Mythic Reality

Read the post I've linked the title of this blog. It is a nice perspective.

Blain Butler, if there is one regret that I will have of my life it is that I never stopped and told you I appreciated the deliberate exhuberance that you showed when you waved to me as I passed you on the street. I can't do that now. You fell victim of the destroyer, the self-loathing that many of us develop quietly, undetected, as we go through life with a smile on our face and seemingly without a worry in the world. Aww Blaine, if you'd have seen the crowds of tear-stained faces gathering to honor your life you may have valued it for one breath more. Blaine you were everyone's favorite person, knew no enemies, separated yourself from no one, and somehow the lie crept in and lived within you. I don't know how it happens - it is foreign to creation. I don't think it can be found anywhere but in humans.

Lord help me to seize every opportunity to value people as eternal beings created in your image for all time and help me find little ways and big ways to tell them. A grain of sand remains a grain of sand forever. It may be dashed upon a rock and wear against that rock once and forever more lie motionless trapped in a bed of sand for all eternity but it was that once, that single moment in time that brought significance to its existence. How much more for the very image of the creator God? Blaine will not father a nation, he won't save a person from a burning home, deliver a calf, offer a thirsty person a glass of water, pay taxes, write a love letter, or greet me with a firm handshake and a smile - not again in this present darkness. We mourn you Blaine and 17 years are to few for anyone.

See you later.

Meaning

I listened to Richard Daukins (intentionally misspelled) this afternoon on NPR. Its a weakness to imagine that there is meaning to life. Why then does he bother to write books and go on radio? Its meaningless and a waste of his time. I think there is a little truth inside of every lie. Especially after I listened to him speak about the universe as if it is creating itself.

I don't know if I read this or if I heard it or if it just came to me so I'm not claiming it but if a person, most people, are looking for meaning in life then isn't that evidence that it is out there to find? You'd think that all of science and philosophy, the scientists and philosophers among the brightest and bravest, would just stop if we once found that meaning is not there yet we continue to explore the very idea that we explore.

Thank you dear God for this longing that I have in my heart for everything that is you.

Evil

I don't know why he did it but Jesse took his own life last night. He was a gang-banger from Lansing, did 6 years for manslaughter starting at 18 yrs. old. He started following Christ while he was inside. Worked on a roofing crew and did youth ministry when he got out. He was one of my best friend's nephews. He called my friend his mentor. I met him a couple years ago. He was a little guy, engaging but humble. His eyes shown brightly with life. He was one person that could describe freedom.

He lived with two of his brothers. In the past month he'd been withdrawn, coming home from work and retreating to his room to study the bible. Just in the past couple of days he started talking again but only surface stuff, nothing too deep. This morning he's gone, in the physical, reach-out-and-hug sense.

He had so much to offer a world of black and white. His life was every shade of gray.

Oh God hear me. Please do not let this tragic event be swept away without your sweet redemption. I pray you move in power among Jesse's brothers and his parents to move them to a new reality in you.

It got me thinking about sin. Yes it is wrong to take your own life but it is no more wrong than materialism, sloth, or unforgiveness. Oh Jesse my heart grieves for you and your family.