The Boxing Ring

I have watched and own all of the Rocky movies, except for the new one. I have admired boxing and have always been a fan of it.

However, I wasn't aware of the strength that boxing took until I got into the ring myself. I had been taught how to fight at a very young age from my brother who beat me up and in his spare time taught me how to defend myself.

But street fighting is completley different than boxing. I stepped in the ring at age seventeen.

I had my boxing gloves on and was dapered out in red and gray basket ball shorts and a red tank top. My hair was pulled back and as I stepped into the ring my bangs flowed in my face. This boxing match was to the death, just how it was made to be in the beginning. It was an old fight reinvented into a new style. My opponent was a tall dark figure who didn't have a face but who was and unpredictable fighter. Watching the tapes of his old fights taught me nothing about his style other than that he had developed and crafted, inside and outside fighting. My opponent had a clear control of the fight but could do it as an inside fighter with a fast and close interaction. Though there were times when my opponent would become a brawler and lose all care for the rules just to beat His opponent. He was brutal and had a tendency to kill.

I had not yet really defined my skill yet in the ring and I had not really understand the game until I had my first fight. My style would soon become a combination of all and would be called 'hybrid' boxing. My style changed over time and became more and more defined as something undefined.

The atmosphere was somber and a tension was a familer taste that salavated in my sweat. There was one light in the room and that was a lamp that hung right above the ring. All you could see was the ring and even that was dimmed by the darkness that my opponent brought.

There was no one in His corner. He was completley on His own. I had my friend Joseph who had been with me from the beginning. You could say he was a divine intervention when it came to my fighting. He had the wisdom and intelligence of a seasoned fighter and was willing and ready to help me out in whatever way He could. He also was a dear friend who stuck with me through every up and down. The room was silent and every moment that had brought me to this fight flashed across my eyes. While I knew I probably wouldn't last this fight I had a sudden sense of peace and comfort about it. I knew that I was unequipped and that I was young...probably too young to be in the ring with Him, but my time had come.

The bell finally rang and we started to dance. He started on the inside- jab-jab-cross-jab. I slipped past all of the jabs and blocked against the cross punch. As I defended myself I realized that all of my senses were in hyper sensitive mode so everything I smelled, saw, tasted, and felt was ten times more vibrant.

He was so close I could smell him. He smelled like decaying flesh. Something that was so vile I wanted to cover my nose. When he got close I could see that He did have a face and I realized why you couldn't see it. It was covered by a black vinyl mask that covered everything. He was entangled under His mask. His flesh, if I can even call it that, was mangled and destroyed and His eyes were sunken in and dark.

I had gotten so caught up in his appearance and his smell that I had forgotten to block, and I suddenly felt it. I had gotten hit by a semi-truck at full speed. I stumbled back and fell to the ground while blood sputtered from my nose.

I looked down at my clothes while it poured out...'good thing I wore red today.'

I quickly got to my feet and remained calm. Early in my fighting days I would have been in a rage and let that get to me but I learned how to control my feelings.

We danced around again and as he came in to attack I started brawling. Just going pulling out long punches and long hooks It suprised Him and it seem like he was confused. He backed off but I wouldn't let him out of my sights. Then it happened.

One long punch and He was down. He stayed down there and then slowly got up. It was all just an act though and then suddenly it happened. I don't know if it was me or if He actually grew three more inches both in height and in width.

"Round One!" The announcer who was unseen yelled out and I walked to my corner discouraged and lost in this fight for my life.

The little town beneath my bed?

I often get out of the bed in the middle of the night due to my small and weak bladder. Usually I get up and turn on the light(because I get frightful in the middle of the night of things that bump around). So I turn on the light and get out of bed in a quick fashion, I head across the hall and use the facilities.

This happens quite often. Well this last night I had gotten up around four o'clock in the morning to go to the bano. When I crawled back into bed I heard a strange scraping sound like someone was moving a bed around. I also heard a women sing in an opera voice at a very high pitch.

So I have come to the conclusion that there is a small village living under my bed. A village of many people, and I think that they were having a small get together. I think that the men's voices sound like furniture movie and the women's voices sound very operetic.

They must have been having a great time because they were making quite a commotion. I hope they enjoy living under my bed. I will try and make contact and will blog about it later.

Christmas Shopping

1 pair of spends shorts...Thirty dollars
2 tubes of jelly incinerated beans...2,000 dollars
3 cheesey Christmas movies...56 dollars
4 cranky people that cut you off....10x the stress
5 episodes of the real world while wrapping presents...5,000 brain cells
6 cookies...10 grams of fat
7 extended family hugs...Awkward and fun
8 Christmas strands of lights to put up...Laborious
9 penguins dancing...Mind boggling
10 phone calls...One large phone bill
11 flu shots...And then the flu
12 days until I can give my presents...Anticipation

The Story of Jesus...Priceless...And not mentioned.

"Use your words"

Every time my neice starts to throw a tauntrum or whine about something we always tell her to use her words. Words are valuable and vital and important. Words change lives.

So I'm going to use my words, because maybe if I right it out I will feel better. Or at least I will stop telling everyone 'I'm good.'

I'm having a bad day.

First- I don't understand how a community who holds community up so highly can go along their daily business like nothing has happened. Meetings here, coffee there. Like it just happens all the time. Now granted most of this community doesn't know the old community but there are still some. It's irritating to be in a place that does not grasp the gravity of death, or at least doesn't represent it well.

Second- I'm still in the angry mourning phase. I'm really angry, angry enough to hit someone. The first question to come to mind is Why? After everything has happend and after all the life that he lived why now and why in this way?

I'm trying to use my words but the burning anger won't be captured in the uselessness of them.

Well it has come again and will continue to come and I will get angrier and angrier every time it happens.

In this moment, I'm not good, I'm not happy, I'm angry and a little sad. I know the true sadness will come much later.

But first I am angry.

"Use your words

Sadness has sunk in.

I HATE DEATH>

I still have no capacity for it even though I have expereinced it numerous times.

New Post

The King

I have always been a comic book and super hero junkie. I love learning about superhero's and really delving into their story. A couple of years ago I actually stumbled into a pretty unique story, and found one of the most powerful superhero's ever created.

This story is set in an Ancient city in Mesopotamia. It revolves around a man, named Joshua, who was born to rule. However, he was stripped of his title and his land and he was exiled. He become a lowly servant in the new town he moved to and was never much of a popular character. He was oddly different growing up and stayed close to his family.

He discovered his super powers around the age of twelve, but they didn't come into full capacity until he was about thirty which is when he became a full-fledged superhero. He was very kind and through his great influence created a following. While he was being followed and making an impact through his human side he was also making a large influence and saving people from dire life circumstances through his super human identity. Joshua's psudeo-name became the "King". He traveled all around Mesopotamia and became a house name among the outcasts and also among those in power.

The King could do a plethora of different things with his power. He could heal people, not only through touching them, but by just saying the words. He could control natural elements and could control the weather. He could read minds, and he could predict the future as well as look into your past. He could disappear in a moment and appear somewhere else. He could clone things, as well, through his control of nature. He had a great amount of power. I'm telling you he is one of the greatest super hero's I have ever read about.

With any good superhero story the King had an arch nemisis-actually he had a group of them. Because the King was gaining so much influential power the men who ruled in the towns where the King prasided where getting quite flustered. So they did what only corrupt men in power do, they framed him.

See every Superhero has a weakness. With superman it was kryptonite. With Batman it was poverty. With X-men it was their other mutant brothers and sisters.

Well the King's greatest weakness was the people he came to save. One day, one of the King's followers decided that he was sick of the lifestyle of selflisness and he sold the King out. These powerful men then caught the King and framed him. They put him through different trials just to humiliate him. Most of the King's followers scattered but there were a few who stood around to see if he would use his powers to get out of this scandleous situation.

The King went through every trial and went through every humilation that was presented to him. These powerful men then took the King and brutally murdered him on a hill outside the city called the Skull. Now every super hero finds himself in a dire situation and is on the edge of total destruction. They usally get out of it though.

The King just died. He just gave up.

When I read it I couldn't believe it. This man who was so influential just gave up. This man who had a super side of him didn't even try to escape the death that was so certian.

I soon found out that the King's greatest weakness was also his greatest strength.

A couple days went by and suddenley people started seeing the King. He started appearing to his closest followers and then just appeared to people on the street.

The King told his followers that he could not stay on the earth any longer but he told them that his Spirit would be with them. The King's followers didn't understand him until they started healing people, and until they started saving people as well.

This comic book hero is not fiction. He is real. He lived 2000 years ago and truly had super-human power, but he didn't let that power control him or determine his decisions. He followed God's redemptive plan and was stripped of his power and glory and he died a brutal death because he wanted to save the people that he loved.

He still wants to save us.

I'm living my dream.

The Will of God is/isn't safe....?

"Who said the will of God was ever safe?" E. McManus

"The will of God is the only safe place you will find in the overlap" W. Shaw

"Safe?" said Mr. Beaver. "Don't you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you." Lion the Which and the Wardrobe, Clive Staples Lewis

I have been recently involved in the will of God and these quotes seemed to have pulled some strings throughout my being.

God is not safe, because in our mind saftey is a precaution to danger. We become "safe" because of fear. We fear that we are going to fly out of our sit and through our windshield, so we wear our seatbelt.

We fear that someone is going to break into our house so we put locks on our doors and windows.

We fear that someone is going to rob us blind so we fear our neighbors and friends.

We are called to fear God. Why? Well I have been told two different responses growing up. The first is that God is powerful and can destroy your entire being in less than time itself allows. Since in our minds souls don't die we don't seem to comprehend that God could make a sudden movement and abliterate our souls forever. The western world has commonly thought of Heaven and Hell being the only two options. Well I would have to tend to disagree. God can destroy you in such a fashion that "nothingness" cotians more matter than you.

Second response to fearing God is actually being in Awe of Him because of His power. Which I guess could go along with the first response but I feel the reaction is differnt. When I fear God because I am afraid he is going to do something I react in a worldy human fear, but when I fear God because I understand the power and can see that power being lived out in my life I react in worshipful way. Awe in God literally scares the Hell out of me and allows me to react in a way that glorifies God.

God is not safe. When did the Gospel become tolerant and comforable. "Take up your cross....the dead can bury themselves, a fox has it's hole and a bird it's nest but the son of man has no place to lay his head..." Jesus never said the will of God is safe but he also lived out his life in ultimate and unfailing trust, which adheres to the saftey of God.

The will of God was never intended to be safe but it was always intended to be lived out, that is probably why it is not a safe place to meander about.

Independence Day Going Down in Flames

Most of us are introduced to the concept of Love when we are born and are fed and played with and shown affection. I don’t understand how this love that we are introduced to in the beginning slowly forms and flows through our veins. We hang onto this concept of love because if we don’t we die.

It’s extreme but if you seriously sit down and think about it you will soon realize that a life without love slowly and surely dies. And not only would you die but the culture that we live in would die as well. We are in a culture of wanting to be independent yet we yearn for a love that NO ONE can deny. This idea of independence that we hear from our parents, from our schools and from our relationships, only leads to one thing...death.

You cannot be independent. The reality simply does not exist. Here’s why. You depend on a job to provide you money in which you depend on your boss to give you hours to work. You depend on the sheet that says you have hours and you depend on getting paid every other Friday. You rent a house/apartment. People are depending on you to pay the rent. Any simple transaction is a cause of dependence. You are depending on a good or service to be delivered and they are depending on you for the money of the delivery or service.

Every person in the world is depending on something or someone. If you decide to go out in the wilderness and not commune with one person you still depend on the soil for your fruit. You depend on the wild game around you to provide you the sustenance that you need.

You have no independence in this world whatsoever.

You are incapable of making a small decision by yourself. Let’s say you are going to college. You are influenced by your parents, by your peers, by your belief system. Your background and your moral standing have decided things for you. If you take the argument of not having a moral standing you now depend on the idea that you have no moral standing and that makes your decisions for you.

You have no independence in your thinking.

North America has created an illusion. They have told you that you can make your own decisions. They have lied to you and allowed you to buy into a product. Individualism is a product that America sells quite well. "You don’t need anyone", "Just do it",
The drive to attain independence through a constant self-centered striving is obscenely ironic. As we strive-as we climb that cliched, metaphorical ladder, we rely on the rungs to propel us forward.

Step one, we are reliant on air to fill our lungs and gravity to hold us down.

Step two, we rely on food to grow and the store to sell that food and the government to keep making money so we can buy the food.

Step three, we rely on our parents or someone to care for us and teach us how the world works.

Step four we rely on someone to give us a chance in the world
that we are so apt to become independent from.

Step five we depend on our environments to create where we will go next and what steps we need to take to achieve our ultimate goals.

Step six we find someone or something to take care of our emotional and physical needs and we become inherently attached to him/her or it.

Step seven we work until we are ready or until someone else thinks we are ready to retire and we depend on our pension to provide for us until we die.

Step eight our environment finally destroys our physical being and we reach the end of deteriation.

Step nine we depend on our children, close relatives, close friends, or co-workers to bury us and to honor the short and mundane lives we have lived. Whether it be a slow and corrosive disease, a night time escape, or a tragic ending we all die. All the things we work for are remembered for a while and then they die along with our name.

So what is the answer, and why is love the ribbon that ties everything together?

"Revolution"

"We are throwing rocks at the bride of Crist and calling it a Revolution" B. Mills

This statement seems to continually reign true in my life as I look at what is happening to the church in North America. I have encountered so many books on this spiritual journey from authors that span from Brian McClaren to Donald Miller to Tony Campolo and Shane Claiborne(sorry Kel). While these authors have good things to say I think that they are missing something.

We apparantly are having a revolution in our church in North America. Something is shifting and we think that if we start something brand new than the world will look at Christians in a different way. "They will finally see Christ!"

We tend to think that relationships are the key. If we just show them Christ and have dialouge with them then they will eventually find God. Here me know. The tolerance that we are showing is not acceptable. We are allowing sin into the church in America and it is unaccebtable.

Why are we so afraid to be different? God has called us to be different yet it seems like this is an outlandish thing. If we are different they will know we follow Jesus. SO WHAT?

Why are we throwing around the significance and holiness of God to have such 'experiences.' In the book of Leviticus God's holiness is taken seriously. Sin is taken seriously.

Sin has no power on us! Why are we so ashamed to live free in Christ and proclaim his name wherever we go?

Has this "revolution" taken over the importance of the church? Have we walked away from the problems of the church because it's easier to start something new, rather than trusing God to redeem the problem itself.

Have we lost the Doctrine? Are our opinions replacing the Doctrine of the church?

Have we blurred the "line" between the world and God that we have forgotten who we are?

Have we thrown mud at Christ's bride to feed our own satisfaction?

Have we become cowards in terms of proclaiming the Gospel?

Are we ashame to be called JEsus FrEaks, because that causes people to suggest that we actually follow Jesus and read the Bible?

Are we reading the Bible?

Why are churches using the term Christian no more? Can another name change the world sees us?

Isn't the Gospel supposed to offensive? If it's not than I'm not really living for anything "revolutionary"

I am not at all saying that I am not part of this myself, but I am trying to figure these things out.

Dance

You know the way the dance makes you feel.

The first couple of steps are nervous and akward, but then the movement comes ever so slowly. The music seems to seep through your viens as you move back and forth with your masked partner.

As you once moved on your own, you now move together in a state of utter transcendance. It feels like you were born to be in this state of mind. As the music gets faster the movement gets faster, and the dancing becomes a fantastic blur to the audience in which the dance is being performed for.

But, it is much for than a performance for the dancers. It is breath. In and out. Every step that slides across the floor the breathing gets easier and more melodic. The heart beats to a steady and firm idea, pumping and tracing the music throughout the essence of the dancers.

You know the way that the dance makes you feel.

When the embarrassment of the dance has passed, the faces seem to interact in an intimate way. They seem to lock eyes as they dance across and around the room. They never look down to see if they are in step because it no longer matters.

The dance transforms the two and they walk away from it very differently. The music seems to end and breathing only comes easier when the dance has resumed. Regular life seems asthmatic, and mundane.

The dance is never easy, and is never safe, but it's always good.

Awe

To be in Awe of God, is to have God literally scare the Hell out of you.

Lights

Ever see things and are brought back to a memory from your childhood in a flash.

It happened tonight when I went to Bloomington to see a movie. We were heading back from Bloomington and I started counting the street lights.

I was ten again and coming home from my Grandma's. I was lying on my back in the back seat of our white mini-van. My head was on the plastic siding and had started aching and the forty-five to fifty minute drive seemed like forever at nine at night, especially after a large meal.

My parents didn't like to listen to music, probably because they thought we would fall asleep, I never did. The rumbling of the car and the yellow lines on the road seemed to flow into one as i lied in the back. I pressed my face on the window because the heat in the car was overbearing.

And I started counting the street lights. 1,2,3,4.....34,35,36.....67,68,69.....

They seemed to never end, and we were moving at a speed where it was a competition to see if I could count every single one that I could see. If I lost count I had to start over.

Then another memory came flashing back and I remember the first time I saw Chicago at night on an airplane. Which in all reality isn't as spectacular as it might sound but I will never forget it. Those lights that seemed to never end. I tried to count them but it was nearly impossible.

The flight attendent came over the intercome and stated that we were ten miles out of our destination and we would be coming into the city limits very shortly. I remember first seeing the lights as the clouds seemed to part. Suddenly there was a massive amount of small lights that were only about a centimeter apart, and as we slowly descended the lights seemed to get larger.

Simple and insignificant lights seem to mark every part of my life.

Black and White dinner!

Blake and I dancing, so cute!











Me and the girls before the party!



Twylla and I sharing a moment.

Rob thinking that I'm Oprah?















Hey, I look good in red.


So my floor put together a formal black and white dinner for our brother floor. It was Awesome. It actually ended up being a dance party. It was sooo....much fun. Here are some pics from it. Oh, bye the way I actually wore a red dress, I just felt like it was an appropriate thing to do.

The Father's song, Matt Redman

I have heard so many songs
Listened to a thousand tongs
but there is one that sounds above them all
The Father's song the Father's love
you sung it over me and for
eternity its written on my heart

Heaven's perfect melody
the creators symphony
you are singing over me
the Father's song

Heaven's perfect mystery
the king of love has sent for me
and now your singing over me
the Father's song

I have heard so many songs
Listened to a thousand tongs
but there is one that sounds above them all

The Father's song the FAthers love
You sung it over me and for
eternity its written on my heart

Heaven's perfect melody
The creators symphony
You are singing over me
The Father's song

Heaven's mystery
The king of love has sent for me
Now your singing over me
The Father's song

the Father's song
The Father's love
you sung it over me and for
eternity it's written on my heart.

It's written on my heart
You sing it over me
Father,

The Shadows

I find myself in the shadows. Lurking around like a huntched back creature and wondering wether the light will ever expose itself.

The shadows seem to create discomfort in my sould but not enough to urge me to leave the darkness. I have the option to get out, but I just choose to continue to lurk. My back hurts and my senses are numb. I try to eat but the joy of taste has escaped my mouth. My eyes have been weakened because I know longer see the life behind the living. My hearing has faded, because it has been so long since I have heard the laughter of the healthy.

The buildings just seem to get bigger. They have overtaken the trees that dance. They have overtaken the natural land where we used to grow old and be merry. I lurk in the shadows of these giants.

I have walked and have no where to go so I will just sit. I will sit and wait. Wait for the abnormality of death to come and visit my sitting place. I sit and wait for the something that will save me from the shadows. I wait here for my death because I am a living corpse, walking around. I am a presence among the living but I can not figure out this life out.

I am called to live a life that represents the Life but I seem to walk around like the corpse that ends it all. The giants have swallowed my hope and have taken my "revolution" away. The dance that was once introduced to me has become a tiresome run from the hands that try and pull me down. The secret agenda's and the pull of the empty hole that has swallowed the growth of my trees.

I just want to see, To hear, To taste, To touch, To know, that as I sit here in my shadows that there is a light.