A Rant

I’m pissed. Yeah I said “Pissed”!

A ‘good’ Christian isn’t supposed to cuss. Well, I’m not a ‘good’ Christian. I’ll remind all those voices in my head from the past that even Jesus said there’s no one ‘good’ but GOD. You ‘holier than thou’ Pharisees! I’ve listened to all your crap my whole life and believed it, even contributed to it! It has done nothing good for me or the people around me. Paper/plastic lives, mine and yours. We walk the walk, talk the talk, everything is good in our ’christian world’. No more than topsoil. Algae-like scum on the surface of a pond. Instead of diving deep together in the ocean of life, we have stagnated on the small surface of our own personal little ponds, all the while thinking so much of ourselves. What fools we have been! Continuing on in this fallacy!

Oh how I have tried to do ‘right’. Think ‘right’. Be ‘right’. I can’t. The Bible says so. I know it. I’ve probably always ‘known’ it. But I could never break free of the specter of my past of who I am ‘supposed’ to be. Why haven’t I seen this before? I mean ‘really’ see all this for what it is. I saw glimpses. I can’t deny that. Why didn’t I stop & take the time to see the truth of the matter. For what it really is. I was fooling myself into listening to them, to myself, to Satan’s lies. And not to You. Why didn’t I ask good questions? Break the cycle?

I loved my earthly father. He wasn’t perfect…..I knew that, but he did the best he could. And that was better than most. I have been so blessed to have been born in the family I was born in. But I realized a couple of days ago that I was angry at my dad. Angry at myself. Why didn’t you tell me about at least some of this crap that you knew I would face? You didn’t tell me about the ‘facts of life’. I had to find out in an encyclopedia. I was alone. At age thirteen, you told me to read Proverbs. No interaction. No explanation. No conversation. The main theme I took away from reading that? Stay away from ‘harlots’. Meanwhile at church, I’m hearing how vile & disgusting we are if we didn’t ‘get right with God’. And it wasn’t enough to ‘be at church every time the doors are open’, I was supposed to ‘want to’. A bad attitude was ‘unChristian-like’ or not enough……or maybe, just maybe I wasn’t a Christian at all! “ Don’t you know boy? You can’t serve GOD if you’re sinning!” “Gotta be washed clean!” Then you can. Then everything will be alrighT! “Once you’re saved, you are a new creature, you won’t do all those terrible things you used to do. Heck, you want even want to!” What a bill of goods.

Dad, you were silent. Just like Adam. And I was too much of a prideful coward to ask ‘why’. So I continued the cycle. You grew up following the depression, your dad died when you were six. You didn’t have a strong positive male role model, mentor, or confidant. So the cycle started. Yours was ‘the greatest generation’ and in a lot of ways I agree. But with that came a huge responsibility. You wanted the best for your children, like any generation. But how to give them that and teach them the lessons you learned through the hardships your generation faced? So you did the best you could, but we couldn’t relate to you because we grew up in the midst of the blessings you received for the character your generation showed during all of your hardships. So like the spoiled children we were/are, we acted out. Each mini-generation thinks itself smarter & better than the one before. How arrogant we have become. How self-involved. How foolish.

What’s my excuse? I have none. None of us do. Every generation, every person has their own struggles, hardships, obstacles, challenges & sins to overcome. But we can’t do it alone. We don’t have to. I don’t have to. I know I’m just as guilty as any other man that has lived on this Earth excluding Jesus. I’m no better or worse than anyone else. It's only through Him that I'm alive. Really 'alive'.

You put me on this Earth around 5pm December 3,1966. And it is for Your glory that I am here. Tired. Frustrated. Bedraggled. Burnt-out. Unholy. Still prideful. I’m a poser, a ‘Ragamuffin, and a ‘Samson’. But I’m Yours. My best hopes in this life ironically enough is to be a 'David'. All my past experiences, frustrations, victories, failures, lessons, & time itself has brought me to this point. Right here, right now. Now, what do I do with that? How can I magnify You and not me? How can I bring You glory?

Tell me....

Show me....

Please Lord....