Making Home Home

So usually I only blog about deep spiritual or philosophical matters but I have recently decided that maybe all my readers out there would like something a little more laid back, relaxed, and more about my life. The last part isn't so much for my readers, do not take me for being that narcissistic, but I think I would like to just vent more about more random things going on in my life rather than feeling this heavy load to write something that is going to be this monumental discovery that is going to change lives. As if I can change lives. 

Yesterday was a good day I officially moved into my apartment and made it home. The first two nights I stayed here I was the only one and it was just to move some things in. Both nights were the worst nights of sleep ever, one of which I spontaneously woke up in the middle of the night and threw up. The other I was having such a vivid dream of a man trying to chop me down with an axe, not to mention hearing weird loud noises all through out the night I was convinced this man was actually in my apartment. It felt mostly like I was staying in a cold, plain, and lonely hotel room. 

But yesterday we broke this bad boy in and made her feel like home. First off we have furniture (a great big leather couch and a lazy boy recliner) and a great 50 inch projection tv screen that is as wide as it is deep. We had our first guests over and broke the kitchen in by making a delicious meal that we went all out on and washed it down with some ridiculously good pecan pie. 

To say the least after a day of really living and sharing life with good friends and roommates in my new apartment it felt like home and I slept like a baby, keeping the man with axe at bay. 

Wisdom of Nee

Could the American individualistic thought that has plagued America since the invention of capitalism be at the core of why the modern church resembles nothing of what we see in the second testament or more importantly its lack of resemblance in the very person of Christ? 

There are many who think that they can be Christians all by themselves! But God will not allow this. Often their individual prayers are not answered, their personal study of the Scriptures does not enlighten them, and their individual seeking does not enlighten them, and their individual seeking does not lead them to God's will.

 

If such a person would say to another brother or sister, "I just cannot get through this matter by myself, would you help me" and they prayed together, he would be clear eventually. Whatever he could not understand by himself, he would see clearly when an answer was sought with his brother. 

Such a person is often still proud, thinking that he can make it by himself most of the time, and that there are only a few times when he cannot get through. 

This is individualism. In the church individualism must be broken. We must allow the Christ in us and the Christ in all the other brothers and sisters to become knit together in one Body.

one and only... Watchman Nee

Into the Wild?

This vacation I began reading the book Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer. Quick Synopsis: "In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000, in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter..." 

You may have seen the movie but the book reads much differently. Instead of focusing on Chris's adventure's tramping around America and highlighting the beauty he witnessed along the way the book is more of a discovery to find out who this young man was that would drop everything and anyone in search of some sort of transcendental experience in the "wild". 

I began to Journal about what it is about the connection between man and the wilderness thats seems to span time. 

This is what came out:

What is it about nature and the wilderness that calls and lures men? Lures me? Nature seems to be seen as a place to heal, meet some primordial need for adventure, and most importantly it seems to be a place we search to complete the void that haunts our lives. We are restless because we demand to live the way we were created to live, we are restless because living the way we were created to live is a mystery to most. Those that claim to possess the truth either parade around in a demeaning and demanding manor, confused by the hierarchal interpretation they have been fed through. On the other pole is those you may actually obtain the truth but have grown complacent and comfortable without sharing or truly tasting a life of risk, adventure, danger, happiness, and true fulfillment. This in mind, with no where to look in society, we take to the wild. Maybe because what we long for is ultimately to know the creator and nature provides the last unadultured view of the creator's face.