Listen

The Lord is not only speaking to you. He is speaking to those around you. It would be a good idea to listen well. 

Frankl

One of the more profound things I have read: 

A man’s suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into a chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether suffering is great or little. Therefore the “size” of human suffering is absolutely relative. Read More

Relationships II

The disorder must be beautiful. It is what makes our world unpredictable and free. We are free to make decisions, travel on seemingly random trajectories, create “abstractly,” and the direction of the universe does not seem to be fixed. Instead, it appears to us defined by our decisions, thoughtful and otherwise. It is loose and forgiving enough to accept our missteps and meandering. This is grace – that we can choose and determine outcome after outcome. And the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It all appears to be heading somewhere and it is ours to inhabit. And yet, there seems to be a force beyond forces, that draws us and presses on us, and is ours to discover. Read More

Relationships I

The thing about relationships is that they are ever-changing. They seem to be stable or stuck, but they are actually a series of forces which are ever-moving, not unlike the forces that act on the tectonic plates, of which our earth is made up. These forces push and pull and make up what we see on an everyday basis, but they are nearly imperceptible. Sometimes they erupt, and we witness catastrophe or great beauty. More often, however, they exert their subtle effect on the world around us and, over time, produce the shape of the landscape far and wide. Read More

Dying

Dying to ourselves means letting God take up the fight for us.

Satisfaction

Satisfaction in this life is not and probably should not be attained “for good.” You are most definitely on your way somewhere. The goal, rather, is momentary satisfaction with the process.

Redemption

I think God is more in the business of redeeming than transforming. He does not change us as much as he takes what is and works with it. I guess we better get busy accepting ourselves as we are. 

Triangles

I’ve been thinking a lot about triangles lately, mostly in terms of marriage, specifically my own. I learned in graduate school that the smallest stable unit of a relationship is a triad. That was profound then, especially because of my own thinking about relationships: that we are not just made for relationship with one another, but also with God. It would make sense that the relationship between a couple would be appropriately stabilized by the Father. Any relationship, though, is made more stable and healthy when the two reach out for a third party which can be God, or even when the two just have in mind the presence and priority of that higher relationship. Read More