Won't You Just Be With Me

Be still and know that I am God.

Be still and know that I am.

Be still and know.

Be still.

Be.

Be.

Be.

Because Be is the beginning of Beginning,

and Be is the beginning of Believing,

and Be is the beginning of Belonging,

and Be is the beginning of Becoming,

and Be is the beginning of Behaving,

You're trying so hard to behave but I'm not going to let you until you learn how to Be.

I'm not going to let you even behave right until you learn to Be.

It's the beginning of Behaving.

Be is the beginning of Beloved. And you are my beloved.

You are my beloved.

Be with me.

-Jason Upton-

The simplicity of this revelation and the power in its truth is crushing me like waves. Drowning me in the realization that it doesn't matter about the friends I have or social status, my job, or education, house, car, clothes, fashion, popularity (if that's even real). It's all fading. The money I live from is just money. The places I go are just places. My efficiency is sometimes blinding. My ambitions are dust. My striving is rust. My accomplishment and success in trying to succeed is the most dangerous; I get what I want long enough that I forget what I need.
Even ministry and good works are empty if they are fueled out of striving.

I could feed the whole world but starve my soul. I could transform the earth but never be whole. I asked where I start. God, where do I start. Be with me. Be with me he said. I go deep, he pours wide. I want to mock the insecurity that is masked under 'logic', by trusting God. By trusting God. Trusting. Falling. Flying. Freedom. "Look at the birds," Jesus said, "Your Heavenly father feeds them," "Look at the lilies and how they grow. They don't work or make their clothing yet Solomon in all his glory was not even dressed as beautifully as they are. Your heavenly father already knows your needs, and he will give you all you need from day to day if you live for him and make the Kingdom of God your primary concern." (Mt 7:26...)

I'm so in love.

I'm so in love.

And all I want is to be with You.

All I want is to be.

Be.

Just You and me.

Of Dried Mangoes, Sesame Snaps, and Single Status

I've developed a bizarre addiction. I've been reoccuringly arriving in the Save On Foods parking lot. Soon I find myself at the till with sesame Snaps and a bag of dried Mangoes in hand. The severity of this impulsion is exposed in this evidence: I've memorized the mango bin number (1186), and sesame snaps (both original and vanilla) are .39 cents each, which is a little pricy considering at most places they are three for .99 cents. I've also converted to Save On Gas just to get grocery discount coupons in support of my habit. It's definitely a struggle for me to admit this, but this is my cry for help. I mean if "You really are what you eat", what am I becoming? Dried fruit and bird food?

I've only recently been released from my apples-and-peanutbutter fixation. That ordeal required some serious rehab, but I'm keeping pretty clean. And all this attributes to why I am presently marveling in single life. I am somewhat of a freak. I think I will always be odd, and I honestly hope to become even more strange, because I love it. Ultimately, I want to be weird because I listen to the voice of God more than I hear the voice of people, not because I have obsessive snack fetishes. Most of my motivation in life is based on pleasing people and becoming acceptable to feel wanted. It's a bitter confession but I would be a liar to say I am firmly reliant on the unbending truth of my creator rather than the wind-blown thoughts of humanity. I am so disturbed by my condition. What a tension. I long to be stripped; pure, naked and unabashed. Not disconcerted or embarassed; poised. Not concealed or disguised; obvious. Yet I hide continuously and these masks won't fracture. I'm in a skin that needs to shed, and i'm grasping the dead cells as a shield. There's growth in the cocoon but death if it is never escaped.

I'm meant to be flying soon; I've been climbing for a while. I make the transition so complicated but all it requires is letting go. Analysing will kill it. While cliff jumping, you have to jump, standing there and thinking for too long will result in never leaving the ledge. I feel captive to a paralytic fear. I can see that it's ridiculous but I stay frozen. When I was young I had this outrageous and exaggerated fear of popping balloons. I took a steak knife and tried to pop one while I was home alone the other day and it was completely nonsensical the effort it took. I went up to the balloon all nonchalant with the knife poised and stood petrified for nearly five minutes occasionally threatening with a slight arm thrust that never intruded beyond a foot radius of the balloons space. Eventually it became so preposterous that I began to verbally mock and coax myself, and was soon rolling on the ground laughing at the halarity of the situation and my foolish fear. Really I should have been more afraid of the steak knife than the air filled rubber, but reason was absent. Finally I just did it. Laughing.

If this story has any moral it is trust and flight. Letting go. "In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength..." Isaiah 30:15 God's view always seems so polar to mine...strength in quietness, rest is salvation....it really defies my "all by works" ethic. But this is another random stream that I'll leave roast in my mind.

This is a really abstract blog, I had no idea what would spill out, it makes me want to steal Arlene's term of "glob." Brain glob.