maranatha

post #333...

half way to anti-christ...

irony...my new best friend...

i'm in a pretty weird place right now. i haven't posted as regularly as i used to, 'cause i'm not really sure if my words would do justice to the experiences. i'm game to give it a shot now, if you feel like reading along.

daily i trip along the hallways of my new church. funny thing is, is that it doesn't look like any of my old churches of which i've always been a very dedicated & vibrant part of, nor does it look like any other church that i've had the pleasure of reading or hearing about & thinking how cool, hip &/or relevant it appeared. this new place is amazing & decrepit all @ once.

the pews are spacious, w/room enough to assume the fetal position, which isn't all that uncommon for the parishioners here. they are the wildly untamed, w/a passion that burns w/such fervency that it often seems to totally consume. you'll find the salt of the earth here & the light as well if you linger long enough.

all are rough around the edges here, yet are as real as any you'll find. genuiness is the golden standard here & anything else is simply not acceptable. pretenses as well as all other barriers come tumbling down as realness leads to rightness, cause all have come to realize that those things only act to encapsulate us in cells of solitary confinement of which we were never intended for.

i make my way down the aisle, allowing my palm to bounce off the pew tops when i stop to talk to an old friend. he knows me better than most & has come for solace rather than the advice that he claims to be seeking. i humor his story & this game of posturing that we play instead of getting right down to the heart of the matter.

'i'm thinkin' of buyin' a strip club...'

i'm thinkin', do i really need to respond here...? i hold my words as well as my judgment for the time being as the tale unfolds. i give him space to realize the answer that he seeks doesn't come from me, but becomes readily recognizable from somewhere w/in his own being.

'i don't think that i need to pray about this...'

why not i respond...shouldn't we pray about everything? in my attempts to be coy, i think that i gave my friend the answer that he knew, but wasn't looking for. or maybe the answer was seeking him out all the while & it was only a matter of time before it found him.

very frank discussion not only takes place here...it's encouraged as necessity. it takes some hammerin' to crumble traditional myth & folks here aren't shy of the anvil. we're all beautifully broken here, wonderfully wounded often @ the expense of our own hands wielded in ignorance.

scars aren't anything to be ashamed of. in fact, the sharing of them often provides inclusion's fertile ground from which tales of redemption & healing blossom. when in bloom, the aroma here is unreal.

i've never known w/more certainty the realities that await in the unseen. i've never made a more cognizant effort to enjoy the now & anticipate forever. temporal has never been more diminished by current perspective.

i'm constantly finding myself in places & situations that certainly would be maranatha to my old church going ideology. this new church is ever expanding & gaining ground in my life in ways that i'm not sure i can completely explain. the wonder of it all is that i don't have to.