Where Was God?

A twisted gunman burst into a church and murdered Christians in an act of hate and cowardice. My heart aches for the fallen, and weeps for my country which seems broken. Where was God when the bullets tore through believers in His house? How is it that darkness appears to be defeating light?

The struggle that I’ve been through the last few years, the problems that I’ve faced, pale in comparison to those of others. I’m not looking at imminent death. Still, it’s been a brutal road for me and my family, with poverty looming, the loss of a job, and emotional battles raging. I have found myself asking, more than I’d care to admit, where was God?

In my novels, this is a central theme, the ongoing erosion of faith in the face of evil and despair. For the Fox family, there are epic battles and catastrophic losses, and still William and Crystal are never truly destroyed. Their faith is stronger than my own has been, the sort of belief I long for and which I see in some of the strong Christians I know. I’m praying, learning, trying to guild myself with the Armor of God.

Often, the hardships we face make us question the beliefs we hold most dear. I believe that God uses times of tragedy, loss, and inexplicable pain to draw us closer to Him, to bring us to a better understanding of His nature. Jesus says in John 16:33, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

It’s easy to blame God when terrible things happen. I know, because I’m guilty of this arrogant, human act. The truth is, evil in this world is committed by man. God did not cause that crazed, racist nutcase to enter a church and kill people. That was a decision that kid came to all on his own, one of free will. Our actions have consequences, for good or for bad.

God is alive and at work, and I’ve seen miracles with my own eyes. I’ve witnessed it in my life, and the lives of those that I love. Too often, I forget, for my faith is not as strong as it should be. In a world of seven billion people, there are tragedies every day, and the news will focus on the ten worst things and beat it into our brains, giving the impression that the world itself is bleeding and slipping into madness, that evil and peril lurk around every corner. We hear the bad but not the good, and this creates a pervasive, ongoing illusion, a destructive one, a lens through which we view the world shaded by darkness, one that filters out truth and light.

For the ten stories of accidents, shootings, disasters, and fires (the media is obsessed with fire of all sorts, from bombs to brush fires) there are a hundred stories we never get to hear. Lives saved, random acts of kindness, hope restored, faith found, and illness cured.

Where was God? He never left. He didn’t move, I did. Sometimes I forget.

“For you were once in darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light.” Ephesians: 5:8

Sneek Peek… FATE OF THE FALLEN

Chapter Twenty-Two

When faith is the bedrock upon which a life is built, the loss of it, when belief crumbles to dust, reduces a man to bitter, abject desolation. Malak died in the sand, and in the sand he was reborn.

Waves crashing, the sun blinding, and the ocean a pale welcome blue, he plucked a crab from his chest and pulled yellow seaweed from matted hair, pushing himself into a seated position. Coconut palms stretched toward the sea along a pristine white beach. At his back a steep mountain lush with green jungle rose toward the cloudless sky. He’d never been anyplace like this before.

“Is this heaven? My reward? It looks a little lonely,” he muttered.

A seagull landed a few feet away and twittered at him. The crab scuttled along the surf line with one oversized claw, and one tiny, ridiculous one. The big claw raised like a shield.

“What do you want from me?”

The breeze,balmy and sweet, ruffled his long hair.

“Remember our last talk? I quit. I’m not doing this anymore.”

The palms rustled and the waves broke upon the reef line and lapped the shore, a steady rhythm of foam and clear water, more than a whisper, less than a conversation. Peaceful, serene.

Malak was not in the mood. He thought about the family he’d lost, the screams of children still echoing in his heart. The demon he’d faced, a thing which he never known walked the earth until he’d felt its unholy power. To him it was days ago, though he had no idea how much time had elapsed between Baghdad and wherever this was. Whenever he was.
His existence was unfair, he decided. Every life he’d lived felt futile, as did life itself. The friends he’d seen die, the blood he’d spilled with a blade… there seemed to be no sense to any of it, within the context of a loving, living God. Especially given that reality.

While he had experienced great peace, the times of turmoil and war overshadowed this, and he saw that both he and mankind were no closer to figuring things out than they were centuries ago.

The crab skittered toward a hole in the sand, and the bird hopped over to the crab and skewered it.
The crab does not pity itself, even as it dies, any more than the bird gloats over the killing and the meal. Men are different. Perhaps emotions only make living harder. For the crab does not expect to live any more than the bird believes it will eat, and the fact that these desires conflict keeps neither awake at night. If the crab assumed he’d be protected, living the crab-life, surrounded by hungry birds, yet confident in his continued prosperity, he would get angry when that beak pierced his shell.

“What’s the point? Clearly, there isn’t one. When I believe, you destroy. You are God. I can’t deny that you exist. Not after the things I’ve seen. But you are not what you should be. You’re a cheat in the marketplace, full of sunshine promises and whitewashed smiles, who then vanishes when it turns out you sold a lie, a cracked jar. You have no integrity. That you exist does not make me love you.”

He knew that these words were the worst sort of blasphemy, and it his lips burned a bit with the speaking of them and his guts tightened up, his body rebelling against his mind.

He walked along the beach, letting the water slide over bare feet, feeling the sand between his toes and the warm sun on his neck. He walked for perhaps an hour or two, and wound up where he started, circling back to his first footprints. The bird cocked its head at him and laughed in the way that birds sometimes do.

He was on an island.

Malak plopped down in the sand and watched the sun slide below the ocean, streaks of pink and yellow and purple painted upon the vast sky, and the face of the waters shimmering orange against the dancing white of the breakers and the deepening blue of the sea. The day dying, the night born.

He did not move, watching the first stars appear, punching through both light and darkness, becoming a wondrous myriad of diamonds strung melting into the sea. All the while, the waves hushed and frothed, luminescent and soothing.
He decided he would explore the interior in the morning, and that if he wanted to quit living and dying for both God and man, this would be the perfect place to do it.

That is exactly what he did.

He would come to call the island “The Rock,” and although he couldn’t know it then, it would become a place of solitude and wonder and joy. It would be a refuge, the only place he was born again more than once; often as he was dying, he prayed he would wake up there. It didn’t happen often enough for his liking, but when it did, he’d feel the sun on his face and the thirst in his soul and hear the music of the ocean and he would smile.

It took time to figure this out. Malak was hard-headed, and immortality proved no solution to being stubborn.
Water was a problem, and it was only through dumb luck that he figured out that coconuts held life-giving water within their hard shells. During a storm, a green one fell next to him, and he heard the liquid inside. After wasting the precious liquid on the first few attempts, he learned how to remove the outer husk and pierce the shell within, drinking heartily. He also learned to drink from plants after a hard rain, and started collecting his coconut shells to gather water during the rainy season. Despite being stubborn, Malak was smart and tough and adaptable

He ate fish every day, because the flesh contained water. At first he speared them, and as time went on, he learned to dig alcoves reinforced by coral and lava rock, letting the tide bring the fish in, where they would be stranded after it receded. He added nets formed with vines from the jungle to make this more effective. There were abundant fruit trees on the island, as well, and when it did not rain enough, these saved his life more than once. The island provided.

He was gifted and cursed with what would later be known as a didactic memory. He forgot nothing. He could recall the taste of food he’d eaten in the Ludus or Lisdenfrane on any given day at a specific meal, along with the ribald or Godly conversations which ensued. The more alone Malak was, the more he retreated into the past, finding comfort and solace with friends long dead. Hearing their cries, at the end. That was the thing.

As good as his memory was, these conversations were all one-sided, more akin to eavesdropping. He could not speak to his comrades any more than they could talk to him on this deserted island. The moments were what they were, unaltered and done, and even though Malak wished to speak into the past, he could not. What was done was done.
He exhausted these memories, and that soul-shrinking loneliness came back. It was a poverty of the soul.

He needed to get off the island because he was going insane. Also, he was bored. He’d been there for more rainy seasons than he could count. At least twenty years. He had every cause to believe that the easiest way off the island was to die.
At dawn, after a long night of dead conversation, he set out into the ocean.

He swam beyond the breakers, the waves smashing into the coral below, his blood blooming in the clear water, warm in the way that Lisdenfrane was not, wild and teeming with life and death.

The first time, he made it beyond the reef. He swam until he was exhausted, swept by the current out into the open ocean. He choked on salt water and sputtered and stroked. Things stung and nibbled at his extremities. The moon rose high and bright and he was far from land and man. He rolled onto his back while a thunderstorm crashed a few miles away, lightning arcing from horizon to horizon, white and ragged, waves building, his body carried up and down, as alone as any man can ever be.

“Here I am! Kill me! You don’t care, so let’s get it over with!” He gulped a cresting wave, the water stinging his eyes.
The first shark took his right leg above the knee with one bite. It felt like a hard shove, followed by tingling and pain and ironic, gulping laughter. The next shark chomped him in the torso and took him down for a while, a plunge into the dark, where his ears hurt and his lungs burned and his guts were on fire below the sea, and Malak decided that there were better ways to die.

He felt the same sun, heard familiar lazy waves, and saw the same damn bird making angry tracks in the sand when he opened his eyes again.

“Really?”

He experimented with ways to kill himself for a season. Drowning, starvation, fire, and the ever faithful sharks. None of it worked. He wound up back on the beach.

And so began the conversation that mattered. The one he was meant to have.

A Christian Writer’s Journey

I’ve always been a dreamer, something that my father instilled in me from a very young age because he would say things like, “son if you work hard, you can be anything you want to be. Follow your dreams.”  I saw my old man write books, toil as a carpenter, and then go to law school. He practiced what he preached, rising from abject poverty to success through discipline and years of burning the candle at both ends. When I left the University of Florida to pursue a songwriting career, my dreams were vast and my ability limited. I had no idea how hard my road would be.

It occurs to me that I’ve had a lifelong problem managing my expectations, and this character trait has tarnished my relationships, my career, and my soul. When you shoot for the stars, mostly you don’t wind up where you thought you were going. The heart of the matter is pride. Leaning much upon my own understanding rather than upon God. So here’s my story, and perhaps some other folks can avoid some of the mistakes I’ve made, and perhaps with the telling of it, maybe I’ll finally wrap my head around the truth.

I moved to Nashville way back in 1992 with a heart full of dreams and a cheap guitar. Those first years were heady, back when I knew I would  “make it,” and I figured that within a few years, I’d be living the dream. I played the Bluebird, penned hundreds of songs with fellow songwriters,  and wrote every single day. I saw, quickly, that I had much to learn. I’d been in town for about a month when I saw a writers round with Bob DePiro and Mike Reid… they slayed me with their talent. Every song was perfection, their vocals were mind-blowing, and their musical ability was so far beyond me that I saw there was an entire mountain yet to climb. I embraced it, and I learned, worked on my craft, mentored by some great writers. I had songs on hold for major artists, went to number one parties, and rubbed elbows with the movers and shakers of Music Row. Then I started doing a dangerous thing.

I began spending too much time gazing at where I wanted to be rather than what I needed to do to get there, and worse, whether that was where I should go. Enter the bitterness, the, sense of betrayal and the resentment. The great Harlan Howard, whom I had the great pleasure of spending time with, once said to a disgruntled songwriter, “well, nobody called and asked you to move to Nashville.” Right.He didn’t say that to me, but it would have bee spot on. Nobody told me to decide to become a writer..that was my choice. But the desire to succeed was eating my soul, clouding my vision and ultimately hurting my music. Some of my fellow writers nicknamed me “Doctor Doom.”

I moved back to Florida following a divorce and the feeling of being let down in my songwriting career (or lack thereof,) thinking that I could leave writing in my rear-view mirror. I was wrong, and I started writing fiction, which didn’t require the same sort of schmoozing and glad-handing that songwriting seems to. When I got my first publishing deal, I was ecstatic. I’d signed a contract for a trilogy, and I hadn’t even written two of the books yet. I decided I would be a wildly successful author within perhaps a year or two. I’m hard headed, obviously, though my wife uses more colorful words to describe my frequent and woeful lack of understanding.

It takes years of hard work, multiple books, and networking, and talent to make it as an author. Like any other artistic endeavor, it’s a subjective thing, and people will buy what people buy. I find the writing in Fifty Shades of Grey to be awful, but tens of millions of people strongly disagree; E.L. James reached the stars by connecting with her readers, and more power to her. I could undoubtedly learn a thing or two from her. So, I’m writing, working, knowing it takes time, and trying not to chafe against that knowledge. Trying to enjoy the journey, and not focus on the destination.

During these decades of writing, I burned down one marriage and almost destroyed another. One of the central reasons this happened is because I expect things to go my way, and when they don’t, I get rankled. My essential impatience, my propensity to reach beyond my means to grasp. Marriage is hard work, and when things go south, which they will in any marriage at some point, I’ve had the feeling that things should be right again quickly. Wounds should heal, others should change, I should change…if not overnight, then within a time frame that I deem acceptable. Utter nonsense. It’s destructive. Because, once again, that resentment sets in and things only get worse. You end up feeling like you’re wasting your time, and when a sense of futility becomes pervasive, it’s already almost too late. It takes discipline and hard work to make it back from that.

Against this backdrop, I’ve experienced the same sort of impatience with God. It sounds as dumb as it is, yet when I’m in the midst of it, I can’t see it, missing the forest for the trees. I cry out to God, asking for help with more selfishness than humility: Help me make it as a writer, help my marriage, please send a briefcase full of money from the sky!  When I don’t get the quick results I desire, I feel betrayed. Like no one is really listening. Like the songs on the radio are full of false promises, and that the Word itself has misled me. But I have misled myself by choosing to focus on the wrong things, by hearing what I want to hear instead of the truth.

The truth is, life can be terrible, hard, and mean. And there is no assurance of a good outcome for any of us on this earth simply because we choose to follow God. The whole idea of abundance theory preached in many mega-churches is dangerous drivel.  It’s connected to Calvinism and the idea that success is predestined, a concept which helped to form the Protestant Work Ethic and build a nation, but which in many ways undermines the deeper message of the gospel. This Calvinistic attitude spawns the belief that poor are poor because God has decided it, and conversely that the wealthy are wealthy because they have earned favor in the eyes of the Lord. This belief system is insidious. Ask the Paul, Peter and Timothy about that.

Because the assurance and peace Jesus and the Apostles talk about is the eternal kind, not the earthly kind, and the our peace on this rock is found in knowing this and feeling fulfilled and joyous despite our circumstances. Salvation, peace, and joy are not things we have earned, but which come, ultimately, through the grace of God. Apart from God, I can do nothing. I am worth nothing. And this, perhaps, is the central truth I’ve missed over and over again.

The story isn’t mine. It never was. Paul extolls us in Hebrews 12:2 “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our fate…”  I’m an author, yet I’m not THE author. I focus on the things which I want, the tangible trappings of success, and I fix my gaze upon that which I cannot obtain alone. I cling to my pride like a talisman and wonder why I become disillusioned. I truly want to reach people, to touch lives and be a force of light, but I’ve been going about it all wrong, putting my own story ahead of the most important story.

It will take hard work and discipline, and faith, but when I look back twenty years from now, I pray I will be able to say that I was living and writing for the right reasons, not the wrong ones, and that I released my foolish pride, my selfish expectations, and human arrogance. By emptying myself, I pray that God will fill me with His spirit and that the kind of peace which matters is the peace I will have found.

I still have a mountain to climb, and my way is unclear. I have much to learn, and am certain I will falter. I am not alone, and in this knowledge I will rest assured, striving to fix my eyes on Jesus, my sole destination.

God and Post-Apocalyptic Fiction

 

When the world is smashed and burning, I believe people will question why God abandoned us, while many who are not religious will turn to religion as a way of coping with the pain and destruction around us. Two of my favorite Post-Apocalyptic novels deal directly with faith: The Stand, by Stephen King, and A Canticle For Leibowitz, written by Walter M. Miller.  These novels both had a direct influence on my writing.

I’ve had a few reviewers attack the religious elements of my work, although the overwhelming majority of readers, both religious and agnostic, are not troubled by the way .the characters respond to the end of the world as we know it. While I wrote these novels from a Christian perspective, the books are by no means intended to be an extended sermon. Man has an innate need to connect to our creator, to find a way to explain our existence. Indeed, the idea of the apocalypse itself appears in Roman and Greek myths. The stories of the Biblical Flood and Armageddon go back thousands of years, and are a part of our collective human psyche.

There is a reluctance now, it seems, for post-apocalyptic fiction to address religion. I wonder why that is? Are authors fearful of alienating readers? (This was certainly very much on my mind when I wrote Objects of Wrath.) Whether it’s zombies, a virus, an asteroid, or a war, the majority of PA novels delve into the questions of faith in a cursory manner. I’m not implying there is anything wrong with this approach, and certainly many survivors would not ask larger questions, being more concerned with finding food or fleeing the approaching hoarde.

When I read a novel or watch a movie, one of the things that keeps me interested are the questions, “what would I do? How would I react? How would that feel?” Whether it’s watching an epic battle from Braveheart and putting myself into the shoes of the men waiting for a thundering charge from heavy cavalry or reading the heart-wrenching scenes in The Road, where the father tells his son how to shoot himself. I contemplate the emotional impact, try to see and feel what the characters would be going through. In Saving Private Ryan, when the soldiers are coming toward the beach, rounds zipping through the water, bombs falling, what would that feel like, to have been one of those men? What would I do?

I’m certain that I’d pray. I’d question my faith, but I’d be simultaneously clinging to it. I think that’s how most people would behave. There are atheists in foxholes, but not many.

One of the  things about post-apocalyptic fiction which appeals to me is that it offers an unflinching examination of the human condition, a window into our essential being. When laws have disappeared and civilization is absent, what sort of people are we? Philosophers like Locke, Rousseau and Hobbs talk about our “state of nature” before the social contract. I love books that take a look at this question. It’s one of the reasons I enjoy The Walking Dead. While some novels offer a very dark outlook on humanity, in which most men are truly evil by nature, others are more hopeful. I think most people are decent and good, although evil is hungry and seductive. Can good defeat evil, even when it looks as though darkness has already won?

Religion can be a force for good or great evil. In my second novel, Children of Wrath, this is the central theme. Faith in and of itself is not always a good thing. There are atrocities being committed around the world even as I write, killing carried out in the name of religion. Whether or not one believes in any sort of God, there is no denying the way that religion has shaped our world. After the world as we know it ceases to be, people will still turn to the heavens, sometimes shaking their fists, other times begging for help.

The War on Christianity: The Enemy is Also Us

Christians face many dire threats around the world, from the decapitations in the Middle East to genocides in Africa, to the persecution carried out by China and Russia. Here in the United States, we hear much about the war against Christians, but it seems to me that the greatest threat comes from within.

The word “Christian” is first used in the book of Acts, and it means one who follows Christ. In America, this definition has been lost, ursurped by other things. Politics, and economics have nothing to do with following The Lord, and yet it seems that many Christians identify themselves by how they vote and where they shop. There is a shrill meanness to the way many Christians go about it, and it gives the rest of us a bad rap.

Jesus gave Christians a great commission, to spread the gospel to the corners of the earth. In the United States, generations are turning from God, and well meaning Christians with microphones and political signs and spirits full of judgement are a big part of the problem.

What Would Jesus Do?

Remember this catch phrase? It was effective because it asked an excellent question. So what would Jesus do now, in this world of sinners like me? Let’s look at what he actually did.

He offered forgiveness. We celebrated Easter last week. Jesus was nailed to a cross so that our sins would be covered. We know that none of us are perfect, that the wages of sin are death. Christ died so that we would not be condemned, giving us grace we did not deserve.

It seems many Christians have forgotten this.

Jesus spent his time among the outcasts. The prostitutes, the tax-collectors,  criminals and sinners. He admonished men to leave behind their worldly belongings and follow Him. He was welcoming, not shunning, leading by example and truth, offering healing in a hurting world.

Judgement is reserved for God, not man. “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone..

Love Transcends Law…”The Greatest of These is Love”

The Old Testament Levitical laws no longer bind us. Entry into Heaven is given, not earned, and it is through faith not deed that we come to the Father. In James we read that “Faith without deeds is dead,”  but again, it is not for us to decide who has faith and who does not.

Christians seem to be focused on the wrong things. If we should, as Paul says in Hebrews “Fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith,” we have lost sight of the things that matter, missing the forest for the trees. When I see the new pope washing the feet of a Muslim woman, I think, that’s what Jesus would do!

One of my favorite verses in the New Testament is Ephesians 2:3:

“Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God who is rich in mercy, made us alive in Christ been when we were dead in transgressions–it is by grace you have been saved.”

A God-Shaped Hole

America is indeed hurting, and there is a God-shaped hole in each of us individually, and the nation entire. What we need is more Jesus, less hate. Greater love, less judgement. Faith which manifests itself by doing what Jesus actually did, bearing fruit that sustains a hurting world. Giving to the poor, helping the sick, spreading the gospel not with a sword but with the Truth.

Remembering Silver Hill…My Magnolia

The woods are lonely and empty there now, but in my mind there is a place which will always remain as it once was. A house on a hill surrounded by forest and filled with laughter and generations and love. My grandparents called it Silver Hill.

In the spring and summer the air of Upstate New York has a sweetness to it. As if the maple trees and rocks, the flowers and the sun breathe new hope into the land itself. Little things take me back. The smell of fresh-cut hay, the clink of ice in a glass of tea on a hot day, the aroma of pipe smoke, the sight of an old orange tractor.

For me, Silver Hill was magic. It was a place of safety and refuge, a constant in a childhood rife with upheaval. My folks moved many times, and I attended about twenty schools, but Silver Hill remained a beacon of hope and stability when things got dark and mean. I remember riding the lawn mower with my Grandfather when I was about four or five, and later being allowed to mow the whole yard myself, a thing I enjoyed. It’s where I learned to shoot, love the woods. I recall reading an entire series of Piers Anthony books over about a week, perched in a comfortable nook of a towering tree, surrounded by twittering birds, the wind whispering through the leaves, and the branches rocking me gently.

There were family reunions and birthday parties during the warm months, and I’d roam the woods and the yard with my cousins, all of us with skinned knees and dungarees. Catching frogs and tadpoles down at the pond, always on the lookout for a snake or Bigfoot, who was rumored to inhabit the area, and whom I was fairly certain I’d seen at least once. Building forts of increasing complexity. The adults would join in games of softball, and football, and there was this wonderful togetherness. That’s how I remember it, and that’s the truth which remains.

We ate blackberry pies, hot-dogs from the charcoal grill, and stacks of steaming pancakes from the griddle, my Grandmother making them as big as we wanted. Eating was a kind of celebration.

In the fall there was a bittersweet, fleeting explosion of color, as the woods came alive in red and yellow and every breath held the promise of the coming snow, a sharp, tingling sensation, a singing feeling in my soul.

Winter meant vast snowbanks, crackling fires, and Christmas. The aunts and uncles and cousins would migrate to Silver Hill, and we’d eat turkey and stuffing and tear into presents, savoring each one. We opened them one at a time, and it was a joyful thing, anticipation and wonder all wrapped together. We built igloos and had snowball fights, epic battles when the wind was cold and the snow was deep, knowing a warm fire, hot chocolate, and a slice of pie waited inside.

Silver Hill became a part of me, and looking back I realize that it’s because of the people, my family, my blood, and the memories which live there for all of us. We’re spread out all over the country now, but Silver Hill, and those black and white and faded picture still recall.What I remember most is love, unconditional and true.

Before every meal, my Grandfather would lead us in a short prayer, the same one every time,and it is etched indelibly into my heart.

“Lord we thank you for this food, and for thy many blessings.

We pray you will bless this food to our use and us to thy purpose.

Amen.”

kinned knees

A Life, Well Written…Heroes, Villians, Lies and Truth. One Draft.

I used to scoff at regrets, probably because they hadn’t yet accumulated enough mass. I was confidant and convinced, in the way young men are, that regrets are for for fools. I believed I could fight my way through life without the deep wounds and scars born of mistakes, and I charged with unswerving abandon and careless faith and speed straight into middle age. The truth hurts when it comes crashing. I’m an author, but I haven’t written my own life the way I should have, the way I would if I were a character in one of my own books.

“Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show,”
Charles Dickens opens David Copperfield with that poetry, my favorite first sentence in literature.  Not only would I like to write like that, I’d like to succeed in living that great commission. Heroes fall and fail and triumph in the end because they learn from their mistakes, because they are able to feel the sting of regret and overcome great obstacles and great odds. There is always adversity, the thing is to defeat it.

I write heroes in my books that would despise me if they knew me, because they’re better, these characters and constructs who are more brave and good than I am. I’m just a writer, not a hero.  I’ve been writing and dreaming and lost in words and acting as though I had an editor for my life. Someone to excise the mistakes, cut the fat, correct the regrets. I’ve got just one draft, though, here and now, which is my life here on this earth. No auto correct, no edits, no way to change the character arc or tweak the ending. One draft, all the way through, is what I’ve got, and if it sucks, then it does. It’s a lowsy story.

I think there’s a bit more to it, though, than that. I’m far from figuring it out, and I’ve got my scars and regrets. I’m writing this interactive video game, where the characters make choices that impact the ending, and I think the universe is like that. Sometimes there are no good endings, no matter what, not here in this mean world. Mostly, though there are endings which could be satisfying when we, the actors in the play, the characters in the story of our lives, listen to the wrong things. I know I do.

Paul says in Hebrews 12:2 “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.”   I’m an author, but I haven’t been the author of my fate, not in the way I’d like to believe I’ve been. I certainly haven’t kept my eyes where they were supposed to be looking. One draft, one chance to get it right, and my choices make a difference, and I’m still hoping that my life will be written well, both by me and THE author.

Don’t Hold Your Breath

Don’t hold your breath unless you’re under water, because while you’re waiting for the next thing, life is drowning you and all you end up doing is choking for air.

It’s the quiet that defines a man, not moments of fleeting wonder and raucous triumph, for the real glory lives in the little things we overlook and forget, the mundane and true. It’s in the Sunday sigh of a woman in love while the rain comes down outside and the moan of the wind and the lazy smiles and wrinkled sheets. Walks in the woods when the world is still and the air is sharp and right and the leaves are turning with bittersweet autumn, death and renewal and the promise of spring, possessed of a magnificence all its own.

The glory in life is found in the simple things. Changing diapers at two in the morning, dancing around the living room with your baby to sooth him back to sleep, walks to the bus stop at dawn, tying shoes and bed-time songs. The laughter over silly things and inside jokes, late-night trips to the hospital.There is glory there, There was. We often miss it along the way, for our eyes are on the wrong things, and then we ache for it when we remember to remember.

We’re constantly bombarded by images of success, and what it means to be happy. It’s the bigger house, the newer car, the promotion, the vacation, the next thing. We live in a world of instant gratification which seems largely bereft of true happiness and contentment. Our technology is miraculous and gives us the ability to talk to friends around the world with a few clicks, yet we are lonely, for the cell phones and ipads, video games and social media which provide this so called “connectivity” lead to a disconnect with our souls. It’s a hollow feeling.

It’s hard for Christians, who are exhorted to be “in” this world but not “of” it, for the lessons Jesus taught go completely against what the world continues to tell us. Christians are supposed to surrender to be victorious, lose in order to win, give to receive joy. It’s hard to keep our eyes fixed upon Jesus when the world comes crashing in, howling and loud, tempting and insidious.

The lasting, true glory is there, though, in a relationship with the Creator, and in those mundane moments, if we listen, he is whispering to us. I admit I’ve been holding my breath my whole life. It’s time to breathe.

Easy Faith?

On Christmas day I had a lively, though-provoking theological discussion with one of my best friends, a man who possesses a keen intellect and a good heart. He is an agnostic, I am a Christian, and this difference in belief leads to many late night debates. We respect one another, so there is no hint of rancor or accusation.

We discussed the nature of free will, which is something that always makes my head hurt. If all things work for God’s good, then how does sin affect outcomes?  How does evil work for good? Mankind is doomed to sin because it is inherent to our nature. God knows we will sin, when we will do so, and how that works out for us in the end. In my extensive experience with sin, short term bliss leads to pain at some point. How does this serve the greater plan? I have no idea.

I told my friend “Everything happens for a reason, and sometimes the reason is that we make dumb choices.Yet even these bad decisions transform into good in the end. Maybe not for us, though. There are infinite choices, and a myriad of outcomes… some are better than others within our own lifetimes.”

My friend wasn’t buying it. “What about a greater scale, then? Let’s take Hitler, for example. How does Hitler’s existence work for the greater good? The death of six million of God’s chosen people, along with Americans, Russians, English, French, Japanese and Germans? Explain that to me, please.”

“Well,” I replied, stalling, “Hitler chose to be evil. He murdered millions, which was clearly contrary to the will of God. The suffering Hitler unleashed will reverberate for centuries. But on a grander scale than that, perhaps there was a reason we cannot perceive.”

“Nonsense.”

“Sometimes we miss the forest for the trees. We are too close to a thing to see the truth in it.”

“We’re not talking about trees. We’re talking about living, breathing people. Women and children. The truth is they died.”

“There were better possible outcomes,” I said, feeling the hollowness of the answer. “But in the end…”

“I wish I had your easy faith,” said my good friend.

“Easy faith?”

“It looks that way to me. You retreat into your faith when logic fails.” True.

Hebrews 11:1 says “faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.”  Faith is the cornerstone of Christianity. Without it, nothing else matters. We trust because we must. Because without that leap of faith, the world feels gray and mean, drained of color and life. Faith itself defies logical thinking. Yet our propensity for faith is as great as our vulnerability to evil.

We are the race of Mozart, Shakespeare, Rembrandt and Einstein. Creativity flows through our veins, itself a kind of faith, a force which propels us to seek the truth beyond what we see before us. Faith is a reward in itself, for it makes the world a brighter place.

Faith is not easy.

Clashes of faith have been a bane of mankind’s existence, and I think God’s least favorite words are “Holy War.”  Faith should not be a weapon, and when it is used as such, it makes the world darker and harder for those of us who cling to our beliefs in the face of hardship and doubt and the rampant evil in this place.

My friend is right, though. I do retreat into my faith. I remember the connection I have felt with the creator, moments that I cannot explain in any other way. I’ve seen miracles. I’ve watched the sun rise over the Rocky Mountains, felt the kiss of joy on an endless blue ocean, and witnessed my sons born into this world.  Faith is a singing feeling in my chest, a smile in my soul, and when it is strong, it is glorious.

I stumble  and fall too often and my steps are not sure, my path unclear, and I lose my way in the forest. The truth surrounds me though, and just because I cannot see a thing does not make it less real. When the darkness presses in upon me, it is then I need my faith the most. Perhaps for me, having faith is indeed easier than living bereft of hope.

“We’ve got this.” Misplaced Faith in the Government

I grew up believing that the government of the United States pretty much had things under control. We prevailed in World War II, put a man on the moon, did not engage in a shooting war with the Soviet Union and managed not to blow up the planet. Sure, there were some missteps, but overall, when I listened to Ronald Regan on the evening news, I felt confidant that the our leaders had things under control. After 9-11, I had the prickly feeling in the back of my head that I was wrong. Now, more than a decade later, events prove that when the government says “we’ve got this,” we should take that with a hearty grain of salt.

In the area of Northeast Florida where I live, gated neighborhoods have sprung up like weeds. Some have security guards out front, while others use automated gates. These gates make people feel safe behind their walls, and they pay hundreds of dollars per month in HOA fees to feel that way. It’s absurd, though, an illusion of security rather than the real thing. On any given day, in these sprawling McMansion neighborhoods, hundreds of construction workers, lawn crews, and house staff waltz through the gates. Many of these are undocumented workers, some, no doubt convicted felons. It amuses me. The United States is like one of these gated neighborhoods. We desperately want to believe in our own security and supremacy, and that when the government spokesman gets on the news and offers his assurances that there is nothing to worry about, he’s telling the truth.

We’ve learned that the FBI warned about the potential threat presented by the 9-11 terrorists. The government clearly did not have that under control. We went to war in Iraq because we believed that Saddam possessed weapons of mass destruction. Whoops. (Now that the region has been destabilized by more than a decade of fighting, ISIL is an evil menace that makes Saddam look like a cute puppy.) We’ve yet to respond properly to that threat, in my humble opinion. I hope our leaders figure this one out before the enemy breaches the gates, because evil knocking, and it’s hungry.

When Katrina leveled New Orleans, it took days before FEMA arrived and any kind of order took place. We saw the bodies in the streets. The government didn’t have that under control. Not by a long shot.

Our embassies have been bombed and attacked around the world, despite warnings, costing American lives. One hand seldom knows what the other is doing, it seems.

A crazy guy with hundreds of rounds of ammunition, firearms, and knives in his car gets past the gates at the White house, and makes it all the way inside before he is finally subdued. Are you kidding me? The alarm had been muted because it annoyed the staff. The Secret Service clearly did not have that handled.

Ebola is now here in the United States, and the CDC is telling us not to worry about that. Yet we find that this guy in Texas was sent home by the hospital even after he told them he’d just come back from Africa. After he was diagnosed, local officials entered his apartment without wearing the proper protective gear. The U.S. has been staggeringly slow to respond to the crisis, and bungled the first known case on our own soil. So when I’m told not to worry, I laugh.

I’m not going to stay up at night wringing my hands. I love the United States, and we are a great nation, a great people, and there is a reason that the world still turns to us for help in time of need. But when they say, “we’ve got this,” I don’t believe it any more, not even for a minute.

“We hoped that clear heads would prevail. We were wrong.”