Where is my forgiveness found?  Did I find it that moment when the child looked into my eyes, embarrassed, ashamed offering apology?  Was I born with it, a youngster capable of letting go of each trespass, easily suffering no lasting implication?  Maybe, it was the day she came back and apologized for straying, having learned on the road the importance and rarity of a man who will stand beside you?  Perhaps, it was the day my Father nearly knocked me out or tore my hide so fiercely because of his drunken rage that I knew some were just given to crazy?  All these taught me the meaning of its riches, my forgiveness was found the day that the Lord forgave me for the horrible man I had become because of these unfortunate experiences.  That was the same time I learned about true, unconditional love, that we all talk about but few understand.  He loved me completely at my worst possible moment, forgiving me where I stood with no requirement but my own willingness to admit my circumstance and ask for help.

How then should I approach the world, having seen such fine example?  Should I rage at their misgivings, holding them to account for every misstep, mistake or encroachment?  Shall I harbor resentment when I know they possess neither the understanding nor insight necessary to awareness?  Shall I disbar them from my organization, finding them unworthy of my approval?  Shall I hate them for standing there watching me in desperate straights only seeing what this world has conditioned them to believe?  At what point do I become responsible for my own actions, manicuring my own yard, tending my own accounts, guarding my own children from the dangers that ought be expected?  To what responsibility do I hold my own willingness to forgive those who have offended?  Can I forgive the Clinton’s or must I hold them in contempt, this somehow pronouncing some manner of judgment over their atrocities?  What does it mean for a man to forgive his enemies?  Is this an easy thing?  Perhaps, impossible.  But isn’t that the expectation to which I am accountable?

Forgiveness is the key to contentment.  The grudges I hold, hold me back.  The angers I compartmentalize turn into plots for revenge and fester.  The forgiveness I withhold bars the blessings of God from flowing through me.  I love you and in so doing must forgive what you’ve done.  That doesn’t mean that I must remain in good company with you if you are unrepentant and believe it acceptable to carelessly harm those around you, but you have been forgiven for that is the power of Christ.  The Holy Spirit gives us understanding beyond our mortal perspective, that we might see that a person who today does not see his misery, may by throwing that rock at my back, tomorrow surrender to Christ.  It is an impossible thing to men to forgive enemies, but a normal thing in the Kingdom of God.  They do not know.  I pray that they will know and that they too will be forgiven as I was forgiven on that faithful day of my awakening.  For now I pray that maybe they see God’s Face in the wake of my forgiveness.  That is the greatest thing that I will have ever done.  In Jesus’ Name.

Does it matter that it matters?  Shouldn’t we be removed, isolated, disengaged, uncaring, unresponsive, untouched by those around us, their opinions feelings and moods?  If this is my planet and I am the captain of my ship, who cares naught for the crew, for they just be hired hands.  Acceptable to simply forget the one person who has fallen from the ranks or the two people to whom I owed forgiveness and apology or is there some internal obligation that requires it is consequential, what they think?  Does it have to matter?  Is it possible for each of us to go our own way, blinding and silencing ourselves to the abominations and plights of the world around us?  Is that okay to just live your way and if something pleases or displeases it is collected or discarded based upon that criteria?  How do we view the man who cares about them all?  Just a fool perhaps to be pitied for caring he ought turn casual eye?

This thing hurts, this life.  It hurts to see everyone going through it alone, tired, hungry, cold, disenfranchised with nothing but a sad story of victimization that earns you nothing but a handful of change.  What a predicament when we first become disengaged from humanity.  Not only those who are the outsiders but the insiders themselves, who must develop, accept and project a tapestry of understanding upon the world that they see the haves and have nots and avoid or engage upon that understanding.  Yes, their stories are atrocious, they are difficult to ingest and frankly easy to sidestep, ignore and forget while set about more important things, the things of “my” day.  But isn’t that even more evidence that each meeting is a test of my own perspective?  For if I view them nuisance, then I have made a discerning judgment based upon my need cylinder that places my time, assets and treasure and schedule above those things which God calls precious?

They stink.  Yes, and so do I, it is just that I have fresh water, soap and even a hose if necessary to wash from me the troubles and perspiration of my walk in this world.  I know what it takes to be a pleaser of men, that I might be classified as a Have and find myself acceptable, relevant, passing muster for every occasion.  What if I were to forgo my hygienic rituals for several days or even a week?  Oh, then I risk becoming unpleasing to the masses, avoidable, inconsistent with public norms.  What if I took every homeless person, gave them a shower and a meal at the beginning of each day.  Would they then become relevant or remain expendable to our imaginations?

Each of us was crafted by God.  Some are having a harder time reckoning that fact than perhaps I have experienced, but all are important to Him.  Perhaps the next person I fail to ignore, truly loving them as God intended me, might find in himself the spark to reach perfect understanding.  Will I take the risk?  Will I pay the price of forgetting my own endless appetites for gratification, necessary to taking care of someone else simply out of obedience to a holy and righteous God who first saved me?  I don’t know folks,  I hear so many complaints about homeless people in every city but see so few actually trying to do something about the problem of their disengagement from the body public.  Perhaps no one cares or no one is watching and I will not be held accountable for the sheep I have ignored for my own purposes.  Ah, but I know different.  I serve a God who sees all, accounts for all and will be requiring of me an explanation for what I have done with the assets given me.  Does it matter that it matters?  Well each of us must answer that question from our own hearts.  In Jesus’ Name.

The open accessible book is easy to chastise, critique or pull out in use to demonstrate hypocrisy, disbelief or pride.  It is known and cannot escape the reasoned analysis any who have read its opened pages.  But there is power in transparency, for a man with Jesus written on his heart, on the binding of his autobiography and on his hat is a man who may not be mistaken for anything other than who he really is.  Do we crave that transparency in our lives, our work, play and government?  For that is the only true method of accountability, that men know who you are what you have done and are doing in and out of the public eye.  This book is here for you to read, like it or not you have the authority to choose to like it, ignore or attack.

I don’t want to escape for that attempt is clear indication of lacking contentment in what the Lord has assigned for my life.  I am accountable for my actions, steadfast in my belief and ready to love, not just as a reward for deed or an attempt to gain some pleasure, but because I truly do love you.  Many mistakes I’ve made and continue to ascribe to the columns of my self inscribed history, but these are not the troubled mistakes of a desperate man who would hide them in shame or reason.  These are the mistakes of a man who knows he is forgiven and is called to be holy even as my Maker bids me be like him in holiness.  Yes, I will falter, fail, stumble, mumble and whine, but it is what I do next and the truth that you see in my life that is truly important.  For if I am ambassador of Christ then my actions on the planet before men are the only things that matter to that role.  Therefore look upon me, you will find fault, you will find frailty, yes you will find all these things and more, ignorance, pride, misunderstanding, envy and pride.  What you will not find is a man who either wishes to explain these things away or hide them from your vision.  I am what I am, and that is sufficient, because God sees all, I might as well stay consistent with that understanding.

It is all worth something.  Read the book, love the book, hate the book throw the book, it is all done in choice.  My life is open to viewing and I know and understand all that this means.  Thank you Lord for allowing me to embrace transparency in its truest form.  I love you and praise you with all that I am.  In Jesus’ Name.

Within this heart, certainly just a chemical pump, made for maintenance, regulation, delivery and recovery.  Why then does it matter so when considering those things which reside at the center of our relationship to the universe, to God and each other?  Does the heart have memory?  It appears there are no such capabilities attached to its physiognomy.  Does it have depth, perhaps as a unique, specially crafted device for maintaining the primary plasma?  Why then do we assign to this organ the romantic or credible allegiance to God, Family and Country?

The head thinks yet the heart feels.  Aren’t those both functions of the head?  I mean all electro chemical impulses, memories and response are from the brain, sent through the central nervous system.  Why would these be assigned to the heart for what appears to be the history of mankind?  Because there is something there that is not of logic, not of simple thought or comprehension.  That spot where idea passes some intangible boundary to become belief and then further to increase in to dependence and faith.  We do not look to a man who has character and courage as a man of “head” but a man of “heart”.  Because at the center of our chest resides the core of who we are the blood pumping oxygen regulating, cell energizing mechanism that makes us who we are?  I don’t just simply think therefore I am, my thoughts Matter, therefore I am.

In this moment I resemble my Maker.  Knowing that although it is always important to be a thinking man with ideas, reasoning and wisdom, it is also equally, perhaps of greater importance to be a man of Faith, without which it is impossible to please God.  Father, this thing is complicated and I count my joys that I have been able to face diverse temptations, lusts, angers, envies and fears that patience has been employed which left to do its good work will at some point lead to perfection.  I understand the difficulties of that task that you face with me and I am sorry for the troubles you will inevitably encounter with this nearly impenetrable cranium.  But Lord you have my Heart, that has always been open and I believe it is there that you reside.  For I know you, not idyllically, not ideologically, not conceptually, but know you for the awesome Father God that you have always been, are and will always be.  My Heart tells me it’s true and that is good enough for me.  In Jesus’ Name I thank you for sparing me for whatever purpose it is you have before me.

No confusion in the moment where the Lord and you meet and he says clearly it is not yet your time son.  No hesitation you fight, stick your finger in your wound and run toward battle, knowing if the Lord has left you here then he will certainly preserve you through the storm.  It rages, your head feels like it will rupture from the pressure, but somehow you breathe, take a moment, wipe the sweat and blood from your brow and act.  That is the moment of disambiguation, where you have traveled beyond event horizon and there are no lies, only truth and that truth is that God wants you to survive.

You thought that you couldn’t get any funnier looking, but then you have to laugh and a young Mexican girls runs to her Mother’s skirt in fear having seen your outstanding condition.  Bloodied, battered, scrape, scratched and swollen you must appear a gruesome sight, but you are still alive and that makes only laugh harder when the little girl points to you.  Defenders of life, we are not always pretty, but to see out hearts as God sees you would think again.  How they see you and who you really are may be two different things, only one of which truly matters.

They loved me and many tried their best to care for their Brother.  Though I was beyond reach and communication, I felt their mighty prayers, bidding me stand up and fight.  So I stood and cried out to Jesus, running in his strength for mine had gone, still focusing on the fact that none of these creatures can hurt us as the Word clearly says.  So it was the promise that preserved me.  The firm stand in His righteous promise to cover me, provide for me and protect me.  Sure, He may allow the enemy’s fiery darts to reach my flesh, but that too is for larger purpose, a purpose that may yet be seen, oh but my growth, my faith, my testimony they have been changed by that interaction.  It is never me who fights, I overcome, I depend, I stand in courage knowing that the Lord fights for me and will deliver us from our trials.  I love you Lord and will follow you even to the shadow of the valley of death, if that is where you bid us go.  In Jesus’ Holy Name.

How do I do nothing?  It seems an impossible thing, to stand bye while that monster on the wall marks time as metronome marks the four four of a Gershwin tune.  Nothing!, Really, I am to simply watch while my eye twitches and my hands quiver admonishing my feet for beginning to walk without command.  Oh, this has got to end, this agony, but how can doing nothing be such burden, such trial?  I know people on their couches that crave this thing, this nothing, gazing slumberly at a energized rectangle, hypnotic, filled with pleasures, history and words they would have you remember.  Not for me this nothing, but as the Lord bids, his will be done.

Doing nothing, seems an irony, for one action and the other the lack thereof.  But, it is a psychological nothing to which I am referring, doing nothing meant to bring about a result tailored to my own desires for completion.  Meaning, this nothing is not doing the something that I desperately want to do to evoke the other something that I wish to turn out right.  Letting go is the first step of a control or willfully disobedient man of God, after letting go an prized moment of voluntary surrender, the true toughness begins.  For at this point when God bids us stay in Jerusalem or go to Jerusalem we understand that the something that needs to be done is the something for which he has commanded us WAIT.  What you are telling me that doing nothing and waiting are one in the same.  Yes, I am.

There are so many times that I have embarked on travels ill advised or left situations meant to teach me the next component of my training simply because I could not tolerate the frustration of not being in charge of the whole thing and being incapable of waiting upon God.  Especially in tough circumstance this is vital, as the Lord is the one who delivers and sometimes if we try and save ourselves we will do unnecessary or further damage that need not occur.  The Lord is my shepherd, which means me being the sheep of his flock I go when he says to go and stay when and where he tells me to stay.  Doing nothing ought to be something with which I am entirely comfortable.  The problem is that it isn’t, entirely comfortable that is.  In fact, it still drives me up a wall.  Standing still for an accomplished man, a doer, a people pleaser, a manipulative man with a fixer mentality is tantamount to failure.  And logic would dictate in worldly terms none of us wants to be known failure so doing something, anything, even the imprudent thing is better than failing immeasureably.  The complication and learning is that waiting upon God is the Best thing that can be done as always indicated by the results of that discipline.

So doing nothing it is and learning to unclench my teeth and untwist my toes and take a big long breath is exactly what I am going to do, for the Lord is in charge and He knows best.  In Jesus’ Name I rest and wait for the proper time to act.

Polished wonderlands, avatar bodies of steel and ironed flesh, memories reprogrammed for the purpose of seeing utopia on Mars, or Sweden or perched in pendulum at Hilton’s L4.  It’s okay they’re just forgotten family, no need to pay heed to their apoplectic pleas for nicety and nurture.  This is the drome, the dome the gathering of tremendous accolade and proportion within which you too may compete for the fate of your brethren.  Snapshots of old tomes reflecting the placating coliseum of empire where innocence was lost or burned for the delight of masses craving, more.  We’ve got no need to remember for in the past lay the failed dreams of yesteryear, forgotten, buried deep, non recyclable rubbish.  Hardened maidens designed for battle, resistance and rebellion dissolve all reflection upon the blessings of motherhood and fealty to good man.

I look to the dream for what it does not possess.  It is full of domination by violence, conquest at means that will matter not as time dwindles memory, forgotten norms of innocence nor investment for sake of others and Spirituality not emanating from self.  Certainly I am as my Fathers before, a warrior, basking in my name echoing against the clouds as my fans clamor for glimpses, sweat and treasure.  What need have I for imagination?  It has all been designed before me with naught but for me to part the curtain and take my honored call, bowing for obeisance in the normalcy of nothingness. Food grown, crops harvested, land tended, water cleansed and captured or children reared, these are jobs for those who have no fancy, no acclaim, no worth in the systems of neon and flame.  What matter have I for feelings, especially my own, for all things will be given or taken by blade, torn, severed or shackled for the purposes of pleasure?

The device, oh the grand pixelated master, beckoning never rest for the price of entertainment and service to digital experience.  When will they convert me to signal that I might live in the blessed dream, sucked from sadness of green, rock and ocean to the limitless horizons of ions, photons and flux?  Wearied of interaction with these frail victims of a life with time and tension.  Escape is my pleasure, to worlds without sand but crystals and suns doused in the silken madness of dimension, holes, within worlds within storms, scorched by stars of tourmaline and tarot.  Where we are all gods and none bid us linger, but fly on to be measured by the game.  Resetting for a time to slumbers rest, questing for that moment to be dead to life but alive to venture unknown worlds in silicone splendor and synaptic fulfillment.  Make me again part of the dream, that I might not struggle with identities and ideals and this tawdry thing I am.

The happiness of helplessness.  Couldn’t make it in sports, academics, music, engineering, computers or even gardening.  Lost my way trying to be all things to people just so I might encounter that love of which so many had spoken.  Lured by its romanticism, called longingly by its promised brotherhood, edified by its warm embrace of encouragement and blessed that some day the ship of contentment would be at the dock precisely as I prepared to board.  The dream was a dream that I chased as I thought the dream was more than a dream but the treasures of reality, a reality I sadly misunderstood, chasing after romance, friendship, folly and approval.  The joy of being empty, the joy of not experiencing love is where we are drawn to the only place from which we could ever experience it unconditionally and be finally, hopefully acquainted with the Reality of the Love of God for each of us.

I’ve got nothing in the tank, but all I have to do is wait and the Lord will provide, not only material need but also energy, thought, words, counsel and comfort.  Being poor is no longer a thing from whence I run or plead victim to be removed from its anguish, it is a thankful, humble, faithful spot upon which to reside in the trust of God’s Promise.  If I am meant to be empty, unloved, hungry, cold, tired, naked and alone for a while, then good, for this is the purpose to the Good Glory of God.  Having walked this valley I will be able to truly appreciate my perch when once again sitting at pinnacle’s peak gazing on the victory of the mire I traveled below.

Please don’t misunderstand this is not a thing where I seek self denial or masochistic indulgence for the sake of spiritual perfection through longing and trial.  It is a thing of faith and trust knowing that God sent me to this planet for His purposes, one of them being my preparation by trial and crucible of sorts.  I welcome it for at the end lay true happiness and resounding joy in the victory of endurance and overcoming.  The trials are God’s message of faith in my capacity to reach out to him and be propelled beyond each obstacle to the finish line of realized faith.  I am not saying that I want to be cold, naked, tired, hungry, poor and alone.  Rather I am saying that I see the personal faith opportunity in each of these circumstances, knowing that the God who loves me dearly will deliver me, provide for me and call me once again to the mountain for prayer after I have walked through that horrid valley absent fear, longing and disappointment.  This life is not tragedy but only opportunity to learn and express the faith I’ve found in process.  Life is its own meaning, found in the living of each day to its fullest.  In Jesus Name.

The passions of tribal peoples.  Celebrating with unquenchable joy the exuberance of life. Not measured by things but by the size of their hearts and willingness to come together in reason, faith or season to do for the good of all what must be carried by all to be achieved.  What have we become without allegiance to something greater than our own belly full of dreams and wishes?  I want this and that and can’t wait to get my eyes, hands and aspirations all over the other.  Can I live a life of work that others might live a life of plenty or experience freedom from the efforts of my diplomacy, my persistence my production?

Today we dream.  Some dream of a time gone bye.  Views a simpler past where less complications and complexity gave a man the chance to breathe more slowly.  Putting together the components of a recipe for sovereignty, trying to recreate that which appears slipped away or consumed.  Preparing another batch of that most favored punch, hoping that the substitution of missing ingredients and improper sweetening will somehow taste equally refreshing.  Some dream of a sailboat dashed upon the rocks of new landing.  Leaving everything behind, sinking to the bottom to be buried for antiquity as memory, bad or fond, matters not for the newness of things will bring forgiveness, forgetfulness and investment.  They hunger for that new place but neither have direction, ownership or security of knowledge. So it remains simply dream.  Others hope to gather together the frail, windblown patches of today’s tapestry.  Holding their fists in passionate discussion claiming all will be lost without coalescence of thought, a thought that has already dissipated for lack of nurture and maintenance. But still they pound the desk, unwilling to do what it would take to heal the division and too afraid to admit the consuming maw of change.  What are we to do with these options few?

To me, I yearn not for the past as it is a thing to be remembered, in pain or pleasure it is history for the reasons of its failure.  I quest not for contentment in a world that sees no joy in the simple things of righteousness, togetherness and surrender to the concept of mutual determination.  I will not cry peace in a world that has no understanding of its machinery.  Nor will I look to new fresh lands for the frontier here exists no longer.  No where left in order to escape, perhaps Mars, or moon or interdimensional travel will remain the cry of those who would see our past submerged.  Free to perpetuate the same folly on new shores, new floors and doorways to distant lands.  No this future is not mine.  For I dream of true peace, the only peace brought about by the Creator of this and every land.  Life made anew without this sin and death and dying found currently in our crucible of preparation.  I seek the new land, the new life, life everlasting with God before me that I might know the answers to all my present yearning and curiosity.  This is where I will make my stand, not for a past that has gone, not for a people who serve themselves and have no desire to come together for mutual understanding, nor for escape to lands distant or moons of Saturn.  I wait and prepare for the return of Christ, loving you and working to endure the trials of this the era in which we find ourselves, forgiven.  If I dream it is of answered prayer for a good life for you and I, together hand in hand full of the Lord’s Joy in preparation and working for the harvest of God.  In this I find the peace necessary to withstand the fire and rain without complaint.  In God rests my trust.  In Jesus’ Holy Name.

When you’ve got so much love in your heart that you are filled to overflowing and you’ve got no spouse, kids or kin with whom to share that excess what do you do with it?  Well you become a pastor or online speaker, so that love might be spread among as many people as it may, edifying them, encouraging them, calling them to the source that brought you to overflowing.  I am here to give you the love he gave me.  You are the designated recipients of that powerful love, energy and care.  Of course, with love once a giver has determined to offer love it must be understood that the recipient may decline to accept that love, in which case I am going to love you in secret, praying for you. smiling at the mention of your name and sending waves of kindness and care your direction.

Will you help me with this problem, an overabundance of love that seeps from my pores, flows from my fingers in word and has given me a heart too big for one man to carry?  Will you see the gift of grace waiting in reserve with your name upon it and come to Christ that he might fill you up with love, giving you in turn my dilemma?  You may think it odd a man filled with love, even for his enemies to the point where he looks past their sin, illness, oddity or hate to the root of his calling, that they might be healed of it all and be set free by God’s Hand of Mercy.  I don’t know much. In fact. I am constantly reminded of my inadequacies by and enemy and my own self loathing that I am insufficient to this task and that I should immediately quit.  But you see that spurs me on, because of the simple fact that if there is an enemy taking so much time and effort to tell me these things in order to effect my palsy, then what I am doing must be so important, more important then my own feelings or true inadequacies.  What I am doing is the greatest thing any of us can do in life, give love to those who need it freely.

I am no fine example of manhood, talent, style, etiquette or purpose.  What I am is a conduit, a cup, a vessel, vehicle and voluntarily disciple of God to deliver His message of love to a world that without it would die in hopelessness.  We need God.  He Loves us.  He sent me to tell you that.  Simple.  I give what I have been given freely.  Freely I go before God and thank Him for whatever His reasoning for selecting me to do this job of enormous importance.  Freely I walk this path, in love with the Lord and Loving You.  In Jesus’ Name.  Amen.