Letter of an Illiterate Pt. 1

Hey dad, it's me Isaac. I just wanted to say hi and tell you about how things are going. I really really to miss you. Its hard to be here without you. Could you hurry up and come pick me up? I know you said it might be a long time but it's already been more than a year. I only have one more year before I'm a teenager so you better come get me before I get too old! I know that you want to work on my room and make it big enough for me and my sister and mom.

Is mom doing ok? She looked really sad last time I saw her when they took me and my sister. You are good at cheering her up though. I remember you cheering her up a lot when I was a little kid. I bet she is helping you a lot making our rooms look nice. She likes decorating rooms and cleaning stuff. Tell her I love her and that I miss her!

Have you picked up  my sister yet? I don't think you ever told us if you were going to pick up me or my sister first. If you haven't picked her up yet then have you checked on her? It's going to be her sixth birthday in a few days and I wanted to go see her. The guys told me that she was going to become a princess and that she would live in a palace, that wasn't even in Africa, with the other princesses. It would have been cool to go with her and become a prince but the guys told me that they only wanted girls now. And that the boys are supposed to be soldiers. They said I wouldn't like being in the palace.

I don't like being a soldier at all. I had to kill someone yesterday and I hated it! He didn't even have a gun or anything we already captured him. My friends tell me that killing people is ok and that I'll like it better when I'm older. The guys all clapped when I did it but I felt horrible. I didn't cry though. The other soldiers said that crying and hugs and stuff is just for the girls and that real African men don't cry or give hugs. But I remember one time when you visited us when I was really little and you gave me a hug. I told mom you visited but she didn't believe me. I told my friends that are as old as me in the army about when you visited and they laughed at me. Some of them said I was making it up and some of the others said that they heard you were killed! I know that's not true. You could never ever die. I told them you are the best soldier ever and they said you weren't in the army so if you are a warrior then you must be a bad guy. I told them that wasn't true either and they laughed at me.

Do you kill people? I've heard stories that you used to before I was born, but I don't think that those stories are true. You're too nice to kill people. Maybe you only kill bad people and you don't hurt them or anything like the guys here do. They are really mean to the bad guys sometimes.

Anyway, I miss you a whole lot and can't wait till you get done building my room and you come get me and my sister, so we can all live together and not have to fight anyone.

In Jesus name,

Amen.

Irrational Violence

For those who don't know what I think about the subject, child abuse is absolutely the most repulsive, evil, torture worthy thing one could ever do. Please recall that torture I see as only slightly less an evil though not worthy of itself. So to say that child abuse is torture worthy certainly makes it an abomination. It is a collection of sins cast with Satan himself out of heaven. It is violent, hateful, dehumanizing, painful, unjust, selfish, sadistic, and cruel.

Of this thing which evokes so much emotion in me I have written a poem to reveal even deeper the crimes of this tangle of sins.

Irrational Violence

Dry rough walls hold him from escape.
His crime’s a repulsive thing to the world.
With this crime—after’s too late.
His righteous anger suddenly unfurled,

When thirty years earlier father beat child.
The wretched man held back her arm
and twisted tight. His fists went wild
in his vile mission to cause her harm.

This man had been taught the right to hurt
 his daughter when she had done wrong.
He had caught her in the act, she’s a flirt.
He had seen her dance to stripper’s song.

Now she screamed for pain to stop

afflicting her flesh. Her father ignores
her begs for mercy and bloody tears drop.
”She will not evade my sting,” He swore.

But this abuser is not our prisoner;
the man in the cage is her brother.
He heard her scream, as quiet listener;
her cries their dad began to smother.

When the door opened he saw the blood
running down his sister’s face.
In his eyes justice was mud,
he ran to and opened a sharp knife’s case.

He fought back his father to save
his sister. And after the struggle
his father’s eyes afraid as the grave.
His father’s body reduced to rubble.

Now he is punished for his good deed.
His sister’s still beaten by father and wife.
Each time she slips she is forced to bleed;
 that’s what she’ll know all her life.

Those who act are punished in disgust.
But still they act. For they know they must.

I believe enough has been said.

Silence-Fear-Heroes (Dying in Dreams)

Months and months pass and fade. Each one setting the path for the time of the future. Days beget days, hours beget hours, seconds beget seconds. Each month passes away in silence slowly not even knowing that a month shall come after it. Men strive to last and survive but why should they? Time does not, it knows its horrific death awaits it as soon as it comes into being.

"This is the way the world ends; not with a bang, but a whimper." - T. S. Eliot

Time, existence, even thoughts pass away silently.
How am I expected to continue on in life if I know my life shall pass away unremembered? With no one to admonish the unbearable silence. What courage am I meant to portray if all that will remain of me is an empty shell of a man? I, like the earth and even the universe, shall pass away in only a shadow of memory which shall then fade into the forgotten.

"We have nothing to fear but fear itself." - Franklin D. Roosevelt

Time itself, the unstoppable force of nature and actuality, shall die just as it begins to live. Though, man can see the fear of death. Animals, Gods blessed creatures, attempt to live for the sake of survival. How good it would be to live for the sake of living. To walk to water for the sake of taking a drink. To study for the sake of gaining knowledge. To kill for the sake of avoiding Death's underling.

Humanity cannot ever exist in such a way. We know the fear that haunts us. Our minds, fashioned akin to that of the Lord in heaven, have the capacity for thought. Not only thought but thoughts capable of forcing us to feel that which we have never felt, even which we could never feel.
The fear stricken imagination of humanity may feel in vile nightmares; the fires of the sun, the ice of the darkness between universes, the teeth of demonic creatures in the night, strike of the earth after falling an immeasurable distance, the silence, pain, hate, and fear of inevitable death sliding over your soul...

Humanity has said that our dreams cannot show us what we have not already experienced. Humanity, to protect its mind from a premature fate--a fate that some suffered even last night--has said to experience death in a dream means the death of the dreamer. To impact the earth means physical passing. How then can we feel the loss of a loved one when we have never lost love? How can we feel fire without being burned? How can we feel the teeth of a creature that has never existed? How can some--myself included--truly know and experience the feeling of death and yet live?

"To die must be an awfully big adventure." - Peter Pan

The wretched feeling of death in the most black of dreams and waking thoughts; in essence a few moments of hell itself, is the fear of the end, the fear of perfectly dark silence. It is the undefeated enemy of all reality. None could ever defeat such a wicked, cunning, malevolent, violent, destructive, and all-powerful enemy. Yet there are Heroes.
There are not always Heroes. Wickedness triumphs commonly and even customarily. Yet in this rare instance of anti-perfect evil there are those whom shall face the evil of absolute end with courage despite the inability to combat it. They shall feel the sickness of life-absence infecting their bodies and their souls. They will gladly experience the moment of pain that lasts a moment and in it an eternity.
These Heroes who find themselves cursed to live through death throughout their lives in an endless fight against this reigning foe will die. This foe who has laughed at their squirms and mocked their feeble attempts to avoid true silence has dragged his wicked talons tortuously across their mind every night that their mind allows him to enter. These Heroes shall look towards their life-long despair and they shall die. They shall glare with a grin as equally wicked as their tormentor and they will scream into the silence, "You are defeated! I shall not die!"'

"I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of YAHWEH." - King David

What must we do?

“On the one hand there is the enormous growth of the Church, and on the other its almost complete lack of influence.” This statement rang loudly true when I read it. The inability to persuade and even minutely control the populace is largely evident.
As Christians we are commanded to work and toil for Christ, and as Noll says that modern Christian pursuit of knowledge has become an “anti-intellectual desire to play the fool for Christ”.
Translating all of this and filling in the holes with modern activities and you get this scenario: A missionary comes to a church and the members become “On fire for Christ” and send out three missionaries. The entire rest of the church does nothing other than attend church and pay tithes. Sure, they attempt to be lights in their mediocre lives but they do not suffer for Christ, they make no change, they wield no true influence. Let us say a member of the church attends a college and hopes to be a physicist, those who find out would say something like,

“Ah! So you want to fight for Creationism!”
“Well, no. Not exactly. I want to study sub-atomic particles.”
“But what are you going to use that for as a Christian?”
“I am going to study and better understand God’s creation.”
“But we are supposed to give everything for Christ! Do exactly as He commands.”
“And God has gifted me in an understanding of the sub-atomic universe. You have told me on countless occasions that you feel God has gifted you in working with children, why don’t you start a youth group or something?”
“Because, our church already has a youth group and besides I pay tithes and talk about Christ at work.”
“Well at the least I am using God’s gift to me.”

Highly intellectual ideas have come under heavy attack by Christian society. This has caused a noticeable fall of the effect that Christians have on society. Thus highly intellectuals consider most Christians foolish. Most if not all highly renowned physicists are anti-Christian. The reason for this? In fact, a certain writer has said about Albert Einstein, “He … looked at what the preachers said about God and felt theat they were blaspheming. He had seen much more majesty than they had ever imagined, and they were just not talking about the real thing.”

No Christian would disagree that Christians must spread the gospel. But, few will sacrifice their own security for His sake. This is evident in the lack of Christians excelling in things other than Theology. If they truly were giving all that they have into their gifts for the sake of Christ, Christians would be at the top of every level of intellectual learning.
That or there truly are no smart Christians.

Do Christians need to give everything for Christ?
Is it possible to make a change in the world for Christ without an amount of influence?
Is a little enough?

"No I want to be Ehud!!"

Something that is intrinsically good is something that is good in its own right. It does not have a definition as to why it was good, it is simply good.

Silence

Fellowship

Worship

Love

Creating something completely new

Darkness

Motion

Art

Persuasion of individuals

The mind

Combat

Justice specifically the process of executing it justice

Playing especially socio-dramatic (Your challenge is accepted….)

Laughing

Imagining entire worlds

Prayer

Discovery

Reading

Heroes with fatal traits, that are hated by some and loved by others

Adaption

This summer at New Life Ranch, I told the story of Ehud to my campers as a bed time story. It’s one of my favorite Bible stories, so I know a lot about it that isn’t in the Bible. Such as culture, the significance of left hand, inflections, and so on. So I got pretty eccentric and excited with it, and I was rather disappointed when they didn’t seem to notice or talk about it in the final moments of the night. I had no idea, however, that they whispered to each other till after midnight about it. The next day they loudly and excitedly announced to me that they loved this story and wanted to hear more or play an “Ehud game”. They didn’t understand socio-dramatic playing—playing pretend, roleplaying, make-believe—so during free time we got our group together, bundled a bunch of sword-sized-shaped sticks together, and went to the trail. I found a rock and gave the speech Ehud gave to the people of Israel, and then I raised my sword towards the trees and bushes and yelled charge…
We fought the Philistine army—foliage—for hours.

Think of something that is intrinsically good,but that you don’t usually do, or that you have not done in a while. Why haven’t you done it? If it is intrinsically good, shouldn’t it be compulsory to do it?
Can something that is intrinsically good, be an unacceptable activity?
If so, how could this come to be?

(Finally a post...)

The Synesthesic Miss Memorable

Dear Miss Memorable, I just thought I would let you know how things are going here. Everyone remembers you well; they all consider you a very successful person. In fact many of those that knows you dream of being as an accomplished student as you are. The memories you have left here have made a very large impact, from leading that youth group, to deciding to leave our church because your dad was a pastor and you wanted a dad for a dad not a pastor for a dad. Though the decision that has made the biggest impact was your decision to go to England to study art. We miss you! I keep remembering those good ol’ days when we worked together to teach those kids. The kids ask to play some of the games you mad up every single week, and they still sing those ridiculous songs you taught us! Your creativity was obviously excellent; I guess that’s a good thing since you want to be an art professor someday.
I think maybe the reason you have such a legacy back here in Lincoln Arkansas is just how many people you got to know and be friends with, but even those that barely know you remember something. It could be how crazy and quirky you are, or it might simply be that you’re love of God is blazingly obvious. Things at New Life Ranch are going well, lots of new kids this year. When one of the  older kids found out I knew you she later brought five of her friends to me because they all wanted to write you letters.
Apparently they remembered you teaching their cabin about King Saul when God told him to kill everything in a land that they were about to conquer. But Saul decided to keep some of the animals to make sacrifices to God later. Even though he knew Gods will, he thought he could do God a favor. It was touching to see how much it had affected their lives in the past few years. They really understand that working for God is nothing compared to being in a relationship for God, even if you have good intentions. “God isn’t impressed by great works done in even the slightest disobedience.” They quoted you.
Well, I’ll tell everyone that you said Hi, because everyone here says Hi to you!
From Joshua.

If we are supposed to do what God wants which is always to do good, then how are we supposed to know what good is from God and what “good works for God” should we disregard?

To follow up the previous question, what if we don’t hear Gods voice in our lives?

Life's Rough Draft

According to Miller, ambition is your drive to continue your story. It makes us desire to find something or to win something. Our story cannot be a good one without it. Our ambitions define us, or perhaps we define our ambitions. No matter which of these is true, it is undeniable that we all desire to have a better story, especially after a taste of a good story in our lives.
Like most teenagers, I wanted a cool job. Maybe I would be a soldier, a professional hunter, or even a martial artist, something that would be exciting and fun. I eventually aspired to be a writer and a teacher of writing. Now I get to create the martial artist, the expert hunter, and the valiant soldier; I am still driven to search intently for new worlds and personalities.
My search for story could be quite literal. My story is made up hundreds of other pre-made stories. I could never forget the feelings of revelation in me when I read the few final chapters of Thr3e by Ted Dekker, or when my sister and I discovered we could go into the nearby woods to play.  My story will always be changed by the mind blowing effects of The Matrix, as well as the mind blowing effect of learning we were going to be moving.
The changes that have happened in me are permanent, but they too might be changing in their own way. My story so far has been a rough draft, always changing and leading up to now. I still love the kind of hero who is unstoppable, but now I prefer him to be unstoppable only with his great allies. I still crave noble adventures played out by noble men, but I want the hero to be flawed. I want action and precise deadly skills, but they don’t have to be deadly specifically to bad guys.
My story is changing, and I personally am changing.