reflection on my actions and comparison with a moral code. It springs directly from the evil that is present in me: it tells me not merely that I have done nothing wrong, but that I am wrong, through and through. That I am a false being. That I have destroyed myself."

~ Thomas Merton - The Inner Experience

....Something that captured my attention this morning over breakfast....

Jasmine and Lavender

All I seem capable of writing about is the culmination of my selfishness, the death of purity and innocence. Even in the paper and ink journals there has been scarcely any words written not dealing with that travesty. It lingers in the air like pipe tobacco smoke, but this is simply suffocating. There is hollowness in my words of the divine, shallowness in my songs of praise.

The simple joys of my life have been reduced to the taste of Jasmine and the aroma of Lavender on my pillow case. No longer do I pine for the company of a woman, those soft precious touches hold no sway. Perhaps, finally, I'm arriving bit by bit at a place of inner solitude one in which there are no soft kisses, gentle words, five dollar pitchers of Amber Bock, or Turkish coffee on the corner.

We learn don't we...perhaps the road ends somewhere we never imagined existed...but its there and we have little choice but walk the wilderness for a spell. Hopefully I can shed this exterior while in these elements...emerge new.

Redemption

When one experiences redemption is it merely for the purpose of salvation or does it heal the wounds of a selfish life? Does redemption take away guilt? I was asked a playful question at work this afternoon. A question whose very presence in conversation is simply a means to illicit laughs, smiles, and jokes all around. For a brief moment I contemplated uttering a falsehood but for some reason I said "as a matter of fact, I have, unfortunately, done that." I said the word unfortunately as if the action had taken place by a series of chance events. Yet it was, at the time, a desired and thought about action, one in which I had planned in order to be seen as the victim, not as the architect.

A little under two years ago I was given the opportunity to do such a thing as I did else where, but I didn't. It was not nobility and moral fortitude that stayed my feet but time. There was simply no time. But later on, given a chance to reclaim a bit of fractured dignity, I proceeded to crush whatever manner of moral guidance and spiritual mindfulness beyond recognition. As the weeks wore wearily on, no amount of pipe smoking, solitude by the lake, strumming John Denver songs, or attending Evening Prayer healed the wound I so readily inflicted upon the spiritual self.

Depravity knows no bounds, I know that I have not reached the depth of depravity that human kind is regrettably capable of reaching. But is there any need of knowing how deep it truly goes? I care not to know. I know how deep I have descended and care not about sinking further down.

So does redemption heal these selfish wounds? Does it restore one back from brokenness?

have mercy

Miserere Mei, Deus. Have mercy upon me, oh God.

I recently(November) made some prayer beads in the Anglican fashion. The smallest of the beads, which number 28, has the prayer "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner." The prayer has allowed me to see the depth of my own depravity. Often we can scarcely see the real vileness of our actions over the seemingly harmless activity in which we find ourselves engaged. Growing up debating the tenants of Calvinism vs Arminianism was a useless debate at the time, it had more to do with being able to win the argument than actually understand the value of either perspective. The first part of Calvinism states that man is totally depraved, incapable of doing any good on his own, including turn to the father. As I watch people, myself with the most depth, I've seen the true depth of depravity we are capable of reaching. Yet I'm not ready to say we're totally depraved, I am also uninterested in debating the topic internally or with others.

We are so far removed from the holiness we were created in. Looking back on my actions since August in some situations I have been so despicable I can scarcely bring myself to even whisper "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner." Can scarcely acknowledge what is plainly seen, my explicit need for redemption. As I walk down the cobblestone streets of Old Towne where I work, completely alone, no one to come home and call, no distraction I see the need for a sacrifice, the need for redemptive love.

One day the waters goin to wash it away

Knowing the divine is foolish to the man seeking the external life. I seek not the external but the divine within, above, and beyond. Nothing exists outside, below, or above the divine. All action is movement towards or away from unity with God, every second is a choice to know God or the self. We exist not as ourselves but creations, extensions of the divine within the physical. We are not ourselves, our life is not ours to live. It is for the divine. I'll be a fool to know God.