Open Wounds

How could you, how could you, how could you hate me?
When all I ever wanted to be was you?
How could you, how could you, how could you love me?
When all you ever gave me were open wounds?

This Skillet song has been stuck in my head recently, specifically the chorus (quoted above). It's so easy to remember the times people we've loved and emulated have given back to us something much less than love, even approaching hate. It's easy to remember the open wounds we have from those we've loved and trusted, those we still love, and those whom we believed love(d) us.

It's also pretty easy, for me, to remember the open wounds I gave Jesus. The way I try to say I want to emulate him, and sometimes live a completely different lifestyle. The way I say I love him, yet do the same things that helped to lead to those open wounds in the first place.

It's harder for me to recognze the open wounds I'm giving to those around me. Harder for me to recognize the love I'm ignoring from thsoe around me.

It's a lesson God is teaching me now. I just hope I can learn it, and with His help, heal my open wounds, and create far, far fewer.

:)

1 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. 2If I speak God's Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, "Jump," and it jumps, but I don't love, I'm nothing. 3-7If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
Love doesn't strut,
Doesn't have a swelled head,
Doesn't force itself on others,
Isn't always "me first,"
Doesn't fly off the handle,
Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn't revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

8-10Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

11When I was an infant at my mother's breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

12We don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

13But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.

Happy Anniversary Rachel.

I love you.

More

Well, today the streak ended ... I guess. We got lunch, instead of dinner, at the church for free, just for helping out a little bit. So, *technically* the streak ended, but you can still totally see God providing at every moment.

Still, I say it technically ended because I cooked dinner at home. We had baked pork chops, baked with diced potatoes and a lettuce and cucumber salad. It was very yummy. And, very affordable. The taters were on sale, and we got the pork chops on a "we need to seel now" yellow tag at Wal-Mart. The lettuce was on sale, too.

But that's not the whole story of God's provision. You see, while yes, we had to use our food for dinner tonight, we still didn't pay for it. Saturday, a friend randomly gave Rachel fifty dollars to buy groceries, something we hadn't done in two plus weeks. So, we went to the store with a list of "needs" and some grocery wants (like produce and frozen pizza), got all our "needs" (like milk, eggs, rice) and a good number of our wants and still only spent $47.85 of the fifty dollars we were given. So even the meal we cooked ourselves was provided for by God's hand.

How amazing is He?

So, anyways, tomorrow I finally get to *officially* start my job. I'll be in Dayton training tomorrow and Tuesday (I think that's it, but I guess we'll see). Wish me luck!

Dinner (cont)

So, God's provisions continue in amazing ways.

Friday night saw Rachel get invited out to dinner (again) and I was fed through the leftovers from the cookout Thursday night which they sent home with us (mmm ... bratwurst ... I love it)

Tonight (Saturday) saw us get fed by Ryan and Andrea after we helped them with some work on their new home.

God's provisions truly are amazing

Dinner

So, I still haven't had a paycheck since May. Still playing the waiting game to hear back from my soon-to-be-employer so I can do training.

In the meantime, God is doing amazing things. Simply amazing.

As we all know, food is an essential requirement to live. We can go without it for a bit, but we really, in the end, need it.

So how does God provide for his servant who hasn't gotten paid in 3 months?

He arranges for dinner. Every night of the week so far.

Monday night we had dinner over at Kim and John's, two members of our Thursday Night small group at St Marks. (btw, I just learned Wednesday that it's St. Marks, not St. Mark's. Oh well). Kim called in the morning to see if we had plans, and when we didn't, we had dinner plans.

Tuesday night, we visited my brother in Cleveland. We went to a Chineese Buffet and his wife grabbed the check before anyone else had a chance too (mom was visiting, too). So we don't even know exactly how much dinner was, but it was free.

Wednesday night, we had book club pretty much directly after Rachel got home from work (we're reading Church Re-Imagined, and I recomend it to ANYONE who wants to know if they can live in a better Christian community, or just wonder if there is a different way to do "Church") so we didn't get to have dinner before we went. As the time went by, my hunger increased, and I sat there thinking "we haven't gone to the grocery store in 2 weeks. We don't have anything complete at home to make dinner. I wonder if Rachel would be ok if we went to Wal-Mart and spent two dollars on a frozen pizza for dinner?" Unbeknownst to me, Rachel was thinking "I wonder if he'd be ok if we went to Wal-Mart on the way home and got frozen pizza?". Neither of us was able to ask the other one, because as we were preparing to leave from Coffee Amici, Becky (a member of the Book Club) says to us "why don't you two come over, and I'll have my daughter throw a frozen pizza in the oven?" So that was pretty sweet.

Last night was Small Group, and we met at Kathy and John's camp ground, where they grilled up some Bratwurst, and other brought chicken, potato salad, fruits, vegitables, and a desert. So that took care of last night. Rachel usually can't make it to small group (because she works on Thursday nights), but because we went late she was able to come out and fellowship and eat.

And we left with some leftovers, some of which became lunch today.

How awesome God is to provide every need at just the right time!

Wilderness

So, I was listening to my "Loud and Clear" Supertones CD on my way to and from the testing center this morning. Got stuck, once again, on the song "Wilderness". This song has spoken to me in so many ways over the years. Usually, the lines that get me are either the chorus:

Have you ever held in doubt
What this life is all about
Have you questioned all these things that seem
important to us
Do you really wanna know
Or are you a little scared
You're afraid that God is not exactly what you'd have
Him be
What should I hold to and what should I do
How do I know if anything's true
I'm somewhere in-between Canaan and Egypt
A place called the wilderness

Or the bridge:

God do you really understand what it's like to be a man
Have You ever felt the weight of loving all the
things you Hate
Have You struggled have You worried
How can You sympathize

Today, it was the start of the second verse:

I'm not one who always trusts their feelings
I don't believe in what you'd call blind faith
But faith that you can do all that you promised
And you said it all works for good

What an awesome promise! It all works for good! Everything the enemy throws at us, every attempt he makes to bring us down, every time he trips us up, God is using that, refining it, and making good come from it. He is using Satan's own plans and temptations and not only foiling them, but using them to work for good! I came to tears looking at some of the things the enemy has thrown at my life recently and in the lives of some of those around me, and just realized how amazing and all-powerful my God is that he would take these setbacks and these mistakes and these challenges and work good out for them.


I'm working on a dramatic monologue for the next five02 service, and this song is really helping to shape it. I just can't help but feel awed by the immense power of one who turns darkness into light, setbacks into advancements, and sin into glory!

C-Bus

So, I'm in C-Bus for the week, taking pre-liscensing courses for the job I'll be starting soon.

The pros of being in C-bus:

• RadioU (new Skillet, Demon Hunter, and Pillar songs ROCK, and I get to hear LA Symph, something I NEVER get back home)
  
• One step closer to employment
• Access to Skyline and Chipotle (haven't had any yet though)
  
• Mountain Dew in the fridge

The Cons of being in C-bus:

• Rachel's not here :(
• Classes are LONG and BORING (8 hours a day)
• No money for Skyline and Chipotle, even though their pretty close
• Traffic

Still, all-in-all not a bad trade-off. can't wait to get back to Findlay, but I'm really enjoying RadioU and really enjoying the thought of "hey, I could go get Skyline if I want"

Oh well.

Musing

Today was a very good day. I got to spend quality time with my wife and mother-in-law, picked up a new suit, a couple of new ties, and some new shirts. Plus, we had Red Robin for dinner (mmmm ... Red Robin's onion rings are sooooo good).

Tomorrow holds promise. Our church is having their annual outdoor service at the Park. That, in and of itself would be exciting. But there's more to it than that. Rachel and I have our dramatical debut at the church tomorrow during the service. We're doing a liturgical drama (with Andrea) to the song "Voice of Truth" by Casting Crowns. I think it can be real powerful. Then, afterwards ... POT LUCK! And we all know if Methodists are good for one thing, it's Pot Lucks!

Prayers would be appreciated for the service to go well. It's not only good outreach, but good inreach for a church that needs connection and healing.

Weddings

I love weddings.

And for a variety of reasons. I love to watch two people commit to a life of commitment to each other. I love to sit next to my wife and be reminded of the vows we took almost two years ago. I love to see old friends, and hear catch-up stories from people I haven't seen in months or years. I love being able to impart some of my new-found advice and "wisdom" and I absolutely love dancing with my wife.

We attended a wedding this past Saturday. I believe this was the first wedding we attended within driving distance of our actual home since we got married! Normally, we end up driving back to Columbus to stay with my mother-in-law for the night (she's a nice half-way stop between Pittsburgh and Findlay!), or we just stay with her for the entire weekend, since a couple of weddings are in Columbus. I mention this only because it gave Rachel and I a chance to reflect on weddings and have a good, serious discussion. And I think we came to the conclusion that we love weddings not because of the event itself, but because of the future it holds. We've seen first-hand the empowering nature of being with your spouse, and how it can improve your life spiritually, physically, emotionally, and so on. And not just your life, but the lives of those around you. Without my wife enabling me, I wouldn't be able to serve Sigma Theta Epsilon as a National Officer, and without my enabling of her, she wouldn't be able to serve on the board of our local Chrysalis. Neither of us, let alone both of us, would be involved with the planning of the new emergent worship service at our church, and, more likely, neither of us would probably even be involved at St. Marks!

As a result, we've started a prayer calendar. We've got five categories in some kind of progressive list, and each day we pray specifically for the designated entry in each category. The categories are STE (Chapters and Officers), Married Friends, Family, St. Marks (our church), and our Activities. I believe this will be a powerful tool to see God moving in each of these areas, and strengthening those around us, and those whom we love.

Yes, I love weddings. But I love the power of prayer more.

Inspiration

Because of the sacrifice of the Messiah, his blood poured out on the altar of the Cross, we're a free people—free of penalties and punishments chalked up by all our misdeeds. And not just barely free, either. Abundantly free! He thought of everything, provided for everything we could possibly need, letting us in on the plans he took such delight in making. He set it all out before us in Christ, a long-range plan in which everything would be brought together and summed up in him, everything in deepest heaven, everything on planet earth.

It's in Christ that you, once you heard the truth and believed it (this Message of your salvation), found yourselves home free—signed, sealed, and delivered by the Holy Spirit. This signet from God is the first installment on what's coming, a reminder that we'll get everything God has planned for us, a praising and glorious life.

From the first chapter of the book of Ephesians, in the Message translation.

Words I've needed recently, to remind me of the victory and freedom I have in Christ, my Savior.

I'm glad I have the close Christian fellowship to keep me on the right page, and to point me towards the passages I need to read.