Where spam gets reeeeal big...

My favorite line is the "Viking's Secret."

Why would anyone buy any of this crap (and you know...someone has to be buying it, otherwise you and I wouldn't get these spam messages).
There's a lot there about unfulfilled promises and a twisted picture of what a man (or manhood) should be. But...tonight I'm too tire to talk about it.

Instead, you get a picture of my spam folder.

At home.

I live in a city of over 1.4 million people.

In the metro area, there are almost six million people.

There are some great things about this. There are times where you want anonymity and it can definitely be easy to find.

But other times, you want to be known.

Jason, I think, blogs about this often (or at times, anyways).

Altogether, it has always been so interesting to me to see people I know in this city. I came home from a long trip today and saw two people I go to church with on my way home. Once was walking out of the train station - those sightings are always a little awkward because you know that the person walking in is in much more of a hurry than the person walking out (sometimes, you'll need to wait thirty minutes before the next train comes!). The other was while I was standing in a subway car. He actually came into the same car and we talked for four stops.

Its a great thing to be known. Its a wonderful feeling knowing that in this huge place that so many people call home, there are so many people that you can call friend - that you can see, that value you and that add value to your own life.

For various reasons, I'm happy to be home.

On graffiti

A couple of weeks ago, I was on a train traveling towards Connecticut and took a few photos. They're from my cell, so they definitely not stellar.

It was sort of a rare day - there were clouds and blue skies mixed with light and and a sort of coolness in the air. Apart from today, everything has been pretty dreary weather wise.

I started taking a little more notice of something that is standard fare for urban living: graffiti. I started thinking about the thought processes behind it. I started to think about the alternatives.

There seems to be a stark reaction from some when graffiti is encountered - I think, more often than not, the reaction tends towards fear or disgust. There is a disdain from some for those who would tend towards defacing another's property. Though graffiti is nothing new. When Laura and I traveled to Italy, we noticed that many ancient structures also had ancient graffiti. One of the stark differences between those [structures] and these is artistic intent. There was an architectural artistry endued to much of what was created as opposed to erecting of a short term and functional building [much of what is built in our current world].

Altogether, there's nothing that I saw on my train ride that just blew me away.

The thought came: is it a rebellion against the premise of ownership (that being that ultimate control is maintained from behind the veil of the capability of financing a loan or making payments; i.e. money equated to power and control) or is ita sort of mutated form of artistic function that holds the artists expression above that of the perceived rights of others?

For equality's sake, I've tried to post both in a negative context above.

Personally...I'm starting to like some of it.

I think that the world might seem more oppressive [to me] if everything was a white walled cube made of corregated tin for the sake of meeting the needs of a consumerist culture. Trust me, I don't mean this as a counter-culture rant, but as a reality of the types of things that are built today (because, it is apparently much cheaper to build a Colleseum type structure with slave labor, so we tend more towards the big box establishment making).

There are other thoughts behind this that I might post later - but I'm really wondering what do you think about graffiti and why do you think about it the way that you do? If you respond, I may repost here. I look forward to hearing from some of you on this (though, I already know what some of you think...)

Lord, be good to us...

There is this guy who I gave a ride home to every now and again.

His name is Lamar.

We were talking a few weeks after the Philly’s won. I’m not usually one who is much for sports, but everyone else around me seems to be. The Philly’s, if you don’t know (or don’t remember), won the World Series.

It was their second World Series win… in 125 (yes, one hundred twenty five) years.
Needless to say, most people remember where they were when the Philly’s won…

Lamar remembered where he was.
He had only just left the hospital…
Right after they pulled the plug on his cousin…
He died from a gunshot wound to the back of the head.

It’s a jarring thought, I think. Few within my age range deal with death in any tangible way. Fewer deal with it as a reference to the reality of the violence practiced by one man to another.

I didn’t think that there was much for me to say.
I don’t think that there’s much for me to say.

For the rest of the ride that night we sat; we would talk but the conversation never came back to Lamar’s cousin. Towards the end, I really felt that the impetus was on me to ask what I could be praying for Lamar’s family (including the obvious loss).

“Just pray that life would be good for us.”

I thought about this on my way home and I prayed for Lamar and his family in North Philadelphia. I thought about my own experience with death – about how, beginning with my Aunt when I was in college, every Christmas and Thanksgiving seemed a little less joyous every year. I thought about how fewer and fewer seemed like they were filled with the joy that usually comes with the holidays. It almost seems as if every year has produced some sort of tragedy (friends who have died, my dad dying, other family members who have died…)

But back to what Lamar asked… isn’t it what we all pray in unnecessary and complex ways?

“Father, I beg you, be good.”

Because frankly, sometimes it doesn’t seem like He is being good to us. Sometimes life doesn’t seem like it allows the room or freedom for goodness to happen. Sometimes (and I really have been wrestling with this in different ways), it just doesn’t seem as if God cares.

Intellectually, I acquiesce to the Apostle’s Creed. I pray the Lord’s Prayer with the Church and I mean every petition (I consciously think about what I’m praying every Sunday with people around the world because I don’t want the word’s to be dead to me). When I speak with God, I ask (in words much less specific), “Lord, be good to me and my family.”

No doubt, things have been good for us in a physical sense.

Though, more often than not, I feel like we have everything we would want…except for a listening ear from God.

God…please be good to us. Amen.

A truck bed full of wood...

As you may be aware (from Jotting Ajar), I have a truck bed full of wood. I'm trying to be a little industrious here by making some outdoor furniture - it's coming along okay.

In regard to that, I was out yesterday with a handsaw making legs for an outdoor table I'd like to make. As an aside, standing outside of your truck bed with a saw and some cut tree stumps is a great way to meet neighbors in the city.

Everyone wanted to know what I was doing.
Some even suggested that I use a chainsaw.
My response, "That costs too much."
"But it's only $20 at the Home Depot!"
"I already have a handsaw though." *smile*

That kind of idea is lost in a culture of waste - theres no value in doing something by hand. No value in the care and attention it would take to do something slowly...purposefully. Part of this definitely feeds into our cityscape trash. Part of this definitely feeds into our city's rate of murder (less than last year, still climbing).

Either way, as I'm cutting Raheem (or, Rahim?) our new little from friend from down the street comes bounding up with a jump rope in tow. We met Raheem during our record breaking city wide cleanup a few weeks ago. Raheem helped us clean up the neighborhood and was probably a lot more enthusiastic that we were about it. We wave at him any time we see him and enjoy talking with him when we have the chance. Right now, he's training to beat his mom at jumping rope. He's in the second grade and his favorite subject is math (especially multiplication, division, and addition).

"Why you got all this wood in the back of the truck?"
"Well, someone was giving it away for free, so I just picked it up out of their yard on my way home from work."
"Oh. All this wood would be good for camping."
"Um...yeah, I guess that it would."
"So when we go we can make a big fire out of it."
"Uh...excuse me?"
"You know when we go camping..."

Now, this wasn't said with any presumptuousness. Really, it was said with a sort of innocence that I guess you'd expect from a second grader moving into the third grade. When I told La, she melted...

"So, whatcha doin' March 13th?" asked Raheem.
"What was that date again?"
"March 13th."
"I dunno."
"Well, next week, we're going to a farm!"
"We are?"
"No, we are."
"You mean you?"
"Yeah, me and my family..."

He went on to tell me how excited he was to go and to talk about the things he wanted to see when he went there.

I would like to go camping with Raheem. Maybe that's a little strange. La and I talked about how we could work in a trip with other folk from City Church or something - that way it becomes something that might become more palatable by his grandmother (who he lives with).

As always, this story is probably funnier if you here me telling it. Though, it was definitely worth sharing...

Hope through a valley named "Trouble..."

Lately...I've felt owned by the city.
I don't try to talk about that subject as much, you know?

Sometimes, people say, "It's so cool that you live where you do." While there's some truth to that, it's also so difficult to live where we do (at times). It's so hard to live where we do.

Sometimes, it feels like a lot of trouble.

The other night - really, at this point, about a week ago - Laura and I were sitting and I told her the same thing. We're coming up on our first full year in Philly. During that time, I've literally lost count of how many times my truck has been vandalized or damaged. I've lost count of the number of hours I've spent on the road for work (whether for travel or just commuting). I've lost count of the number of fights Laura and I have gotten in (no doubt, the burden of our city weighs on this). I've lost count of the amount of trash we've picked up off the street (sometimes, even placed in front of our house intentionally).

I've lost count of the fights on the street.
The number of parking tickets we've gotten.
The number of times I've had to contact the gas company due to their immense ineptitude.

Last week - March 25 - things even took a turn for the worse. If you know me, you know how much of an advocate I am for taking public transit. Come to find out, I may be the only one who uses it out of an office of 400. Seems SEPTA (Southeast Pennsylvania Transit Authority) has found out to - which is why they cancelled the route to my office - I now have to walk over a highway that definitely has signs forbidding pedestrian traffic and then 15 minutes at a clip to my office building.

Oh, by the way, I found this out after I sat in the bus for an hour.
Oh, and don't forget, I overslept that morning and missed my Amtrak out to my office's area and had to take a later train.
I left my bike helmet on that same train.
Too, work was really hard that day.

There have been a number of things (personal and public) that have caused me to question whether hope is lately. I don't write this lightly - because without hope, there's not much of a reason to continue forward.

At the end of the day, when I finally made it home (helmetless, cold, angry, etc.) I overheard a conversation down the street.

girl (questioning) - "You're in the fourth grade, right?"
boy (proudly) - "Yeah, but I'm supposed to be in the sixth. You know, they held me back for a while."

The same boy came walking down the street. As I struggled to get my bike into the house, the same boy walked up to me and asked, "Hey, can I ride your bike?"

me (incredulous) - "Where do you want to ride it?"
boy - "Around the corner to my house."
me - "That's a little far."
boy - "How about down the street?"
me - "The bike might be a little big for you."
boy - "It'll be aight."
me (hesitantly) - "Um. ok."

See, this kind of crap doesn't happen. This is the kind of stuff of naivety that leads one to losing their bike and never seeing it again. But...I felt compelled to do it.

So, he rode slowly on the bike, but only after switching it to the lowest (slowest) gear. He rode down one block. Then two. I locked my door - I thought to myself, "I can catch up if I need to - the shoes are okay to run in."

At the end of the 2nd block he turned around and began the work of riding the bike back. As he approached, two older boys rounded the corner.

older boy - "Where'd you get that bike."
boy on my bike - "It's not mine."
older boy - "Then whose is it?"
boy on bike - "My friend's over there."

He was pointing at me.

I was reading through Hosea earlier that morning and thought a lot about the pursuit of the Church by Christ. I thought a lot about how that pursuit of me...as an individual part of a whole...looked.

See, I at the end of the day, I can look at my situation and feel like I've been owned. I can feel like there is no hope. But our feelings, by definition of a reality that has elements of ruin intermingled with the capacity of understanding, can stand erroneously and in contempt of what is.

More often than not, my problem is not that God is destroying me by my environment. More often than not, my problem is that I don't understand my circumstance to be subordinate to the hand of God - to His providence, grace, and mercies.

So when a fellow image bearer, who I've determined to be of ill repute in my own heart - to be of low standing, of little trustworthiness, and disparate motives - embraces me (whether literally or metaphorically), it strikes a cord. I've lent that same understanding to my environment too.

Instead of seeing the boy as an image bearer, I see him as a thief.
Instead of seeing the earth as a means of God's providence, I see it as a prison.

And so what is real is defined by me. I make myself a god. And for that, I deserve to believe that life is hopeless (as, in that context, it is).

Seriously though, thanks be to God - who can show me that through the Valley of Achor (trouble)...there's a door of hope.

Right now...I'm glad to be in this valley, because I know that this valley...this city...isn't the whole of reality. Right now...I know that it something be be engaged - something that I can grow to understand and love, or something that I can fear and hate.

Working through Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount has been a little slower going than first expected. There are the obvious hang ups (the business of life, moving nearly one thousand miles, starting a new job, etc). Then, there’s also the not so obvious hang up of definition (i.e. translating from English back to Greek for a more inclusive understanding of what I’m reading when I read it).

There’s been a lot of good in taking the time for definition, however, as it has reminded me of how I do take words for granted rather than dwelling on their inherent and implicit meanings. In addition, it reminds me of how some words (maybe in their over usage or flippant understandings?) have lost the significance, breadth, and depth on me (i.e., reading over a text and glossing over what it’s really saying all for the sake of “just reading”).

In the very act of translation, we may lose some of the force of what was originally said. Being the case, I will put out the caveat that we are not to mistrust a translation simply because it is a translation. In the vein of Christianity, we can believe that though we may not (at first) understand the intricacies of meanings behind the words we are reading, we can still yet trust that the Holy Spirit is real and that He will enlighten, penetrate, and correct our hearts and misguidance to the end that Christ is made more beautiful in and through our lives.

A little sharing regarding three verses in the Beatitudes (and hopefully, a reprieve from my “How To’s”).

Matthew 5:6 – Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Generally speaking, I would have seen this as “Blessed are those who really desire holiness because God will give them satisfaction.” Honestly, in breaking apart these words I was kind of blown away. Spiros (the main resource I use in my translation as I can’t yet understand or read Greek) gives some great insight. First, “Those who hunger” is altogether one phrase and is more correctly identified as “Those who starve, are famished; to metaphorically hunger for something other than literal food.

As a middle class American, it is hard to understand the impetus that starvation is for action to someone who is starving. The implication is that Christ is not speaking of mere desire, but of a deeply seated and desperate desire (hunger) for righteousness. The implication is that when one is starving for something, there’s not a whole lot that can avert the pains of starvation apart from satisfaction.

So the Holy Spirit reminds me, “You aren’t starving for righteousness, but you should.”

Matthew 5:7 – Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Matthew 5:7 is the only verse that uses this sense of merciful (eleēmōn) to reference believers in the New Testament of the Bible (according to Spiros). It means compassionate, benevolently merciful involving thought and action and is generally relegated in speaking of God’s mercy to us. As such, mercy is much more than giving a sandwich to the homeless person who asks you for extra change. Mercy, as defined, is a planned and intentional action for the benefit and well being of others when there is a recognized need (i.e. compassion). Therein, it is much more than “I forgive you.”

Matthew 5:12 – Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Jesus tells us that we are blessed when we are persecuted for his sake (see the preceding verse 11). If (or when) we are persecuted for His sake, the translation of verse 12 could be elaborated upon by saying “Joy to you! Be glad in an exuberant and absurd way!”

I don’t think that it is something that I can quite understand, because when I feel wronged I am not prone to turn the other cheek and rest in quiet faith. Instead, my actions will more often dictate that I simply don’t trust that God has a plan for the situations I am placed in and that there is more truth in chaos rather than in a God who has a perfect and exacting plan for my life. In essence, it’s easier to know what the truth is than it is to believe the truth.

Sometimes hope comes with the knowledge that I’m wrong, however.

I can hope in a Christ that speaks the Beatitudes so that I might be drawn to Him and changed through His power rather than a Christ that speaks and says, “Now do this, or else.” The same grace that opens my heart to see this Jesus is the same grace that allows me to accept the broken world around me and to not expect the very thing that it is unable to produce apart from God’s grace: righteousness. When I drive through the streets of my broken city, I can lament with those who are not part of my family in the knowledge that in and of myself, I am lacking too. In the vein of that knowledge, I can also (from the depths of my own iniquity) point to one who is better than us, but who became like us so that we could be better than ourselves.

In short, the Beatitudes remind us that we suck. But they also remind us that there is a God who came to us to save us, that there is a transcendent hope beyond what we consider as tangible, and that there is a completion to be fulfilled by a God who sacrificed Himself and was resurrected to give us real life. They remind us that Jesus is about the building of His kingdom and that we have the privilege and unspeakable joy (rejoicing in persecution…) to be a part of that work.