Life NOW BITE SIZE!

I have been doing this whole life thing for a good two decades, and in that time there have been many moments where time seemed to defy it's own character.  When you're young, life can't possibly be going fast enough, you're not tall, big, or strong, you're merely this little thing that takes three steps for Dad's one. Then comes that moment, that un-definable moment, where the clocks over the earth stop and take notice, all of space and time halt dead in their tracks, the everything the world over becomes silent as you experience the first real kiss of your life.  Time no longer means a thing.  Then you blink once or twice, and find yourself starring college square in the face and wonder what happened to those sweet simple years of High School.  Yet even as we have all seen this, even as some of us have gone to places such as Camp Shamineau, and experienced life happening at alarming rates, and friendships born out of urgency and accelerated days, seem tighter than the ones from lifetimes ago.  Even as all of these things happen, and I knew they would again, I look at my life here at the Honor Academy and wonder at how very much does happen in such a small amount of time.  It's hard to imagine what life was like (on the side of experience) back in a world, really back in the world.  An hour feels like three, a day like a week, a week much like a month, and a month like half a year.  It boggles my mind to think over how much has happened and see that what otherwise might take a good two years of life to occur has in fact been done in but a month and a half.
There is quite a lot of stress in this place.  Regrettable as it may be.  Yet, one could hardly ask it not to but expect the effect just the same.  Here I've found myself in question of why, what has brought me here, (of't I ask what could possibly have compelled me to), what do I hope to learn, what were my expectations and how are they progressing. I ask these question in a quantity and frequency likely not beneficial, and reap from them answers of the same dearth as they're worth.  
Life here can be trying to say the least, I come from a mentality where my life is to pour out.  Its what I do, its who I am; and not that I cannot change it, but why on earth would I? Yet I came from a place where work was less so the same, and often I had more time to reclaim the energy spent that day.  But here is not such a place. They push us in classes (good things all the way) and ask us to work 7hours of the day. Then after we've put what heart left we had, we then are sent forth to love on our clan, the men we call brothers, the ladies our sisters, we love on, and minister to, for long untamed hours.  For some I imagine such ministry natural, but those who give out so much, like me find it harsh, to still find more self to pour into our Core.
(By the way this has become a bad poem for no reason, and I have chosen to stop that as of this moment as I am annoyed!)
So we attend our classes, we work in our ministries, we pour out into our family (the men and women we're grouped into families with). and then if there is still time we may have an hour or so to go and say hi to the friends we don't see.
I came here wanting to grow, I came here wanting to break. The breaking may happen, though unlikely the kind I envisioned.  But as of so far the lessons, the learning, the "teachable moments" the Core Time, and Family time, these are all lessons I have learned already.  I am not learning.  Life gets so condensed here, its hard to keep in mind that I came here to encounter a Living God, not to waste time in a year of review.  There is so much I could be doing, the ministries back home, there are people who no one loves, no one remembers, those who are ignored, beaten down and cast out, the people my heart breaks for, those people I love.  I could be there, with them, loving them ministering to them, trying to show Christ to them.  There is my Saint Cloud.  A place that has been called "The City where Pastors go to Die"  This place my heart breaks for, because the only christian influence we see is a group of teens who love less than the LGBT, and preachers who scream.  Christ is not like these people!  I could be there trying to fight that. Trying to fight for them, maybe a little.
I was asleep this morning, and I found myself spinning around in memories.  Painful memories, and I found, one thing after all the places I went, that I need to seek the Face of this God, if this year is to mean anything thats the only thing I can do.  I struggle so much to want to go home, to love on those people and be fighting there now.  Then I remember these people are here too, one of us just this week tried (though unsuccessfully) to end his life on campus.  Now I am torn, go to where no one is speaking, or go to where no one is listening.
I am torn.
Bitterly and unwavering torn.

The Calm Before the Storm

Here I sit, awaiting the moments where I will probably endure the most tremendous physical pressure I've ever seen, undergo excruciating emotional strain, and find myself (GOD WILLING!) starring brokenness in the face.  In but a few hours more I will have lost my name... they will not call out in joy "TC!" they will not utter in concern "TC?" they will but, through groans of pained exhaustion, shout "311!"
My name, is 311.
I have no rank, but I am 311, I am a member of the 6th Platoon of Massachusettes, and will for the next (apparently indeterminate) few days be tried by the most intense role play I've yet seen.
I have no name, I have given up the things that made me noticed, I have no piercings, I have shaved my head, I will be standing in the trenches as a nameless, faceless, number to possibly remove this illusion of individual entitlement that the American society has instilled.
I stand there, though, not merely being tested, but I have challenged them to BRING IT!
I have asked my company leaders, my coaches, my Captin, my General, my facilitators to push me harder!
This is going to break me.
It has to break me!
If I can walk away from this, the same, without any change, then I have proven to myself now irrevocably, that I am fully self-sufficient! Fully Self-capable! that no challenge can face me that I am unable to solely overcome alone.
This will be the greatest tragedy in my life to date.
To know how pathetic I am and yet find nothing that can undermine me.
So I Bring it!
I willingly choose to abandon my identity, my name, my features, to assimilate unto this illusion of self, the face I have not known, the voice I have not heard, the eyes I dared not look in.
I willingly now step out to die to self, to meet my silhoette and perhaps heal this voided disconnect.

But for now, these minutes, these grand and glorious minutes I wait, in the calm before the storm, anticipating the life change, envisioning the turmoil, psyching up for the strains.  These minutes, these great and wonderful minutes I continue now, to serve, to extend the call in voice to many "WILL YOU GO?!"
Shortly, I will stand before the alter and find my heart in disrepair, desperate and weakened. 
Then, in that moment, I will be called to arms, and I will step out, leaving behind a false sense of self, and stepping into what may prove to be, the birthday I never had.
Dream as I may, feeling slightly torn,
but as for now,
I wait...
In the calm before the storm

The gauntlet has been thrown!

It has almost been three full weeks since my arriving here.  And lets be honest, its felt like much longer than that. I haven't been able to capture these last weeks into words, and not sure I can even yet.
This has been a magnanimously overwhelming week.  God has decided to begin the relentless process of destabalizing many of my personal walls, and has placed very purposely certain people in my life to accomplish this with a fever I have yet otherwise to see.
I came here with the intention  of transformation, I came here with the mindset of surrender, and not with the intentions of leading, and I find myself always in a position of leadership, either on our morning run,  or in the dorms.
However, I could easily say that I am in the best shape I have ever been in my life.  We get up at 5am, we're out on the ANVIL by 5:30AM pumping out Navy calisthenics, and then off to a three mile run.  It is amazing!
As I am writing this I find myself falling short of my own expectations, unable to capture the true picture of all that's happened in mere words.
This has been a truly awing experience.  Many of us know that in places like this we find the relationships we make to develop quickly, the Honor Academy is no exception, the relationships I've formed here seem already life long, and its mindblowing to acknowledge that it's only been three weeks.
Three weeks, and I have friends that I miss,  three weeks and I realize right now, were I to go home, a part of me would rejoice in my return and a part would remain in Texas.
Three weeks, and I find that even now, there are alterations under way that will dramatically impact the next year of my life in such a way as to radically change my world.

Let me, for a moment, pause, slow to understand that when I say things like "Change the world," "Impact," "make a difference" it is not with a blight nonchalance that I do so, it is sober-mindedly assessing that one person can affect at least one person who will go on to affect one person, if in one year a life is changed, then after 10 years 10 lives are changed, but if I were to strive harder, to make it my mission to touch more than just one life, what if I purposed my life to love unconditionally, to care with reckless abandon, to lead with passion, and to serve with zeal then I could easily affect 100 lives, and those 100 lives now forever different because they met me, will go one to affect 100 more, by the end of one year 1million lives are changed!     \

I came here to light on fire, I came here to recapture my relationship with Christ, what I have found (only in three weeks) is that the fire was never out, the relationship never dry, that I only needed to wake up and realize the truth of where I am.  Now, that I have seen that I am purposing my life to strive for excellence, to have a vision of GENUINELY impacting the lives of those around me, longing for the wisdom to do so, disciplining myself in order to accomplish this, and leading those who desire to make a difference.
My heartbeat is to provoke a young generation to passionately pursue Jesus Christ and to take His life giving message to the ends of the earth, and empowering Godly men and women to posses wisdom, vision, and discipline to excel as leaders who's lives advance the kingdom of God.  And I will conduct myself Honorably before God and man in word, thought, and deed. My heart's cry is to see lives actually lived to their potential, I am tired of watching us waste away.

Semper Honorablus!

Valedico

Normally, my updates are of a more heavy profound nature, words spun to articulate a lesson I've learned, a message I've formed, or some other thought, idea, or process.  However, this time, there are no eloquent words in the form of delicate oration, no carefully articulated speeches, no diatribes of the existential, just merely a burdened heart "Valedico" (To say goodbye).  So instead of such pompous words I offer this, in whatever spirit it may be taken, take it thus.

Valedico.

Valedico, valedico, valedico.  My heart weeps at the thought, I must utter such curses.  To say to you, a dear friend, a confidant, a brother, a sister, a love perhaps lost.  To utter to you these horrible words, my heart breaks.  Some of you I have found great honor in knowing, you have guided me to a better view of myself, my world, and my life.  Some of you I have poured out my heart to, cried some, laughed much, and sides of me have been unveiled that were never meant to be seen.  Some of you, though only a short while I have known, have touched my life in ways yet still unshown.  To you, who my heart has touched, to you few who've touched my own, I say Valete.
My days of late have been spent by spending a few last moments with those people I have known, those hearts I have touched, and those whose hearts have touched me, my heart weeps at the sound of such simple words, to say goodbye, to say farewell, but please know that I will not say such treacherous words without knowing that its days are numbered, when after a time, the goodbyes will end, the sun will rise and a greeting I shall soon extend.  To you of whom I spoke, know that this, is to you wrote.
I say, for now, and just for now, a short goodbye, a short farewell, until one day when a hug will say the greetings my voice could not.
For now, and just for now...
Valedico.. valedico, valedico.

The dark side of light.

So, it occurs to me, that many people have no concept of what Christianity is.  I know the Islamic community believes we are all sinners because they hear us declare that we are a Christian nation, and then they see lady Gaga, and wonder what sort of God would support that. The Atheistic community looks at us talk about our heady theology, and our scientific quarries, watching us claim the name of Christ and then turn around and bomb a family planning clinic, or turn our backs on someone because they didn't live up to the standard. If we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the light is not in us.  Are we truly so depraved that we can call ourselves Christian if we ignore the very words of Christ with our behavior yet condemn a man for his sin?
We live on the darker side of light.
I recently came to an understanding that I am not who I thought I had been for the last 20 years. In fact I wasn't even alive until roughly 10years ago. I look back into my memory and see darkness.  Not the theological sort but real relentless darkness, I can't even see myself back there.
This brings me to a place where I realize I don't know who I am.
Or rather who I've been.  I lived as a secret for years, unknowing of my words. What I liked, or wanted.. I was asleep. Literally dead without knowing it.
I was a prisoner in my mind.
Now I have grown up in the Church, and I have never known separation from God, so how can I know where my brother is if I have never seen his world?
I cannot.
I have grown afraid of the self I never met, and now am at first discovering I hadn't lived yet.
This stuck a fear of great proportion in me, if I was born somewhere in my 9th grade year, then who lived my life, what was he like, what had he done that I will have to account for?
I live with such fear or this that I surpassed it and now I have lost it.
But to my point, I have never lived away from the grace of Christ, but I have lived in secret, and I must new ask myself.. where do you go when you realize your life didn't happen?
When the walls come crashing to he floor. I know my teachers would say run to God, but how does one run to a being not physically in their world? How does one  surrender to he that cannot be seen?
This I do not know.
But faith as I am told is to believe even though there is no tangible evidence, and evidence in my experience is not so objective as it is, so evidence without imperacle process is even less so.  But my heart and soul and mind can't be manipulated like that, not that well, and that concurrently not that perfectly, so thee must be truth there.. truth even though truth cannot be seen so scientifically.  I have resolved that as I had not lived until so recently it serves to ask had I ever been saved from myself? If no, then what have I been doing? Could that exain it?
What had he done that I must account for? Is there grace for me?
Is there mercy for me?
Is there love for me?
Has he even met me?
These are the cries of a newly realized heart, cries from the darker side of light.

When Truth defies Logic

So, one day I'm sitting at Church (cliche I know), and I had been worrying about what on earth I was going to do with my life.  Work was seemingly not an option, school had become a non-reality, and life just seemed to be spiraling out of control.  Then (yes chliche, no fire or visions I promise) an Idea kind of just popped into my head. The Honor Academy.
Five years ago, back in my days as an Angel (metaphorical, so no, I'm not insane, just used to be really really saint-like), I attended a Youth Conference, Acquire the Fire.  This was the catalyst that really sparked my passion for youth, for the hurting, for God.  I worshiped there, like never before, and from there I ended up launching into a radical Christianity that infected every part of my life.  I was so not you're Sunday-Wednesday christian (little c).  God was everything.  While I was there, I took the opportunity to listen to a speaker discuss the Honor Academy, and from that moment, I've dreamed of going.  Now, for one reason or another, it just wasn't possible.  No money, or a job, or a girl friend, it just wasn't happening.  I went to work at Camp Shamineau, and that fire just grew hotter.  Until one very wonderful day (note the sarcasm) when my whole life just crashed.. and then life seems to want to see just how far down it can crash.  So like I said, I'm sitting at Upper Room,   and the idea just kind of pops into my head, so, I hop on my phone and fill out the application (not really expecting much).  In the weeks that follow I just can't seem to shake this idea.  Honor Academy... phone calls, scrounging up the initial fees, more phone calls, conversations, and interviews,  and the idea just keeps getting more rooted in my mind.  Then came the excruciating wait-week.  Waiting... just waiting to hear back, to find out if I am going to be able to go.. very painful.
It was crazy, I officially left the era of teenagedness on Tuesday the 5th of July, reaching my second decade of life (scary thought), and it was Tuesday, at 3:25pm that I got the phone call... I was accepted.
Now, I don't express a lot of emotion usually, and I'm almost never overcome by it, but I was having a tough time breathing hearing that news, I was basically in shock.
However, it seemed that my fees were not all paid. Now there was this $200 Housing deposit that needed to be paid within the first two weeks.  Scary thought for a poor ex-college kid (really college drop-out *Cringes!*) with no job, but I had to believe that if this is in fact where God wanted me this year, then He's on tap for making it happen, cuz I certainly can't.  I had no clue where I was getting this 200 bucks from, and yet another crazy moment happened... I got a check from a friend (for my birthday ): ) The check was for the whole 200!
God made it clear in my head that this is happening... and He has continued to amaze me since then.

Now for those of you who know me, you know how (obnoxiously) logical I am, you know I don't accept ANYTHING blindly, so the fact that I am a Christian probably screws with some of your heads, but I know that this God cannot be a placebo, too many coincidences and ridiculous things have happened in my life from how I am still alive, to how on earth this is a reality, theres just no way chance can make it happen its a statistical improbability bordering on impossibility.

God is moving, and I, being as screwed up and fallen as I am, should be the first to say, no fable can do what has happened in my life and no law of physics can account for it, no psychological theory, or philosophical postulation can encompass my experience, and for that I bow to truth above comfortability, and I am grateful that I have had the chance to see it happen.

Anyway, that's been my life these last months, I hope this meant something to those of you who took the time to read it all... God bless.

At the Stoplight of life

I know its been a while since I said anything at all, and I would wander to the notion that I have yet to say anything of lasting value yet.. so allow me a moment to change that.

A variety of things have happened since my last post, namely moving home, finding a brand new church, and re-establishing my faith.  To the few who read this having actually met me, they may be surprised to know I have been a terrible example of Christ in their lives as of late.  So to support that, and perhaps open the door to fix it, I'll tell you the story of what these last weeks have amounted to.

Roughly two and a half weeks ago, my friend invited me to her church, its The Crossing in Elk River.  So I went.   I was struck by the Christ-like attitude of everyone I met there, I was blown away by the worship and how much I could feel that the people here were not just singing, not like at other churches at least.  I was further astonished by the message, the speaker was talking on the story of Ruth, I know it well, and her style was not new, nor was her message, however; I can tell you God moved there.  I talked with my friend for something like six hours after that.. and I realized I had come to a crossroads, to either accept or (continue to) deny that God chooses to love me.

Understand, I have grown up in the church.  I sang the song "Jesus Loves Me" ad-nauseum.. and I have read, re-read, and memorized John 3:16 to the point of callus. I have heard more times than I could count "Jesus love you" "God loves you" or "Grace abounds."  But I am too well versed in the nature of the Church to have said "God cannot love me" so much as "he shouldn't love me"  which I still believe, and no honest believer would disagree.  However much I know he does, did, and will, I'm afraid to let him, because then maybe I won't be tortured anymore, my punishment will end, and I don't believe that is okay.  So I rejected it for so long.

I prayed, really, for the first time in a while, and I was honest, I said "I'm not ready for what that means, but I'll give it a go anyway."  For the first time in three years, I felt okay.  Life seemed to have healed some, at least enough that I could assume I was finally going to wake from this coma and thrive again.  Little did I know that I was far from that point.  a couple of days later I ended up finally moving back home, which is a bitter sweet thing.  I went back to the Crossing this last Saturday, and oddly enough (again) the message was perfectly applicable in my life.  Conflict. the verse that they centered on was Micah 6:8

^"He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"

Do Justice:  in my life right now I need to do what is right, even if it hurts, even if it means I am embarrassed, or consequently lose the fight.. or feel like I have forfeited something to my opponent.
Love Kindness:  Leave the harsh words behind me, leave the snapping back at the door, my arrogance, and selfish-motives have no right to impose on my actions.
Walk Humbly with my God:  What am I?  We so often get it in our heads that we can somehow demand an audience with the God we worship.  Why? We are nothing! We drown in merely three inches of water (not even enough to bathe in.  Wind, which literally nothing! pushes us over, and tears up earth killing two people in MN! Not to mention micro-scopic little bugs (supposedly lower [lowest] evolved organisms) kill us.. and debilitate us!  With what authority can such pathetic excuses for organisms are we that we can demand a response or complain about the choices of a God who designed it all?

We cannot.

This is hard for me.
To first let him love, and second let myself be inferior.
To shut up.
To sit down.
To back away, because I will make it worse the harder I try.

I'm learning how to let him love, its hard, it hurts, but I'm sure if clay could talk... it would laugh at me for how little I have to deal with compared to being torn, mashed, and incinerated before its ready to do its job... and that right there... that makes it worth a try.

I am trying to learn how to be loved again, to find the balance between becoming who I was made to be, and not becoming so consumed by the dreams that I forget how insignificant I am.
To not get lost in training for the Olympics that I ruin my life in the process and forget why I signed up in the first place.

So, I will take this moment, and apologize to my friends who may read this, for my pathetic excuse for my faith, and I will promise that while I cannot promise to be good at it, I will try to be a better ambassador of Christ than I have, and maybe then, truth can win out over my pride and God moves.

God bless.