Pursuit in 2013

DSC_0156 In 2013, I would like to pursue more diligently what God is guiding me after as it relates to speaking, performing, and writing. You can help in that pursuit. I have listed a few ways below. Please consider how you would like to help and be involved.

You who have been faithful readers at ragamuffinpc.com are so greatly appreciated; I want you to know that. You are the ones who can help me pursue these next steps next year.

FREE OPTIONS Share Share Share - You may not have any idea how much of a great help it is when you share my posts on your facebook, twitter, blog, or other social media routes you are involved in. If you appreciate something you read, please take a moment to click and share. This helps immensely.

Tell, Tell, Tell - Please tell others about ragamuffinpc.com If you have found encouragement, humor, or anything else here, please tell others about it who might also enjoy what you have found here.

MINIMAL COST OPTION Get the EP - I have created a short spoken word poetry ep with 4 tracks. I started it out at $5, but I removed it and made it 'name your own price'. You can name your price at $0.00 if you wish and get the album for free. This helps me get my work out there. It is only a beginning. I am writing more than I have in the past. I want to move toward a full length, better produced album. Get the ep here.

BESTEST BEST OPTION (MAYBE EVEN FREE TO YOU) Hire or Recommend Me - I would like to begin speaking for groups, retreats, camps, chapels, convocations, churches, or anywhere you will have me in the next year. If you need a speaker for your event, please consider me. My honorarium is very manageable (typically $100/talk + travel, but I can chat if even that is too much). You can find more info at my speaking page.

If you know someone who has a need for a speaker or spoken word poet or emcee, please put in a good word and direct their attention to my speaking page. These are the best helps to me.

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Thank you again for all of your support and continued reading. I will continue to write and produce the words God gives me here at ragamuffinpc.com

Risk, Trust, and one of my all-time favorite movies

eternal-sunshine-of-the-spotless-mind One of my top 5 favorite movies is Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. There are elements of realizing the memories we wish we could eliminate, and how important even those memories are. It shows the parts of our hearts we often overlook as either expected or painful and thus necessary to cover up or forget. The movie really is wonderful, full of great quotes and scenes; like the very first spoken line, “Valentines Day is a day created by greeting card companies to make people feel like crap.” But the very last scene is my favorite. The scene goes like this:

Joel: I can’t see anything that I don’t like about you. Clementine: But you will Joel: Right now I can’t Clementine: But you will. You know, you will think of things. And I’ll get bored with you and feel trapped, because that’s what happens with me. [Joel shrugs] Joel: Okay [Clementine nods…Joel smiles] Clementine: Okay [Clementine cries, but laughs] Clementine: okay Joel: Okay [They both laugh]

I love this scene and what it has to offer to us. It is a great reminder for those of us who are in relationships. We spend so much of our lives trying to run away from people because we are afraid of not liking something about them. We are afraid of getting bored with something they do. We get afraid that they will run away from us. We’re afraid that something will come up that we don’t like, and “then it will be too late.” I love Joel’s response, “Okay.” It signifies the realization that Clementine will probably find something boring about him. He probably will find something he doesn’t like about her later. But okay! If we thought we could wait until a relationship that would be absolutely perfect, without arguments, annoyances, pain, temptations, we will be waiting forever. By saying, “Okay,” Joel opens himself to trust Clementine. Real trust! A trust that says, “Okay! Fine! You will likely do something I don’t like, but I love you and I trust you. Let’s do this.” As if to say, “That’s a risk we gotta take.” Its not even that it was a risk. It was simply an expectation we have to be willing to take. We have to be willing to understand that things like that will happen. We will find something we don’t like, but are we willing to love them and trust that they love us anyway? Okay.

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What do you want me to do

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In Matthew 20, Jesus asks some blind men, "What do you want me to do for you?" Why would Jesus ask them this? I mean one, we know that Jesus is all-knowing. He knows what they need. But two, come on, anybody walking by would know what these men need. They're freaking blind! It is obvious that these men want and need their sight. EVEN I CAN SEE THAT! (see what I did there) Of course a study and reflection of the passage lets us see Jesus want to be asked. He wants to be desired. We can study forever the reasons Jesus would actually ask what these men want him to do. Jesus did that all the time.

The challenge is trying to see myself in this passage. As a disciple, what would I have done? Would I have seen the need? Yes it is blatant and obvious, but would I have really seen the need? I mean really?

I am a Christian who desires to serve, to have compassion and serve, but will I notice the needs around me? I mean they are blatant...just as blatant as two blind men, but I don't serve the needs around me. I don't even serve the blatant needs. Should I be asking, "What is it you want me to do for you?" I don't know. I mean there are blatant obvious needs around me, but OBVIOUSLY I don't see them.

Is it that I do not really see them? I do not have my eyes and ears open to actually see those needs around me. I have to be attentive to the needs around me. They are not always so blatant as a blind man asking for sight (lucky Jesus). Sometimes it is nearly a need for respect and compassion...someone to listen...heck...someone to smile. Am I really so clueless to miss an opportunity to smile for someone who may really need it? Probably!

Now if I miss THAT, how many other chances will I miss? I need to be more attentive. After being attentive I have to be willing to be interrupted. What is the point in being attentive to people's needs around me if I'm not willing to STOP!

I have to open my eyes, my ears, my heart to see and notice the obvious needs around me, and then free myself to be interrupted and STOPPED for those needs around me.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4&w=560&h=315]

Let me love you

There are days when it seems God just wants to love me. There are days when I sit with open Bible and heart, and I wait....and wait... There are days when God does not speak to me in His Word, even when I come faithfully to it. There are days when I will sit and stare at the pages, reading a text without affirmation of any message or lesson. There are days when I will sit silently awaiting God and all I will receive is a challenge to my heart to close my Bible and let God love me.

There are days when I am ready and prepared to discover God in his Word and I am challenged to sit and let God love me. Searching the word of God will not prove necessary every single day. There are days when my heart truly needs to be still and rest in God's love; to sit and pray, "Abba, I belong to you. Please love on me today."

Some days bring my heart to a place where God has a different challenge than I realize coming into it. I cannot depend on the word speaking to me every single day I come to it. If someone desired to know me, they can only ready my journals so many times before they would need to step away from them a little while and let me love them, get to know them, talk with me, get a cup of coffee with me and let me relate to them. There are days when I need to step away from the word and sit with God and allow him to love me...to accept his love.

There are days when my mind has soaked up all the love God is pouring on to me, leaving my heart and soul a little dry. There are days when my heart aches to know the love of God and engaging my mind just will not cut it that day.

Some days God desires to lavish his love upon me. If I would only but receive it. It is on those days I have to really test my faith and abide in Abba's love. Because studying is easy when the words are there to understand and dissect, but my heart and soul operate on another faith which simply allows itself to be loved. There are those days when God desires to pour his love out on my heart, and I need to willingly receive that tender love. Today is just one of those days.

Assault and the Gospel

abuse I read a quote once, which read, "The Church is like a battered woman. The more bruises she has, the more make-up she puts on."

This is very common with those who are abused. In an attempt to protect the abuser, but more detrimentally, in an attempt to hide their obvious need for help, battered women will put on a lot of make-up in order to cover the scars and bruises.

Eventually these battered women start to look fake with all of this make-up. As these women hide things more and more, nobody realizes anything is wrong. Nobody cares about her. Why doesn't anyone care about this woman who is abused and battered? Because nobody realizes she is abused. Nobody can see a need for love, for care, for protection. She becomes fragile but artificial. Nobody takes the time to care for her. She covers her pain, but more importantly, she covers her need.

The church and God's people have become battered women who cover up their hurt, pain and reality with spiritual cosmetics. We all have wounds and pain, but we cover them up and keep anyone and everyone from seeing the reality of ourselves. In so doing, we have come to appear frighteningly fake and artificial. We become people who nobody wants to approach, because we aren't real. We are artificial, have-it-all-together, battered men and women whom deflect people who could be there to come alongside and help us heal the wounds we are inflicted with.

We have neutered the Gospel when we mask ourselves with spiritual cosmetics. We become a sect of people who deny our pain and wounds, and in so doing become people nobody wants to relate to. Humans know pain and relate to those who can come alongside each other in pain to heal. But we cover up our pain and our wounds, we appear naive. Humans do not desire to relate to anyone who is naive to pain.

The Gospel is one of a God who hurts when we hurt, and weeps over our wounds. We verbally believe a Gospel, which claims a belief in a God who created a people who would operate as a body. When a part of the body is wounded, it (the body) begins to heal. That is the body we were created to be...the body the Gospel rings of, but we neuter the Gospel when we cover our wounds. We don't' expose our wounds for the body to heal. We cover it up with make-up and keep anyone from seeing that the pain is real. When we hide ourselves and our wounds, we hide a Gospel we SAY we believe in. We hide a God we SAY we believe in. We also hide the Gospel and God not only from ourselves, but also from the needy around us.

WHY: On Repentance and Forgiveness

But why Acts 2:38: "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins." Why Acts 17:30: "IN the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent." So why repent if God has already forgiven our transgressions, forgotten our sins and thrown them as far as the east is from the west? The answer lies in 2 Corinthians chapter 7. Verses 9-11 read, "yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and LEAVES NO REGRET...see what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, WHAT LONGING, WHAT CONCERN...AT EVERY POINT YOU HAVE PROVED YOURSELVES TO BE INNOCENT IN THIS MATTER."

This passage presents to us how important our repentance...our "Godly sorrow" is. It shows us that repentance "leaves no regret." It proves and assures that our being forgiven was not in void. Our repentance proves that we are not just taking advantage of and milking the grace we are given. It shows our "longing, our concern." Our repentance shows that the relationship is important enough for us to eagerly pursue even through our sorrowful repentance. Only then are we able to be proved innocent "at every point."

FORGIVENESS FORGETS FAULT

BUT

REPENTANCE REPAIRS RELATIONSHIP

Magnify

magnify Have you ever read certain terms in scripture or used certain terms in your Christian speak without knowing what they mean?

Me neither...

Except all the time.

Have you ever had moments when those terms just open up to you in meaning?

'Magnify' is one of those words for me. We are to magnify the Lord, and the Lord shall be magnified. It is one of those words that are vague until you put such a simple understanding to it.

It made so much since when I thought about a magnifying glass and its purpose. Now suddenly, magnifying God makes plenty of sense.

As with a magnifying glass, I would make anything within its focus BIGGER.

Everything else is smaller. God should be and is made so much bigger when he is in focus.

I magnify God when He is made bigger than all my other things...

bigger than my stress bigger than my problems bigger than my deadlines bigger than my deficiencies bigger than my accomplishments bigger than my...