Endings and Beginnings

Today is the last day of many things. The year 2009 is drawing to a close. Winter break is also sadly slipping away. But to me, the most significant milestone is the passing of a decade. The '00s will be over in less than 12 hours and I wonder what that means.

I like to find meanings and connections in things, to try to sort out the chaos of life, and find some direction in my existence. The end of each year is when I usually sit down to collect my experiences, and this year is no different. In fact, the feeling that one chapter of my life is closing is more potent than ever.

Ten years ago, on December 31, 1999, I remember sitting in anticipation for a new millennium to begin. I was just ten days shy of turning 10 years old and rockin' the bowl cut (back before my hair was curly), with a full decade behind me. I was living in Las Vegas, in a two bedroom apartment with my mom and 4 year old sister. The countdown was starting and I was half expecting to see some kind of massive explosion on TV when the Y2K bug heralded the end of the computer age at midnight. Of course, nothing happened.

At the close of this decade, I don't anticipate much more than the usual fireworks and festivities. But an internal change has already begun. A seed has been planted in my soul this year that I feel will blossom in 2010. I am no longer the carefree grade school kid I was ten years ago. A long decade of hardship, heartbreak, and learning has brought me here - to Flagstaff, to college, to being just 10 days shy of being one-fifth of a century old, and to being a man with a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. This year, I have found independence, I have found my true friends, I have found a niche in this crazy world, I have explored my passions, I have reawakened my spirituality, I have discovered what love really is, and I have felt healing take the place of pain.

I am, in essence, reborn. Like this new year, this new decade, I have a chance to start fresh. I can take the lessons I have learned with me and leave the old sorrows and habits behind. I have always perceived my life as a journey and after many years standing still at the fork in the path, I have made my choice. I have committed myself to a direction that Robert Frost once described as the road less taken, and it truly has made all the difference.

Where the Teens will take me in 2010 and beyond I will learn with time. For now, I am content to look back on the last 10 years with nostalgia and look toward the next ten years with hope.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11

May your new year be happy and blessed, overflowing with the love of God. I'll see you next year.

Living Intentionally

For me, church should be something you live in your daily life, not just on Sundays. Notice I say "should." That's how I feel, but I can never seem to make it happen. I just don't have the time to be church during the week, and that frustrates me.

The problem, I think, is that I surround myself with like-minded people (my friends from church) on Sundays, but during the week, it's just me. It makes sense - I am a highly social creature, and without others to keep me grounded, I will drift off. I am incredibly thankful for them on Sundays, but my soul craves more.

Among some of my friends, there has been talk of setting up an intentional community. The online dictionary defines an intentional community as "A small, localized, often rural community of persons or families pursuing common interests or concentrating on certain basic values." Now, I'm not so sure about the rural part, but the rest of the concept appeals to me. A close-knit community of people pursuing the same goal - being church in our daily lives.

I'm still doing my research and probing to find out what this community would look like, but I am intrigued. This could be the answer I have been looking for. I could really use a community that would support me and join me in my journey as a Christian-in-progress at this point in my life.

I think we all could use a community like that, but what does it really mean? How do we transform a good idea into a functional lifestyle? How do we live intentionally?

A Gift of Grace

(Breathtaking photo courtesy of Audrey Zannini. Please don't steal it.)

Let me begin by apologizing for the length of my absence from the blogging world. A lot has been going on in my life. In fact, it has been completely turned upside down. It seems as though everything has changed. It seems God felt my existence was overdue for some spring cleaning.

Over the past year or so, I have suffered off-and-on from depression. Nothing serious, nothing requiring any kind of medical attention, but the kind of depression that can set in and subtly start to overtake your life, the way vines will consume a building that isn't well cared for.

I was constantly reminded of how well I was doing - about my grades and my scholarship and the fact that I was buying myself a new car and that I had lots of friends...I was even making a claim to modest YouTube fame. But all of the accomplishments felt hollow. There was something missing. There was an emptiness - a hole that desperately needed to be filled.

As is my nature, I put on a happy face, a mask for my friends and family - one that disguised my pain from the world all too well. Only the Man Upstairs wasn't fooled for one minute. Even though it went unspoken in my prayers, God knew what was missing in my life, as he always does.

In all my experiences drifting in and out of faith, one of the few constants that I believed in were guardian angels. But not winged beings of light descending on clouds - just regular people sent to make a difference in other people's lives. And it was in my darkest moments of depression and self-pity that God sent a guardian angel to me.

Jesus summed up the Ten Commandments in just one over-arching maxim: "love each other." I had forgotten what that meant until a sweet young lady reminded me of the kindness and generosity that the human soul is capable of, but that is so often stifled by our self-serving society. The world could learn a thing or two from love. I know I have.

Spirituality Test

My good friend Kinna found this quiz online. It looked fun, so I thought I would take it. Who knew it could be so insightful. Here are my results:

"You are a Mystic, known for your imaginative, intuitive spirituality. You value peace, harmony, and inner silence. Mystics are nurtured by walking alone in the woods or sitting quietly with a trusted friend. You may also enjoy poetry, meditation, wordless prayer, candles, art, books, and anything else that helps you connect with God.

Mystics experience God best through rich images and symbols. You are contemplative, introspective, intuitive, and focused on an inner world as real to you as the exterior one. Hearing from God is more important to you than speaking to God. Others may attribute human characteristics to God, but you see God as ineffable, unnamable, and more vast than any known category. You are intrigued by God's mystery.

Mystics want to inspire and persuade others, and need to live lives of significance. At times you push the envelope of spirituality, helping the rest of us imagine who we might become if we followed your lead.

Sometimes you may feel a bit guilty about your need for solitude and silence. If so, you probably have bought into the American myth that says being alone and doing nothing is lazy, antisocial, and unproductive. Stop it -- now. Give yourself permission to retreat and be alone. It's essential for your well-being.

On the other hand, don't get so carried away retreating that you become a recluse. That only deprives the world of your gifts and deprives you of the lessons that come from being with others. Some Mystics may have a true vocation for solitary prayer, but the rest of you need to alternate retreat time with involvement and interaction."

Most online quizzes are not this accurate, but this is me. It's no coincidence that I have lately been devouring the writings of Christian mystics like St. John of the Cross. To me, the universe is a mystery that we can never fully comprehend. God is so beyond our understanding that we have no choice but to trust in his presence and love. When I think about creation, I feel so small, but so interconnected with everything around me. It's intoxicating.

I like being a mystic. It makes life seem all the more beautiful.

If you want to take the quiz, you can find it at http://www.upperroom.org/methodx/thelife/. I'd love to hear what result you get and what you think it means. Peace!

No Strings Attached

As a human being, I am flawed and imperfect. I am learning to live with that. But even in my imperfection, I am surprised to see moments when I am more than just skin and bones. There are times when I have felt the Spirit working through me.

There is no possible way to describe that feeling. For me, it's kind of like an electric charge coursing through my body. It's exciting and full of joy. At the same time, it's peace, like lying out in the sun next to a mountain stream.

So much of the time, I push away that divine impulse. I reject God's love. All through high school, I was shut off emotionally. No one knew the pain and the heartache. Some people sensed that there was something wrong and tried to help, but I pushed them away every time. I now see that God was working through them to crack open the cold hard shell I had built over my heart.

My senior year, I came to a time of crisis. I could no longer carry my burden alone. By the grace of God, my friends were there, ready to share the load if I was willing to open myself up. It was scary, accepting that love. Perhaps it's human nature to assume that everyone, even God, has a motive, and that love must carry a price tag. But the Kingdom of Heaven, I have learned, is not at all like the world we live in.

My friends wanted nothing in return for my trust and the opportunity to be a shoulder to cry on. They just wanted what was best for me. So, too, God wants what is best for us.

When I opened up my heart, I was exposed to even greater heartache and emotional exploitation. I lost control, but in giving up that control, I opened myself up to an even greater gift of love. Love that was unconditional, that filled the empty places in my heart. I didn't have to pay for this love or earn it in anyway. A love with no strings attached and no fine print. This was a love that I had never before known and a love that I cannot live without.

And with God's love, I am complete. In the immortal words of the Beatles - all you need is love.

What is the Trinity?

This past Sunday was Trinity Sunday, one of the most obscure festivals in Christianity. It is the day that we celebrate this strange idea that God is three entities in one and one entity split into three. Of all the concepts that are core to Christian faith, this one has caused me the most trouble.

It's hard to wrap your head around the idea that something can be both one person and three, or both human and divine. How is this possible? How can something or someone exist in this kind of dual existence being both and neither? That's not how our world works.

In the course of my roller coaster ride as a Christian in progress, I was lucky enough to stumble upon Father Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest seen as one of the leaders of the emerging movement in Christianity. In the talk he gave at the conference I attended in March, he spoke at length about the mysticism that has been lost over the centuries. According to him, the early church didn't struggle with these questions. They were simply able to accept that not everything has a logical explanation. For me, that's still a difficult leap to make.

The leap that I need to make now is a leap of faith.

Faith. Another one of those tricky concepts. Total acceptance of God's will. Letting go of the rational and the material to make room for the wonders of God that simply have no explanation. Having faith in the trinity is difficult. I don't like to feel that I am not in control, but over these past few months, I have learned that I feel even better when God is in control and I'm just there for the ride.

In the end, it makes sense. God is everything. How could we possibly understand how he is moving through us and the people around us? We can't. But we can trust that he loves us and cares about what happens to us, even if his ways of caring for us are sometimes a mystery. In my experience, the things in this world that are the most mysterious are also the most beautiful.

Breathe In the Spirit

I probably should've posted this sooner, as it explains the title of this blog, but it is so hard to put into words. I'll give it a try.

At the Emerging Church Conference, one of the speakers was Father Richard Rohr, a Franciscan monk. One of the things he talked about was the Commandment forbidding the wrongful use of the Lord's name. Many ancient Jews took this to mean that you could never say God's name: "Yahweh" in Hebrew.

However, written Hebrew does not include vowels, only consonants, so it is the responsibility of the reader to add in the correct vowels. This meant that there were many different ways of pronouncing words. In the case of Yahweh, the correct pronunciation did not allow you to move your lips or teeth. It was physically impossible to say it, you had to breathe it. "Yah" when breathing in, and "weh" when breathing out.

Just try that. Breathe in and out, slowly saying God's Hebrew name. It's amazing to me how calming that simple act is.

In the same way, we do not need to speak when we pray. Breathing is prayer in itself. The Spirit is all around us, in the very air we breathe. So, I try to take some time every day to stop for a few minutes to breathe and be with God.

It's pretty powerful stuff, breathing prayer. And it may not make sense to a society that is conditioned to demand physical proof of everything. It's hard to see God is everything around us, but I believe he's there. It's hard for me to let go and simply trust in a power I cannot see or touch, but when I breathe it, I believe.

And when I can't think of the words to pray, I can take comfort in the fact that God doesn't need words to understand me. All I have to do is breathe.

Lost

I am lost. I am alone. I'm not sure why I feel so disconnected, but I do. It has been nearly two months since my life-changing experiences in New Orleans and the Emerging Church Conference and I sense the spiritual adrenaline rush starting to wear off. I have come so long in such a short time in my journey as a Christian and yet, now, I don't know where to go.

There has been a lot of upheaval in my life these past few weeks. Final exams drained me, and now that summer has come, I am in the awkward place of not knowing what emotion to feel - with new friends leaving for the summer while old friends are returning. The people who lived out church with me over spring break are far away and I can't seem to make anyone else understand the transformation I went through.

With my fellow travelers gone until the end of August, I stand alone. No, not alone. God is with me. I want to continue the path I have begun. Up to now, I have done this as part of a group, but now, I have to do it myself. Just me, sitting down to discern my place in the world. Call it a spiritual coming-of-age. Let's see where it leads...

Burned Out

For a college student, life is stressful. We're constantly being pulled in contradictory directions, keeping up with lecture notes and endless essays, all while trying to remember to eat daily, sleep ocassionally, and hold together some pathetic semblance of a social life. It's demanding, and after not too long, it gets harder and harder to keep up with everything.

All too often, my spiritual life gets thrown by the wayside, a casualty to my hectic schedule. I forsake religion to study or to cram in a little bit more time with friends before they all go home for the summer.

I used to think this was normal, but my relationship with God is far too important to discard, even for a short time. My life is crazy, but that is exactly why I need time to be with God. Without him, I starve.

Matthew 11:28-30 says, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

These are the words I need to hear right now. With my social and academic lives playing tug-of-war with my time, I feel helpless and alone. I can't do this all by myself. I need someone to help me carry my burden.

Finals are looming, but I can survive. All I need is a little quiet time to pray and the assurance that God is with me every step of the way. If I remember that he is there to comfort me when I'm frustrated and stressed and that he carries me when I think I cannot go on, then I have nothing to fear.

I'm exhausted physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. I want to give up, but I am not alone. Even when the night is darkest, God is there to walk with me and lead me into the light. Now, that's a comforting thought to get me through my final exams...

Called to Serve

God certainly doesn't want me to stay in my comfort zone. Every time I show a glimmer of complacency, he throws me a curve ball. Just as I was starting to get settled into this new community I had discovered at Lutheran Campus Ministry, I got some news I hadn't expected - I had been identified as a "leader within the community."

I have lost three pastors in the past 2 years, a strange phenomenon that has come to define much of the time I have been growing in my faith. This third time, however, is different. Pastor Kacey is leaving, but I have the rare privilege of serving on the LCM Call Committee. Now, while I am bound by a strict confidentiality agreement, I can discuss the purpose of the committee. In essence, I get to help choose the new pastor.

I'm not sure what qualities made me stand out as a leader, nor do I know the first thing about serving on a church committee of any kind. It's intimidating to say the least. So far, I have come to grips with one fact that has eased my mind. I am not here to lead. I'm not on this committee to make executive decisions that will effect everyone within the community. I am a servant. My job is to listen to the concerns of those around me and to seek their input to guide my decision-making.

The responsibility is terrifying, to be perfectly honest. I am afraid that I will not be able to represent the students at LCM on the committee. But I do not need to be afraid. I am not alone. There are 7 other call committee members and God will be with me every step of the way. I have to trust that the Spirit will move through me and the committee. After all, I have been saved from sin by grace; and grace will lead us to the right person.

Taking Comfort in the Uncomfortable

I don't always know what God wants from me. Let's face it, most of the time, I don't know. But I'm getting better at figuring out when I'm doing something that God doesn't want.

Albert Einstein once said that the reason he was a scientist was because he wanted to know the mind of God. I think that's what we all want. To know what God is thinking, and what his plans are. It always seems like we're guessing. At least, that's what it felt like most of my life.

Throughout my high school years, like many people, I drifted spiritually. I still went to church, and I believed in God, but I could never see him at work in the world around me. I knew people who said that God had "called" them to do something. I could never understand what they were talking about. I had never felt compelled to do something in the life of the church.

That's not to say that I ever felt uncomfortable in my faith. Looking back, I was very comfortable in my slow drift through the motions of being a good Christian. But I never got deeply involved or invested in the ministry work that was happening.

It was not until I went to college and was looking to reinvent myself that I started feeling trapped in my little faith community. I started hanging around the Lutheran Campus Ministry on the campus at NAU. What they were doing was very different; a radical departure from my traditional Lutheran upbringing. The folks at LCM were leaving the building and doing things. My interest was piqued.

Sometime in November, I agreed to go with a small group to go do some maintenance work at a local homeless shelter and then drive down to Phoenix to package food headed to North Korea. I didn't know anyone. It was uncomfortable, but it felt right.

Later on, I went to New Orleans with a group to help the rebuilding efforts. Our living arrangements were uncomfortable. And that's when it hit me. God is pushing us to give up our comforts and go do the dirty work. God wants us to live as Jesus lived. Not a life of comfort, but a life of service.

God has pushed me out of my comfort zone. It's scary, but it feels right. This is the path I need to take. I can make a difference and live a truly Christian way of life. It will be uncomfortable, but the reward - spiritual contentedness - is well worth the sacrifice.

Where's the Open Discussion?

Hopefully, this post makes sense. If it doesn't, it's because I'm still trying to make sense of it all myself. So, bear with me.

As a Journalism and Political Science major, I am usually neck-deep in politics. The people I know in my field talk politics all the time, spouting off their opinions. I know that most of us were taught that there are two things you don't discuss in polite discussion - politics and religion. In journalism, we simply throw out the first one. Politics are our bread and butter. Sure, the discussions in my section at the campus newspaper occasionally trample politeness, but regardless of whether we agree or disagree on an issue, I always learn something from those with viewpoints antithetical to mine.

I love an open discussion, where nobody holds back their opinion. It's invigorating, and one of the reasons I chose my major. However, as I have grown in faith and have looked for opportunities to expand my understanding of spirituality, I have hit a dead end. There's the road block.

I quickly discovered that religion is the only taboo subject in a newsroom. We'll discuss ethics, we'll debate the everything from gay marriage to bank bailouts, but never do we sit down and have an intellectual discussion about our views on God.

In journalism, the only acceptable way to talk about religion is to bash it and tear it down. For the life of me, I cannot understand why talking about religion in an article automatically destroys my credibility.

As a journalist, I am also bound by a strict code of ethics. I have to be committed to an unbiased, fair and balanced approach to any topic. Yet, for some reason, these ethics to do apply to any talk about religion.

Why can't I be a respected journalist and a Christian? How do those two worlds conflict? I can't see it.

It's not that the entire newspaper industry is atheistic. I think the real problem is that it's hard to have an intellectual discussion about religion without offending someone, not to mention journalists' aversion to anything that cannot be concretely proven with scientific evidence.

Even so, I cannot renounce my beliefs to fit in with my coworkers and I need free expression. I think we could have a friendly, open, engaging and challenging discussion about religion if we would just get over our fears. I think the time has come to invite everyone to the table. Maybe if we just sat down to talk, we could figure out what God really wanted from us.

I'm ready to talk. Are you?

Emerging Ministry

Recently, I attended a conference in Albuquerque on a new Christian movement tentatively called the "Emerging Church," though it defies all attempts at being labeled. At this conference, 1,000 Christians from all backgrounds (Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Pentecostal, Mennonite, Charismatic, and everything in between) came to sit down at tables with people from other traditions to talk about what God wanted the church to be.

What I quickly discovered was all my my life, I had been using the word "church" incorrectly. Church is not a building where people come to worship on Sundays. Church is a community, a group of people who want to follow God, irrespective of bricks and mortar. But I believe church is much more than that. Church is not something stagnant. Church is a verb - it's what you do.

So, how can we call ourselves a church if we're not actively participating in being church? After all, Jesus didn't gather up his disciples and say, "Okay, now we're going build a cathedral." He went out into the streets to preach and to perform miracles.

That's the example I'm called to follow, and a lifestyle that I believe we are all called to emulate. So, you could say the "Emerging Church" is a fitting description of what needs to happen. All my life, the building that I called my church was a small, self-contained community that didn't branch out. The Emerging Church on the other hand, is the church emerging from the confines of the buildings.

It will not be an easy transition, but since when is being Christian an easy path to follow? As a person, I am often closed off. God is something I experience through quiet prayer and meditation. But whenever I open myself up and experience God through other people, the feeling is a hundred times as potent. My soul craves human interaction. My soul is emerging and I will follow wherever it leads.

Starting Over

After reading my friends' blogs about their struggles to follow Christ in the world, I am inspired to throw in my two cents. I will not be able to phase things so eloquently as they have, but I'd like to share my journey.

It's hard to be a Christian today. It's hard to see all the suffering around us and believe that an all-powerful, all-loving God would allow such things to happen. It's frightening, and for a time, I wondered if there was anyone listening when I prayed. Sometimes, you have to see something to believe it.

One month ago, I got on a plane in Phoenix with 31 other college students to spend a week in New Orleans doing relief work. I didn't know what to expect when we got there. As a journalist, the only expectation I had was the determination to return with a good story, a clean 450 words for the campus newspaper. I came back with more.

In these gutted houses, working alongside people who had lost everything, I saw God. God was there, in the city that had spent weeks under 11 feet or more of toxic flood water. God was there in the moldy rafters and down in the potholes filled up with oyster shells. Even now, it is hard to assign words to the experience.

One woman, who was in a wheelchair, saw the hurricane as a blessing. She told us about how happy she was that now the doors in her home could be rebuilt wider to allow her to move comfortably through her home. She wasn't angry at God. She saw the disaster as an opportunity.

I think that's why God throws hardships in our way. Just as a forest is healthier after a purging wildfire, our soul is stronger after our ego is torn down.

I have been torn down. Though I am young, I still carry a weight on my shoulder beyond my years. But God has torn me down, and I am new. The time has come to rebuild myself. I need to construct a new faith. I need a new life, and I trust God to lead me there. I'm ready to start over.