grown up

"This melancholy that I carry makes me feel so grown-up
At the kitchen table doing shots of resignation
I never thought I'd see the day when I would say 'I give up'
And break the stallions of my wildest expectations"

Ani Difranco

This how I feel these last couple of days. As though adulthood has sucked all the color and excitement out of life. As though being responsible somehow excludes me from adventure. My routine, though completely doable, and despite the way it helps me to manage my life, is lulling me into a state of comatose.

Only the boring are bored. Life is what you make it. I have been living life inside my head, in order to cope with my boredom. Maybe this is why I have been spending so much time contemplating matters of spirituality. I think it's important to think about these things, but I think I have been unbalanced. Talking about God is different than talking with God. I can theorize all day but the fact of the matter is that I'll never get it figured out, and even if I do, it won't be enough. Information is different than relationship. I know a hell of a lot about Ani, but she probably won't take my calls.

I had dinner with my Dad today. He gets wiser with age, and we have learned to talk to each other about things that matter. He is the one who expects me to change the world. He speaks life to me every time we get together. It's so strange, because our relationship now is the opposite of what it used to be. So I'm always pleasantly surprised to find that I come away from our talks feeling refreshed and rejuvenated, and centered and inspired. Between him and a very special friend, I am finding the motivation to claw myself out of this rut and start moving my life outside of my head.

I don't know how, but I haven't much to lose. Currently compiling ideas. Feel free to contribute.

reacquainting

As I commit to questioning everything, I have been questioning two things: The personal nature of God, and the identity of Jesus. Losing faith in a literal understanding of the Bible has made it difficult to sort out. Part of me says that I need to believe that God is deeply personal and interested in me individually, and I should believe it because I need to believe it. Indeed, I used to simply trust God for the difficult things in my life, but lately I'm not sure if He's looking. (Maybe He's not aware that the world revolves around me ;) While in every other area I have felt liberated by questioning, in this area the fruit has not been good. This particular question has left me with.... an old familiar feeling.... the feeling of not being protected. That old 'demon' that rises in my mind and says "I guess you'll just have to take care of yourself."

This thought has good reason to be there. I have always depended on myself primarily, surrounded by undependable humans and what I percieved to be a hostile culture, and especially now that I am alone in a city far away from family, in the worst neighborhood of the city, no less. I revert easily to this mentality.

In the last few years I have learned to trust God for my protection and provision. I have found a bizarre amount of confidence in His presence and love. It has been safe, and wonderful, and it is slipping away, and right now I'm remembering a good friend telling me that sometimes we have to rely on our experience to tell us about God.

So I'm breathing deeply and making myself remember the amazing ways, the crazy coincidences that led me to trust. And I feel better, and safer. God is still silent, it would seem, but I think He wants me to question it. I think He knows as well as I do that if I never question, my faith can only grow so strong.

And then I think about Jesus, and the more I think about Him, the more I'm reminded of my thoughts on evolution, "it takes more faith to believe in evolution than it does to believe in creation," except now I'm thinking that it takes more faith to believe that Jesus isn't the Son of God than it does to believe that He is.

I mean, really, I am not one to believe that multiple coincidences that intersect can be completely random events. So when Jesus fulfills all these prophecies written hundreds of years ago, can it be an accident? If He satisfied one or two, maybe, but all of them? And then to whip out this teaching that totally fucks up this culture that has been feeding me to the sharks since I was born? And then to die for it? Even if He didn't come back to life, I would be sold. It would be enough for me that He lived. It would be enough that He loved so much.

If Jesus is a picture of God, that is, if to know Him is to know the Father, then I am overcome. If it was God who sent Him, I am amazed. I can know I am loved at every moment by big big love.

So, I am satisfied in this regard, and I feel safe.