waiting…
just waiting and waiting and waiting,
sometimes,
i’m just waiting for the dark
to fall like the covering earth,
falling from indifferent shovels
over me,
around me.
silencing me
and the surrounding world
Month: June 2015
mute
in the face of the ever falling rain,
i have not the words;
in the midst of the constant blowing sand,
i have not the words;
in the burying, smothering storms,
i have not the words;
i am mute and immobile before every onslaught
that pours down and threatens to bury
but for the many hands that are held high
as a shelter over my head, taking the bruising brunt
and warding me from this falling dark
that i might continue to stand –
if only in silence
remembered rain
rain
and
remembered rain
fall in a mix
behind my eyes,
before my eyes…
they blend
like past does with the present
sometimes.
i think strange thoughts
which are normal
– for me –
there is no such thing as good,
there is bad
and there is
the good bound to be turned bad
like fresh bananas hung
on a warm and humid day;
while i,
i sit within
the eye of it all
watching it spin around
and away,
disconnected.
the rain continues
thinking it helps
to water the world,
to keep it alive
like an intravenous drip…
drip, drip, drip
every drop prolonging the end,
the great and drying finality,
but for now –
it rains
cool and wet upon my feet
stretched out to receive this small baptism,
this sacred ablution
to clean away the filth
i have walked in
all these years
how much rain is there?
The Church & LGBTQ+
This is not going to be a theological post about who is right and who is wrong except for these brief opening sentences where I clearly state my own perspective for the record and for the sake of transparency – I do not believe that being LGBTQ+ is sin/open rebellion against God.
Of course I have the benefit of a theology that leads me to believing that all humanity is broken at a foundational level and so focusing in on the details as we are fond of doing sets up a global farce of 7 billion pots calling 7 billion kettle’s black in an often violent and sad cycle of endless brutality.
That being said the Church (Big C global collection of various types of Christian believers in their many and differing contexts) believes it is being confronted with a very specific challenge – how to respond to LGBTQ+.
I say “believes” because it may in fact only be the Church that sees this as a confrontation while those within the LGBTQ+ community and their supporters are simply moving forward with little regard for whether the church comes along or not in the same way that a field of wheat may see itself being confronted by an army of infantry tromping through it whereas the army is completely unaware of the wheat at all as it has its gaze set on more distant goals.
Herein lies the conundrum for the church. Unlike cultural changes of the past that “confronted” the church like slavery and women (which is still being worked through sadly in some corners) the church does not have the luxury of a century or more to mull over and craft its position when it comes to LGBTQ+ concerns…for the most part western culture has already moved on and brought LGBTQ+ with it. There is no more space for “don’t ask, don’t tell”. This is not to say there are still not significant issues of bigotry that face LGBTQ+ – there are…however the momentum of western history is solidly with LGBTQ+.
It is at this point that some in the Church will say – “So what? Just because culture is doing this does not mean we will compromise our Biblical values” etc. ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
To which the rest of the world says exactly the same thing – if they are listening at all.
Do you see what is happening here? The world is rapidly believing the Church is irrelevant and the Church is rapidly starting to believe (or at least act like) the world is irrelevant…at least in areas where they disagree.
Theologically (sorry), that the world feels the church is irrelevant is to be expected…however for the church to act as if the world is irrelevant is perhaps the greatest sin it could possibly commit, as it exists for one reason and one reason only – the world.
I have no idea what the way forward is for the Church (lies! I have some thoughts) but I do know one thing…whatever it is, the world is caring less and less to the point that it won’t matter one day at all and this is the real tragedy.
it is the snow
the snow,
the white, fresh snow
like linen on the ground
blankets the path ahead
and takes my foot prints as
a record of the past, now passed
it is the snow,
it is this evidence of a life lived
that will visit me in the end;
a journey to grandmother’s
for food and fellowship
long and away gone
that have been left like a brand
burned stark upon my mind
because i put it there
and cannot for the life of me remove it
these paltry things
for just one mountain to fall,
just one sea to carry my weight
that i might tread the waves,
for but a moment…
that the sun would simply stand still
just for a second at my request
and the moon, that she would be held,
a pearl in the skies before my eyes
if the wind would only breathe
small words of silver in my ears
while the trees bowed deep
for only the briefest of time…
for these mere things
my life, my golden life,
for these paltry things
pressed
pressed,
we are pressed
flat to the earth
like old leaves
between the pages
of some book,
held in posterity
and kept on a shelf
forgotten and preserved
as memories
that were meant
to dance in a wind
that never came
Harnessing Chaos 