#rockbottom

mad koala on the loose!

I'm sitting at The Anchor waiting for Jobst to show up. We're going to smoke pipes and catch up on life. And we'll be drinking coffee, too, of course.

These past several days have been pretty rough for some of my closest friends. Jim died of cancer this past Wednesday night. I haven't seen John or Brandy since, everything's turned into a whirlwind for them, all the preparations, the funeral. Tiffany told me the death of a parent doesn't sink in until all the rites are over. That's when you really feel the loss. My heart and prayers go out to them. The funeral's tomorrow; Amos and I are making it a priority not just to show our support but to honor Jim. I only met him a few times, but his Fun Friday Facts were always a highlight of my Friday morning post-patio smoke breaks. And we shared a few talks about ancient Mayan and Aztec history. He was cool as you-know-what. 

There's an old couple in the booth across from me.
The man clutched his cup, took a sip, and moaned.
"This is the best coffee in the city," he said.
His wife just shook his head.
"Americans are dumb when it comes to coffee," A Scotsman told me the other day.
He's right. The Anchor does NOT have good coffee.

I read a great blog article this afternoon, written by a former classmate. The article's HERE. He had lots of really good points, about how we're so keen on finding our "soul mate" that we don't invest our lives into someone until that person meets all our checkered requirements. Our demands for a potential marriage partner are bred in fantasy-land and ignore the fact that we're all messed up, fallen human beings, and waiting for Prince Charming or the Perfect Man will leave you waiting a long time. These checklists often leave no room for imperfection: "Well, she's not as [insert quality here] as I want her to be, so she can't be the person God has for me, because whoever God has for me will be PERFECT for me." When it comes to relationships, such thinking is self-sabotage: we sever the possibility of investment and connection because of how the person doesn't "live up" in some regards, and we use every possible transgression from our Soul Mate requirements to disengage. We treat breach of preference as Red Flags and overlook all the great qualities in a person for their less-than-great qualities. He makes his points better than I do, so read the article; but here's a great quip of his to close out this mediocre quip of mine: the biblical marriage, he says, "paints a portrait of two sinners, committing to the task of one another, for the sake of one another, until death do them part. It's two imperfect people, committing to the sanctifying work of expressing Jesus' self-sacrificial love, to their lover, so that they might see him or her become the person God has always intended them to be, knowing full well that neither of them have yet to reach this goal."

If someone wants to measure my value and potential off my imperfections, I'll pass on that.

I don't glory in my imperfections, and I don't expect the woman I end up with to be perfect.

For all my flaws and shortcomings, I know I'll be a good husband and a good father.

I know this in the deepest part of my being. It's in my wiring.

And if someone chooses not to see that for any little reason, that's not on me.

I'll move on, I'll find someone else, I'll be the person whom God wants me to be.

The kind of marriage my old classmate writes about, that's the one I want. As much as I have a lofty view of marriage, I know mistakes will be made by both of us. At times we'll both be tempted to think that maybe we married the wrong person. But what matters in the end is persistent love and devotion, of sacrifice and selflessness, of sharing in life and growing together. If a woman wants me to be all grown up before making any sort of investment, she'll have to wait a long while. I'm far from perfect, very far from it, but I'm trying, and I'm growing. If someone wants a perfect marriage, they'll have to look elsewhere. But if they want someone loyal, faithful, devoted, open, and eager to share life together, I'll give them my number.

christian eschatology: a sketch

Eschatology by Anthony Barnhart

historical fiction (IV)

The ironic part about this post is that this book isn't fiction but narrative history. The two are completely different.

I finally finished "A World Undone: The Story of the Great War" by G.J. Meyer, and have started "A Short History of World War II" by James Stokesbury. Both authors make it a point to show that World War One and World War Two are part of the same conflict, that of newly united Germany trying to establish itself as a world power over against the other European powers, not least the French, who held presidential weight in the European balance of power. The two decades between the two wars were far from peaceful, with a worldwide Depression nestled right in the middle, and the end result of false peace and false disarmament set the stage for Hitler's rise to power.

I'm pumped about Stokesbury's book. I've liked all his others. I'm equally pumped about getting into Shaara's "The Rising Tide." It's historical fiction, focused on the North African campaigns of World War Two.

the 25th week

The Anchor's getting a little too classy for my tastes...

Memorial Day. At 9:00 I met up with Tony & Jessie at The Anchor, who’re in town from Illinois. I got coffee, bacon, eggs and toast. It was great catching up. I took Jessie by work, made us some iced lattes and threw together the food order. I planned on doing some reading at Eden Park, but it was super crowde for Memorial Day and there was nowhere to park, so that fell through. Blake and Isaac returned from North Carolina, and Traci joined us for an evening at Amos’. I went to bed rather early. The Wisconsinite was in a rather stand-offish mood and told me that “we need to talk ASAP.” My intuition: she’s changed her mind. 

Tuesday. I went to The Anchor to do some writing. A fly landed in my coffee and I drank it anyways. Isaac, Ams, Amos, Frank, Rebecca and I hit up Rock Bottom for Pint Night. We got five appetizers and countless beers for $5. Damned good deal. We rounded out the night taking shots and watching an Animal Planet documentary on “real-life mermaids” at Frank’s place. And, as expected from the start, Mandy K. changed her mind. I was too secular for Mo and not Christian enough for the Wisconsinite. I just can’t win. Her revoking the whole “let’s try again” didn’t cause me much pain, mainly because I was wise enough not to put much stock in her words over the weekend, and I didn’t feel sad so much as I felt mad. I reigned my tongue, no reason not to be civil. Knowing I’m not “good enough” for her (quite literally) my be positive: perhaps my affections, my love, can wither under quiet anger. All in all, I now know that we have no future, and I can move forward in the hope that I’ll find someone who stirs me up like she did and who treated me as well as Mo did.

Wednesday. My 4-day weekend is over. The best way to get over Mandy K. is to get out there, so after work I freshened up and went on a date with a chick named Amanda (ironic, is it not?) at Awakenings in Hyde Park (where I awkwardly ran into Brandon making an emergency delivery). Amanda and I got coffee and sat out on the square and talked for an hour. She seemed cool, but no real connection. A very innocent-looking girl, and she didn’t get any of my jokes. Oh well. I wasn’t expecting, even wanting, anything in the first place. Ams & Josh joined me back home, and we watched Arrested Development and chewed on Starbursts and ate brownies.

Thursday. Frank & I oepend together. I spent the afternoon playing Dead Island: Riptide. Around 5:00 I went to The Anchor to do some writing and reading prepping for Small Group. Small Group went well: we made a fire, cooked s’mores, enjoyed Yuengling and bourbon Tom Collins’ (so… not Tom Collins’), and we talked about the book. Always good and refreshing.

Friday. Eric & I opened. It felt like a Wednesday rather than a Friday, since I had Monday and Tuesday off. Back home I played Dead Island: Riptide and Ams came over and fixed us baked pasta. Isaac got some shitty news: his mom has an invasive form of lung cancer, and there’s not much they can do about it. And she was perfectly fine not two weeks ago. His brother John came over, and we went to the Happy Hollow and took shots for their mom. John’s dad is doing really bad and now Isaac’s mom is in the same boat. Death. Fucking. Blows.

Saturday. I’m thinking Mandy K. made the right decision: she deserves someone far better than me. I’m not perfect, and that’s okay, but I do have a lot of growing to do. I can’t flagellate myself: my struggles and fuck-ups are normal, and I have God’s forgiveness. There’s a lot of growing to be had, but growth comes from looking forward rather than backward, and I need to remember that. I slept until 2 PM, woken up by an intruder (Ams), and I joined her on the sofa and promptly passed out for another few hours. We went to Amos’ for an evening of hockey and ordered Domino’s for dinner.

Sunday. I went to The Anchor for morning coffee, hit up U.C.C. for church, and then played some Dead Island back home. I picked up Wendy’s for lunch and then enjoyed said Wendy’s with Isaac and Amos at the Loth House. I spent the afternoon writing and made a trip to Kroger before Ams arrived for a Sunday Night Dinner: steak, mashed potatoes, and cream corn. Pan-seared, homemade, and paired with Tuscan boule and a garlic vinaigrette dipping sauce. Fantastic!

what are we looking for?

What is it we're looking for? This drive to experience life, to build security, to pursue pleasure and fame and knowledge, all of these well up from a dilemma in our own hearts that we can't seem to pinpoint. Much of us strive to solve our dilemma without knowing there is a dilemma. Saint Augustine answered this question when he said that our hearts aren't at rest until they find themselves resting in God; he later added to this that our hearts aren't at rest until we find ourselves resting in God and in relationship with both other people and with creation. He's speaking, of course, of "the glory of God": mankind in the Garden, in a beautiful, functional, and good standing with God, one another, and creation. Human beings are created as God's image bearers, and since we've been kicked out of the Garden, deciding to bear our own image rather than God's, we're no longer at home, no longer where we're designed to be. We feel off because we are off. Something's not right, and the bible's clear about the dilemma: we've been ousted from the Garden.

What we've lost is God, but that's not all.

We lost the whole thing, the whole package: life in the Garden.

What we've lost, really, is our true selves and true names.

We're but shadows of what our Creator intended us to be.

The Greek philosophers sought to answer the question, "How do we find eudaimonia?" We tend to translate this Greek word as "happiness," and it makes sense to us, after all. What else do westerners pursue more than anything? We're all in the pursuit of happiness, especially here in America (it's written in our Declaration of Independence!). But eudaimonia is a richer, far more dynamic and full word, transcending some euphoric feeling of contentment to encompass a holistic scope of the human experience. It refers to a fully flourishing human existence, and that's what we're after.

Paul often uses philosophical language when talking about the Christian life. Well-schooled in Greek philosophy (he studied in Tarsus, after all), he knows what he's doing. That which the philosophers seek is found in Christ. The wisdom of the philosophers is subjugated to the foolishness of a cross. A fully flourishing life is found in Christ, not in cynicism, or epicureanism, or hedonism, or any of the other "isms". 

The gospel is, after all, the story of redemption, of rescue and renewal. We have mankind in the Garden, glorying in God. We have mankind trying to put himself in God's place, and we have the curse of such rebellion: dehumanization. God isn't content to leave it at that, and launches a rescue operation culminating in Christ's death and resurrection. In Christ there's redemption, rescue and renewal; dehumanized human beings are rescued from their dehumanization and indwelt by God's own Spirit, a guarantee of our inheritance and future glorification, when we'll find ourselves in the Garden yet again. Salvation--being rescued from dehumanization and restored to our rightful, God-ordained place in the cosmos--is a two-part process. We're saved in the present with the promise of full salvation in the future. 

Eudaimonia, a fully flourishing human life, is found only in Christ.

All other attempts, efforts, and experiences are but shadows.

In Christ, we can taste eudaimonia in the present, though not fully.

One day we'll experience full eudaimonia when we find ourselves replanted in the Garden.

I don't want to sound too crude, but the gospel really is the existentialist's wet dream.

on the violation of death

May turned out to be a hard month for many of my closest friends, and June doesn't look anymore promising. John's dad's lymphoma came back, and there's nothing the doctors can do: he's in hospice, and it's turned into a waiting game. Not a week later, Isaac's mom was diagnosed with invasive lung cancer. She's on chemo, but the doctors aren't too hopeful. Prayers, obviously, are appreciated, even demanded. I joined Isaac and his brother at the Happy Hollow ("You go in happy, but you leave feeling hollow; I think that's where they get the name?"), and we took shots of all sorts of liquor celebrating their mother. "No one can call me a son of a bitch," Isaac said, "because my mom's just so awesome." I've never met her, but everything I've heard tells me that's the case.

I've thought a lot about death the last year, and especially over the last few weeks. My thoughts always go back to the Fall of Man in Genesis 3. This is why death is here, and this is why it feels like such a violation. Because of our sin in the Garden, we image bearers have become subject to decay and death just like the rest of creation. It isn't so much that we sinned and then death entered the picture; it's more like we sinned, and we became subject to the same laws that apply to the rest of God's creation (look through the fossil record: death's there, through and through, part of God's good creation). We've acquired bodies like that of the animals, subject to the forces of nature. It isn't just that earthquakes and tornadoes can kill us: we're also susceptible to disease, to prions, to cancer. We sought to become gods, but now we rot and die like the animals. It feels like such a violation because this isn't how things are supposed to be. And so I praise God for the gospel: those who are in Christ never die, we simply change. 

The story of the gospel doesn't start at the cross but in the Garden. God makes mankind in his image, sets him in the Garden with the command to rule over the world and fill the earth. Mankind wants to become like God, and the end result is what N.T. Wright calls dehumanization: we become like the animals. We become subject to death and decay. This isn't just a spiritual death, a spiritual decay; it's all-encompassing. All of our human experience is scarred. We face the same fate as the animals: we live, we rot, we die, we're gone. But God doesn't wish for this to be the case, so he does something about it. He sends Christ, to bring about the great work of redemption, to inaugurate and seal God's mission of rescuing and renewing the world. This rescue and renewal starts with humankind, since we're God's prized possession. In Romans 6-8, Paul offers us a panoramic view of this salvation: in Romans 6 we're dead and sin, then raised to newness of life in Christ. We're new creations, and we need to start living like it. We're not like the pagans, who seek to honor God but can't. We have God's Spirit, and the Spirit works in us and for us, reworking our hearts and minds, bringing us all the more closer to who we truly are as God's image bearers. This rescue isn't complete, for even now we groan with all creation, yearning for "the hope of the glory of God," which is no less than God's final intent for his world: a full and final rescue. Human beings who have been "saved" aren't simply saved from hell to enjoy some sort of ethereal heavenly experience. We're saved from ourselves, from our dehumanization, and we're returned to our rightful place in the cosmos. Paul calls this glorification, and it is the hope of the Christian, when we will be revealed as God's adopted children. 

Those without the hope of Christ grieve absent hope of ever seeing their loved ones again. Paul says immortality is a gift of God; those who die without that gift go the way of the animals: extinction. For the Christian, this life is but a breath before the rest of our existence. For those absent Christ, this life is all there is. In Christ there's freedom from having to experience it all before we die. We know that our time here is brief, to be lived for God's glory and in preparation for the world to come. In Christ there's hope, for we know that through all life's trials and heartaches, this world is not our home. Here we're sojourners and aliens. Those outside Christ die, and we celebrate the life that has ended; those in Christ go home and we celebrate not only the lives they lived but also the lives they're beginning. 

Jesus didn't raise a lot of people from the dead. Really, he only resurrected three people: the widow's son at Nain, Jairus' daughter, and Lazarus. Such a sign and testament to Jesus' identity and mission, why didn't he do it more? It seems incredible to us, but those who are tasting paradise get the sludge end of the deal.

There's so much death and suffering in the world, and like all theists, I ask, "Where is God?" I've been praying about this a lot, for those who are Christian suffer no more or less than those who aren't. As it says in the Bible, the same rains fall on the just and unjust. The simple truth is that we can't expect God to deliver us from an untimely death, to deliver us from these bodies subject to decay and death. In his wisdom God has enacted a two-part rescue operation, and we're in the first stages: we're saved, but not yet. We still must face the cost of our rebellion, that of decaying and dying. But though death is awful, it isn't the end for the Christian. Paul has the nerve to ask, "Death, where is your sting?" Christ was bold enough to say that those in him never die: perhaps, just maybe, at the moment of death, there is a seamless transition into paradise. We in Christ don't cease to be; we just go someplace else. My mom's told the story about being at the bedside of a dear family member taking her last breaths. The woman's eyes lit up, a smile crossed her face, and the fear was replaced with peace; she took my mother's hand, and she told her that angels were in the room, that everything was okay, Jesus was there and she wasn't scared. She drew her last breath and was gone. Not extinct, just elsewhere, and she didn't seem too upset about it right before she made the plunge.

We see our lives as all there is. Our lives begin at conception, we draw our first breaths, and this world of death and decay is all we know. We're told that there's more, but we have no proof of it. It's hard not to see this life as all there is, because it's all we know. But I wonder, if we only knew what waits for us when our bodies cease to function, we may not be so disturbed by it. While in high school, I prayed so hard for months on end to just catch a glimpse of paradise, as Paul did. One night I went to bed and closed my eyes and then woke up and it was morning. This was weird, because (a) I always have vivid dreams, and I had none that night that I could recall, and (b) there was no sense of the passage of time: I just closed my eyes around 11 PM and it seemed in the next instant it was 5:30 AM with my alarm going off. I thought nothing of it and went to school, and later that day my mom asked me, "What was so beautiful?" I had no idea what she was talking about. She told me she went into my room around midnight to check on me, as she always did, and I was curled up in bed with a big smile on my face and my cheeks aglow, and I kept saying, "It's so beautiful, it's so beautiful..." Those who know me know how skeptical I am, but I have to be honest: I really do think God answered my prayer, that I caught a glimpse of paradise,

At the Happy Hollow the other night, Isaac told me his mom has peace.

She knows death isn't the end of her story. She knows this world isn't her home.

She doesn't see death as the end of her life, but as a transitional stage.

I want her courage, her strength, and her confidence in the face of her greatest trial yet.