Beauty in Abjectness

This girl was my favorite child I met at the Mathare Slums in Kenya. Honestly, seeing the slums was perhaps the most amazingly difficult thing I've ever seen or done.

Reflection and Contrast

Treatise on Memories

I sit here and life seems to move slowly. I think of all the good things in life: friends, music, traveling, and laughter. What are these things? They are simply memories; memories of the past, memories presently being created, or memories that will be forever ingrained in the mind. Our lives are simply a series of moments that have separated themselves into the monumental moments of success, failure, joy, pain, elation, depression, stasis, and change that become our memories.

These memories are not independent nor are they self-sufficient. Either they depend upon each other or they relate themselves to a physical stimulus. It is in this contingent relationship that a memory finds its inherent beauty. On one hand, a memory is awakened by its related memory. For instance, a grandfather sees his grown son playing catch with his grandson. This memory eventually causes the father to remember the countless summer nights he spent playing catch with his son. This could even cause the father to think of his own father and their relationship. In a process that could occur in mere milliseconds, this man has forever associated what used to be a few independent moments into a collective memory.

On the other hand, an influential moment or time in a life can be associated with the physical elements of that moment. The crisp, cool air of a high school football game, the smell of freshly cut grass and summer heat at a baseball field, the song playing when you danced with a special someone. These stimuli can become as important, and potentially, more important than the memory itself. Without the stimuli, the memory does not exist. If there is nothing to recall the memory, it ceases to be.

Regardless, what is a memory but a present expression of a past emotion? A recollection is merely an utterance of what was once felt. And what of the memories that are forgotten? Every moment of our lives shapes us into what we are in the present. The memories which are “remembered” can be evaluated, but those “forgotten,” at least consciously, are lost in the vast ocean of time and have floated into the immensity of collective human experience. However, the impact of that memory has been forever imprinted with distinctiveness on time and humanity. It is in this vastness of time and memory that one either loses or finds himself, or perhaps more accurately, is found. Either way, he is engulfed by the presence. In the engulfment, the man both stumbles and drowns, or he is lifted up into the Truth. To the former, life is a series of meaningless and pointless events, to the latter, life’s memories all point to One.

"I AM the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." - Revelation 22:13

HE IS is all your memories, your hurts, pains, tears, triumphs, victories, successes, and joys. HE IS life. There is none like HIM.

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Memory...little threads that hold life's patches of meaning together. ~ Mark Twain

It’s a beautiful night. The air is cool, but not cold. Every breath is refreshing, renewing. It’s beautiful, but it’s cloudy. In the lowest realms of that infinite darkness, there is a mist. I breathe that in as well. The refreshing air and the drowsiness of the clouds mix in my lungs. It moves upward until it sparks a thought, a memory. The night is filled with them – dances on the driveway, a ball on the wet evening grass, an empty parking lot and weak legs, the drive home, tears of farewell, a winding, single floor building, a split level house, a golden moment with a golden friend, a parking lot surrounded by palm trees, a six man tent, back roads, windows down. The memories are unrelenting – a field in the middle of town, driving home with a friend, white mist covering the road, shiny black asphalt, arguments In parks, football games and friends. As each memory flashes before me, it mixes with the air and the two become forever entwined. They are one and the same. One can only be triggered by the other. I breathe the air; it’s cool, but not cold. I think of who I was, who I knew, and who I loved. I breathe in the air. Now I think of who I am and who I am supposed to be. Again, the mist closes in. This time it is not a memory, but a question. What will be summoned next time the air is cool, but not cold? Who will become the picture in my mind? The question is posed, but the answer is not given. Yet, I am unafraid.

To those who know me ~ If a memory creeps across your mind or you find yourself in the words above, do not be surprised. Most likely, it is yourself that you read about. What were two simple sentences became a series of memories, which became one cohesive thought, which in turn found itself in one warm winter’s night.

You Loved Unselfishly

You loved unselfishly, You gave without expectation
You took the violence not of Your hand
And the lies not spoken by Your mouth
To become a guilt offering
You died to yourself, only to die for me

By my hand You were oppressed and afflicted
I rejected You and yet, You carried my sorrows
With a cowardly cry I pierced Your side and yet, You healed me
You lay with the wicked
Now I lay with the righteous

I fall short, but Your grace justifies
Tis not my works that bring me back to you
But a grace that calls me home
Tis grace that makes me pray:
Take my desires, my ambition, my pain
Take my needs, my fears, my sin, my shame
Take my friendships, my failures, my selfishness
Above all, take my heart, take my life