Job 4:3-6

3 “In the past you have encouraged many people;
you have strengthened those who were weak.
4 Your words have supported those who were falling;
you encouraged those with shaky knees.
5 But now when trouble strikes, you lose heart.
You are terrified when it touches you.
6 Doesn’t your reverence for God give you confidence?
Doesn’t your life of integrity give you hope?

I'll pay for you, anytime.

You know who I miss? The Sooybeans, specifically Jeff Nickles, Ward Hiney, and Kole Shannon.

Lord, Lord, the fools we are as men.

1 John 4:7-21

7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

13We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. 16And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. 17In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. 18There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.

I was talking to a few of my friends about heartbreak. Specifically, Heartbreak that comes from loving, and being disapointed. Film promises, "the greatest thing you'll ever learn is to be loved and love in return." Sometimes it just dosen't happen right away or at all. At least romantically. Sometimes people just don't recipricate the same way, or treat you like a loved one should be treated. Sometimes you're the one letting your loved one down.

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

How do you press on, past that heartbreak, and keep showing love? When is it appropriate to let go of feelings, because your love is a lost cause? How can we apply the fact that Christ loves completely unlovable and ugly people and keeps on loveing to our loves?

I don't know fully how to answer that really. But maybe it's just that no matter where I am or what I'm doing, my job is to love unconditionally. No matter what relationship I'm in, I'm called to love that person and seek that person's best. And when you find the person that's able to do that same for you, maybe that's what love is in the romantic sense. You know, sprinkled with physical attraction and butterflies and the decision to stay faithful and all that.

It's just so hard to find it. It's hard to be it.

because he needs her just like he needs medicine

I really like Ryan Adams. He's written some of my favorite records and favorite songs. So here's the track list to a mixtape I made a long time ago, maybe even last year. By no means is this a best of, or even my favorite songs. But this is what made the cd that always helps me remember there's still hope after heartbreak.

1. Oh My God, Whatever, Etc. (from Easy Tiger)
2. When Will You Come Back Home? (from Cold Roses)
3. So Alive (from Rock N Roll)
4. Rock N Roll (from Rock N Roll)
5. Wild Flowers (from Gold)
6. Always On My Mind (a b-side, and even though this is a cover, I think it's a dang good song)
7. The Hardest Part (from Jacksonville City Nights)
8. Oh My Sweet Carolina (from Heartbreaker)
9. This House Is Not for Sale (from Love is Hell)
10. Political Scientist (from Love is Hell)
11. In My Time of Need (from Heartbreaker)
12. Come Pick Me Up (from Heartbreaker)
13. I See Monsters (from Love is Hell)
14. Call Me on Your Way Back Home (from Heartbreaker)
15. The Fools We Are As Men (a b-side, from the Gold sessions, I believe)
16. Starlite Diner (from 29)
17. How Do You Keep Love Alive? (from Cold Roses)
18. The Shadowlands (from Love is Hell)
19. Elizabeth, You Were Born To Play That Part (from 29)

I really like heartbreak songs and bittersweet love songs. So that may be why I picked these out of his discography. I haven't had a chance to listen to the new Cardinals record yet, but that's something I plan to do soon.

I'm so epically broke. Money's gonna be really tight for the next few months, and possibly for the foreseeable future. I've got this feeling of unrest, but that may just be because of money. Will you say to me, a little rain's gonna come, when the sky can't offer none to me?

how to steal third, but never make it home.

Cigarette and coffee stains
on all my clothes. And conversations
turn to how my mouth is bleeding.
My friends were here, they all are leaving.

I wish I could believe
in all you say to me.
Words come out so cheep when you're enamored.

My cup has turned a cola color
from tobacco and dirty water.
It's new years eve, the ball is dropping.
God, I feel my heart is stopping.

I wish I could believe
in all you say to me.
But, words come out so cheep when you're enamored.

you used to think that sound was something pure.

John 10:14-15

and only he who was troubled shall find rest,
and only he who descends into the nether world shall rescue his beloved,
and only he who unsheathes his knife shall be given Isaac again.
- Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling

I think the point is that it's hard. And that it's supposed to be hard.

The following may be a bit complicated.

Maybe, and let's suppose this for a moment, that God wants my absolute attention. Suppose He knows better for me than I do myself. Suppose in order to get me to listen to Him, he has to break my legs.

So I sit with legs broken and mangled, and I have two choices: believe that God is unjust, and that he has no right to take from me what is so valuable to me, seemingly essential to me; or I can believe that God actually has my best intentions at heart. And suppose that He, this same God who has broken my legs, starts to hold me up and nurse me back to health, if only I would let Him.

It's only when a seed dies that it starts to grow and becomes something beautiful. It's such a nice thing to say but it can suck when you're the seed. Reading the scriptures scares the shit out of me sometimes. I think it was Augustine who said he felt like he was being pursued by his Holy Adversary.

But that dying to the self is what Christ did. So I can't call God on asking more out of me than He requires of Himself. Look at the gospels. Pain. Sacrificial Love. He gave us the example on how to lose yourself in order to find yourself.

I keep learning the context of this passage:

Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside of Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.

Conversely, when love becomes a god, it becomes a demon. Love ceases to be a demon only when it ceases to be a god; which of course can be re-stated in the form “begins to be a demon the moment it begins to be a god”. This balance seems to me an indispensable safeguard. If we ignore it the truth that God is love may slyly come to mean for us the converse, that love is God.

- Lewis, The Four Loves

So love, the concept of love (or maybe more accurately, the security that comes from being loved and loved in return by a woman), became a god and then became a demon. So maybe God needed to shake me up a bit and take away all my defenses, take away what made me feel secure. In the same way that if my legs make me stray, the best thing is to break them. If your heart offends thee, pluck it out.

God if it were only possible. I give you my heart and my hurt and my heartbreak and my desires.

Pray for Mike McSherry if you think about it. I love that kid so much.

There's so much I want to say.

My boss called me a rogue today. I took it as a compliment.

I drove to Charlottesville and back last night with Alex and Caitlin. One of the best trips I've taken in a while.

I'm really happy to be alive.