"Follow me where I go, what I do, and who I know;
Make it part of you to be a part of me.
Follow me up and down, all the way, and all around.
Take my hand and say you'll follow me." -John Denver (by way of "The Innocence Mission")
Showing posts with label they said it best. Show all posts
Showing posts with label they said it best. Show all posts
"The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheaply, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value. I love a man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death." --Thomas Paine
The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!" --Jack Kerouac
"Question-and-answer is a vanishing art. We are so drowned and smothered and deafened by panels, dialogues, rap sessions, discussions, talk shows, and other such exercises in the pooling of ignorance that, far from developing the art of asking questions and giving answers, we have very nearly lost it altogether. The time allotted for a program must, it seems, be filled--it doesn't much matter with what.
When is the last time you heard a clear, short question asked and a straight answer given? My heart sinks when it is announced that, following the lecture, there will be time for discussion. People put up their hands, but it turns out that it is not information they are after at all. They want the floor. They go on and on.
I was one of the panel of experts (i.e., married women) discussing the subject of marriage in a college women's dormitory a few years ago.Afterward there were lots of questions. But it was hard to figure out just what the questions were. Here is one of them (verbatim--I did not make this up. It was taped and then transcribed):
Um--like--um--I have a couple questions. Do you think--like--that--uh--do you think a woman could have a call just to be--like--a wife, but not--like--not just to be a wife--like, say, you know--if you're gonna be personal--like--my own engagement--like--I have a gift of--you know--a talent in music, you know--like--I mean, I know you're not saying--like--you know,especially in that case, I mean, you're saying more like--you have--like--I think our greatest thing in common probably is--um--is that--you know--is the dedication to serve God--you know--in the desire to, to follow--you know--to do his leading and--like--neither of us,you know, and especially in this kind of life you don't have a blueprint of what you--what he's gonna be doing necessarily, you know--and I'm just kinda concerned because like--you know--I've even thought about that cause I've kinda had a conflict--you know--growing up that way--you know--I'm talented musically--you know--so therefore I should probably look for somebody that's talented musically but he--he likes it--you know--I mean, he doesn't understand it totally but I'm sure we could live happily together with it, you know, but I don't expect him to have a--you know--yearning to go to all the Beethoven concerts or anything--you know--but I mean--I've heard of very happy marriages where--you know--there's quite different--you know--interests--you know--there.
(I apologize for not knowing the rules of punctuation for this kind of English.) Nobody on the panel knew what the girl was asking. She was confused--that came through loud and clear, but she might have seen through some of the fog simply by making the effort to clarify and shorten her question....
The late W. H. Auden once appeared on a television interview and it was delicious to see his interviewers thrown completely off balance by the clarity and the brevity of his answers. They had their questions carefully worked out and the timing approximated, but long before the show was over they were casting about for new questions. When they asked if he thought of poetry as a means of self-expression, he said,"No, not at all. You write a poem because you have seen something which seems worth sharing with others." The ideal reaction from the reader is, 'I knew that all along, but I never realized it.' He could, I am sure, have lectured for an hour on that one subject, but he didn't. He had a sense of occasion.
"You will be living in Oxford, England, Mr. Auden. Do you expect to be teaching there?"
"No."
"You won't be teaching. (Pause.) Well, Mr. Auden, as you move into the more--shall we say--mellow years, would you say that you have any unfulfilled ambitions?"
"No."
One of my unfulfilled ambitions was to hear a simple answer on a TV talk show. Thank you, Mr. Auden.
-Elisabeth Elliot, from All That Was Ever Ours, Keep a Quiet Heart and Love Has a Price Tag.
I believe in being a poet in all moments of life. Being a poet means being human. I know some poets whose daily behavior has nothing to do with their poetry. In other words, they are only poets when they wrote poetry. Then it is finished and they turn into greedy, indulgent, oppressive, shortsighted, miserable, and envious people. Well, I cannot believe their poems. I value the realities of life and when I find these gentlemen making fists and claims-that is, in their poems and essays-I get disgusted, and I doubt their honesty. I say to myself: Perhaps it is only for a plate of rice that they are screaming.
Why I Am A Christian: How I Got Here From There Current mood: thankful Category: Religion and Philosophy
I grew up in a trouble-free home with my mom, dad, and younger sister. Although both of my parents were raised in at least nominally (I assume) Christian homes, they both left the faith and, consequently, my sister and I were raised with no religious training whatsoever.
I don't remember my dad ever talking about God. My mother would routinely mention karma, biorhythms, angels, aliens, and horoscopes. Our culture and my mother provided what little (and I mean little) understanding I had about God.
When I was younger (I'm not sure what age, but old enough to read on my own) I somehow acquired a Children's Bible from my uncle's house. After reading a bit of the beginning, I got to the story of how God saves his people from slavery at the hands of the Egyptians. This is a story many people are familiar with from the movie "The Ten Commandments." I remember going into my mother's room and asking her why God killed all the Egyptians in the Red Sea if he loved everybody. Since she couldn't give me an answer, I lost interest in reading any more of the Bible and filed away some negative feelings about God.
As I got older, I adopted the typical attitude of the culture: you do your thing, I'll do my thing, and as long as I'm not hurting anybody it's all ok. You have your truth, I have my truth – it's all good. I admit I didn't give this philosophy any thought because it was all I really heard, so I just assumed it was true.
In high school I started getting into witchcraft and Wicca. This was appealing to me because I knew there was magic in the world, and I liked the idea of trying to control things. (I didn't have a very good time in high school.) I carried on into college, where I found this religion to be very frustrating. Most of the people I encountered were guarded, selfish, or unhelpful. I wanted to learn, but no one wanted to teach. I also realized, unfortunately, that demons are real creatures, and they have no love for humans.
Somewhere in the college years, both my sister and one of my best friends became Christians. I was pretty unhappy about this, especially in regards to my friend. She did a total 180 on me, and I felt I had lost my friend. Just recently I found an old note I'd written to someone about her where I said, "She is dead to me." How striking that was for me to read now, because that was exactly what happened.
"We were therefore buried with him [Jesus] through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life." [Romans 6:4]
"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" [2 Corinthians 5:17]
Not surprisingly, this only made me dislike God even more. My friend, bless her heart, was caught up in the newness of her faith and in her concern for me she was a little overzealous in telling me what I was doing wrong. I can understand it now, but at the time it was only annoying. After more reflection, it is also clear to me that just by her obedience to God and wanting to please him, that illuminated my disobedience and lack of interest in pleasing him.
"This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed." [John 3:19-20]
A number of years later I sat at my desk at work doing my art and wanted something to engage my mind while pushing pixels. I discovered internet radio (oh boy!). This seemed like a prime opportunity to listen to some Christian BS so I could go throw it in my sister's face after asking her to bless my corn (running mealtime joke). I ran into a few radio guys who liked to yell, but I had a lot to choose from, so I eventually found a few shows that I could stomach. This is where God finally showed me who he was. I listened to those shows at work all day for a year before I ever set foot in a church. It was a slow process. I heard teaching on the scriptures; I heard amazing stories of totally messed-up people whose lives had been radically changed by God; I heard authors who had written well-researched books; and I heard what love sounded like.
"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." (Jesus speaking.) [John 13:34-35]
These Christians understood that command from Jesus and it showed. This was not the self-seeking and adversarial attitude I had seen in my experience with witchcraft (and, frankly, most of the world).
There were two other small things that happened at this time, but I consider them important because they were God speaking to me. They were two specific lines of text that got stuck in my head for months on end. The first was from a phone conversation I had with my sister where I was arguing with her about Jesus being the only way to God. She quoted this scripture from Jesus himself: "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." [John 14:6] The other was a line from a Christmas song: "God is not dead, nor doth he sleep." ["I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day," Henry Wadsworth Longfellow]
This is how I became a Christian. God did it, 100%. He gave me eyes to see (finally) and a new heart and he gave me the faith to believe. This is why I love Jesus, because he first loved me. Without him I was a God-hater, an idol worshipper, engaging in fornication, homosexuality and adultery (not in my own marriage). Let's call a spade a spade here. This is what I was.
What am I now? Still a sinner, as are we all. I've heard people say the church is full of hypocrites. Yes, some people in the church are hypocrites, but not everyone in the church is a Christian. (Surprised?) It's important to remember what a hypocrite is: a person who pretends to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that he or she does not actually possess, esp. a person whose actions belie stated beliefs. A hypocrite is not someone who messes up and then feels bad about it. Christians mess up, but they are saddened by it, ask God for forgiveness, and are forgiven. Christians are repentant.
I've run into some pretty alarming "Christians," both before I was redeemed and afterwards. Once I was at a funeral (before I was a Christian) and since it was in a Catholic church they had everyone take communion (though honestly I don't understand why). I was just following everyone else, and when I got up in front of the priest I guess I didn't do whatever it was I was supposed to do to receive the communion, and the guy actually gave me a nasty look and said, "Why are you here??" OH my goodness. Talk about a completely out-of-place thing to say at a funeral. Someone died. Why did he think I was there. That was just another one of those things that made me not a big fan of God for a very long time. Sadly, people who claim to be Christians but really aren't make some pretty big waves in the world. You rarely hear of the ones who are loving their Lord.
So, this is my story in a nutshell. I understand that you're not me, and we all come from different places. I hold the Bible in the highest regard as God's word, and I try every day by God's grace to live in a way that pleases him. I love learning. I've been a Christian since the year 2000, and God has taught me so much. I have so much more to learn. But I can honestly say I have never had more joy, peace, and understanding than I have now. I am so grateful to my God."
