I wish I could go to sleep and not wake up until June 16th, and that, in doing so, some satisfactory amount of money would be raised for me to go to the Chapter Planter's Cohort at the end of the month.
But it doesn't work that way. Even if I didn't have to do the work to make the results happen, I couldn't sleep for 15 days straight, no matter how much it might feel like I could sometimes.
But I've still got a long way to go, and it's taking all I've got to believe that I really can raise $15,000 by June 15th. It's taking all I've got to believe that that's at all possible. Honestly, I've no reason to believe it's possible beyond the fact that God can do anything. That is enough, but it'd be a lie to say I've got a plan that will get that much money. I don't. I don't have those sorts of contacts, that rich or supportive of a family, and no "church-I-grew-up-in" to turn to. In the most perfect world, where everyone I've got to talk to yet gives as much as I'm hoping they will, I'm looking at 11,900, and that sounds like and is a lot. I'll just be honest, I don't expect all of those people and churches to fulfill my wildest hopes. Like I said, I don't know how this is going to happen.
But God does. God knows how it's going to happen if he's planning to make it happen. And I've got faith in that, but I'll be honest that my faith in anything else just isn't there right now. Rebuke that lack of faith all you want; I'm just being real. God is bigger than my unbelief though. I'm confident that what he wants to make happen will. All the while, I'm doing all I can to not slide into the despondency that beset me while I was fundraising (rather unsuccessfully) in 2009. I do feel like I'm getting somewhere this time though, more than that time. But even so, as such, I'm not doing it fast enough. I raised $2000 last week, which would have been an incredible week...but it's not even half what I "needed" to raise to be on track.
But I'm resting in the truth that God's in control. It's his money and he'll raise it up for me if that's to be the case. I'm not worried, and I'm not afraid. At the end of the day, God's love for me and for all of us transcends all strivings for anything to do with money or material comfort or even physical necessity provision. Whether I'm in the cohort, whether I'm on staff with Intervarsity, whether anything this is or will be now is or will be at the end of the month, it's my life's work to proclaim that love. I don't need money to do that. Sure, "the worker deserves his wages," but whether we get what we deserve or not, God's love is bigger. That's what grace means, all the way around. There is no justice, there is no peace. There is only forgiveness, because love is broader, deeper, and more important than $15,000 or $150,000.
If you want to help make it happen, go here: donate.intervarsity.org/support/zacharybelcher If you don't or can't, then pray. That means more and will do more anyway. I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength, with or without money. But I could always use more prayers that I stay in Christ so that he can give me strength.
No, I don't believe Christians are justified in being capitalists. Sorry.
-Zack
"Lead me to the truth and I will follow you with my whole life"
-Mumford and Sons
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
The Precipice
This is the 260th post I've started since migrating to blogspot. That doesn't mean anything to me, because I've got a large volume of unfinished, unpublished posts. That number doesn't mean anything to me, and I don't know how many actually-published posts I've got. I don't care either.
Tomorrow is my last day at Hillsdale. While the plan had been that I'd return for New Student Outreach in the fall, extenuating circumstances ended up dictating otherwise. I'll be starting at Cleveland State right away in the fall. I'm excited about that. Very excited. It will be the beginning of the work I feel like my life has been tending toward forever. I'll finally be doing something the feels like something I'm supposed to be doing. I'll be able to be me.
But I've got to get through tomorrow, and right now, that's got me pensive. I can't wait to move onto the life I'm more excited to lead. I can't wait to finally have a home again and be married.
But, for all its faults (and trust me, they are multifarious), I'm going to hold some slight place in my heart for the first campus I ever staffed. More than that though, because honestly, I think Hillsdale is an institution adding to the destruction of all that is good faster than they're making a positive influence in the world, I'm going to miss the people. Say what you will about the college itself and most of the people it attracts, at least 3 or 4 of the people it, at some point, for some reason, attracted, are people that I've come to love, and I will miss them, even if I enjoy my next place more on the whole.
It's where I grew up, where I first lived truly alone, and where, honestly, I had to be to meet and get to know Alexandra to the point that we ever started dating. God knew what he was doing even if, objectively, from the other side, I probably shouldn't have been placed at Hillsdale as a single guy from Wooster. But this is an instance where hindsight doesn't work like it normally would. As far as I can tell, I shouldn't have been placed at Hillsdale, but looking back, hindsight says it was the best thing. That's an analog for the Kingdom of God, it really is. He used Hillsdale in me, and somehow, he used me at Hillsdale. It turns out, in the end, that no matter how much you might want to leave somewhere, it's never really easy to say goodbye.
But I'm diving in. In just a few short weeks, I'll be wrapping up all association with Hillsdale students when Chapter Focus Week ends. That will probably be harder than tomorrow, because most of the students I'll miss the most are going. Tomorrow night, at 9:30 though, I'll sing the benediction with the whole crowd one last time, but I know I'll never forget it.
Truthfully though, I haven't been myself very often at Hillsdale. For all their trumpeting about freedom, I've felt nothing if not chained to closet what I wish I could say and do on campus. "Walking on eggshells" doesn't begin to describe how its always been while I've been on campus. I can't wait to get away from all of that.
And yet, I'll dearly miss some of the people. It's hard to believe that tomorrow is my last new day prayer, my last student appointments in AJs, my last Unite. I'm glad to be ending at the beginning of the year I think, because at least I'm not the only one going through all of the lasts this time around.
In related but entirely separate realms, this is quite possibly my last night living alone too. It's been a good run, but I'm a worse person when I'm not in more constant community. I'm looking forward to experiencing that again; something I've not had since moving to Hillsdale. Part of that is my fault, but socializing with people associated with Hillsdale college, when you're not one of them, is like grasping for straws with both hands tied behind your back. To not be an outsider to even some takes an eternity; to be accepted fully in the community requires a long-form birth certificate, extensive voting history, and panoply of republican candidate bumper stickers. The requirements lessen with age, but I'm far too young.
It's a war inside of me; wanting to not-leave the people I care about; the people I want to continue to see grow versus wanting to leave as quickly as possible for more fitting and enjoyable pastures.
The war ends tomorrow.
-Zack
"There is a designer, the lament and cry of my heart to see the beauty of love as it was meant to be"
-Mumford and Sons
Tomorrow is my last day at Hillsdale. While the plan had been that I'd return for New Student Outreach in the fall, extenuating circumstances ended up dictating otherwise. I'll be starting at Cleveland State right away in the fall. I'm excited about that. Very excited. It will be the beginning of the work I feel like my life has been tending toward forever. I'll finally be doing something the feels like something I'm supposed to be doing. I'll be able to be me.
But I've got to get through tomorrow, and right now, that's got me pensive. I can't wait to move onto the life I'm more excited to lead. I can't wait to finally have a home again and be married.
But, for all its faults (and trust me, they are multifarious), I'm going to hold some slight place in my heart for the first campus I ever staffed. More than that though, because honestly, I think Hillsdale is an institution adding to the destruction of all that is good faster than they're making a positive influence in the world, I'm going to miss the people. Say what you will about the college itself and most of the people it attracts, at least 3 or 4 of the people it, at some point, for some reason, attracted, are people that I've come to love, and I will miss them, even if I enjoy my next place more on the whole.
It's where I grew up, where I first lived truly alone, and where, honestly, I had to be to meet and get to know Alexandra to the point that we ever started dating. God knew what he was doing even if, objectively, from the other side, I probably shouldn't have been placed at Hillsdale as a single guy from Wooster. But this is an instance where hindsight doesn't work like it normally would. As far as I can tell, I shouldn't have been placed at Hillsdale, but looking back, hindsight says it was the best thing. That's an analog for the Kingdom of God, it really is. He used Hillsdale in me, and somehow, he used me at Hillsdale. It turns out, in the end, that no matter how much you might want to leave somewhere, it's never really easy to say goodbye.
But I'm diving in. In just a few short weeks, I'll be wrapping up all association with Hillsdale students when Chapter Focus Week ends. That will probably be harder than tomorrow, because most of the students I'll miss the most are going. Tomorrow night, at 9:30 though, I'll sing the benediction with the whole crowd one last time, but I know I'll never forget it.
Truthfully though, I haven't been myself very often at Hillsdale. For all their trumpeting about freedom, I've felt nothing if not chained to closet what I wish I could say and do on campus. "Walking on eggshells" doesn't begin to describe how its always been while I've been on campus. I can't wait to get away from all of that.
And yet, I'll dearly miss some of the people. It's hard to believe that tomorrow is my last new day prayer, my last student appointments in AJs, my last Unite. I'm glad to be ending at the beginning of the year I think, because at least I'm not the only one going through all of the lasts this time around.
In related but entirely separate realms, this is quite possibly my last night living alone too. It's been a good run, but I'm a worse person when I'm not in more constant community. I'm looking forward to experiencing that again; something I've not had since moving to Hillsdale. Part of that is my fault, but socializing with people associated with Hillsdale college, when you're not one of them, is like grasping for straws with both hands tied behind your back. To not be an outsider to even some takes an eternity; to be accepted fully in the community requires a long-form birth certificate, extensive voting history, and panoply of republican candidate bumper stickers. The requirements lessen with age, but I'm far too young.
It's a war inside of me; wanting to not-leave the people I care about; the people I want to continue to see grow versus wanting to leave as quickly as possible for more fitting and enjoyable pastures.
The war ends tomorrow.
-Zack
"There is a designer, the lament and cry of my heart to see the beauty of love as it was meant to be"
-Mumford and Sons
Monday, April 18, 2011
The Window
Presented with the facts, we just turn away and look at what we want to see; listen to what we want to hear; feel what we want to feel.
There's a subconscious power-struggle inside of me, between what I want to write and what I feel like I should write. Neither is really right.
I've never had a format I liked. The only lasting format was when I'd write daily updates and talk about what I did during the day. I can't and won't post daily on here and I wouldn't want to write about what I do everyday. It's probably more exciting than what I did during High School, but that doesn't make it actually exciting.
Because my last two posts were serious and spiritual, I feel pangs of regret that I don't really have the will to do that right now. I feel like I should keep that up. I feel like I should develop a theme and thereby, perhaps someday, develop a readership.
But that's not why I write this. In all honesty, I write this, recently, because I can't think of where to go in other things I'm writing during my designated writing-time each day. I write just to fill up an hour.
That's not to say I didn't mean the last two posts. But they were fabricated out of needing to fill an hour more than inspired by something passionately welling up inside of me. That's not to say, either, that I'm not passionate about what I wrote.
But I'm not passionate about writing theological, philosophical, sociological critiques, analysis, or whatever you wish to call anything in those veins that I might write.
I'm passionate about words; how they fit together and what they express. I don't believe in definitions; I believe in the supple arbitrariness of language, gaged by the understanding of the readers- so I strive for accuracy, but hate when people make arguments based on definition or mis-definitions. Words don't mean anything I don't mean them to because if they did I wouldn't use them as I did. The only reason knowing what a word means means anything at all is just so you can interpret what I'm trying to say. But you'll never quite know because you're not me. Nor will I ever know what you read when you read what I write because I'm not you. Italicized words mean much less when you use too many of them. It would hold then, that an italicized word has no real meaning on its own; just like the rest of language.
I don't know really, what that means for The Bible. I actually change my opinion on that every day it seems. But I do know that the meaning the Bible signifies is the word of God. What the Bible says, however, is a different matter. Most would say you can't divorce the two, but I don't see how to do anything else. If there's not meaning bigger, broader, larger than the words on the page, I don't know if I could believe the Bible as such. It's just another book at that point. Words don't do anything if they're not signifying a meaning apart from themselves.
There's a lot of hubbub about "accuracy" in translations of the Bible, but I don't quite understand why. Actually, I do understand why, but I hate the fact and would rather pretend not to acknowledge it than give it the thought-space in my brain. I don't really care, what the Hebrew says or what the closest English equivalent is or has been. I care what the Hebrew is signifying, and I want the best way to express that to a reader or hearer. But every reader/hearer is different. We're similar enough that we don't need personalized Bibles. But we're different enough that just reading the Bible isn't enough.
And so the circular castle circles back on itself and I've only got one thing to say: It all comes back to community. God created us all in his image and we're not going to find that on our own. He gave us his Bible but we all read it with unique eyes. Our best hope is to go at it together. Our best hope is to go at life together. Then we'll get closer, but not just because we'll know the Bible better together. It's actually a bit different, to some degree. When we're doing that, we're doing what I'll shout to the day I die: we're meant, above all else, to love one another. Love is done best in community. God didn't make language ambiguous because he's got it out for us. He did it because we need to love one another.
-Zack
"I swallow the sound and it swallows me whole"
-Florence and the Machine
There's a subconscious power-struggle inside of me, between what I want to write and what I feel like I should write. Neither is really right.
I've never had a format I liked. The only lasting format was when I'd write daily updates and talk about what I did during the day. I can't and won't post daily on here and I wouldn't want to write about what I do everyday. It's probably more exciting than what I did during High School, but that doesn't make it actually exciting.
Because my last two posts were serious and spiritual, I feel pangs of regret that I don't really have the will to do that right now. I feel like I should keep that up. I feel like I should develop a theme and thereby, perhaps someday, develop a readership.
But that's not why I write this. In all honesty, I write this, recently, because I can't think of where to go in other things I'm writing during my designated writing-time each day. I write just to fill up an hour.
That's not to say I didn't mean the last two posts. But they were fabricated out of needing to fill an hour more than inspired by something passionately welling up inside of me. That's not to say, either, that I'm not passionate about what I wrote.
But I'm not passionate about writing theological, philosophical, sociological critiques, analysis, or whatever you wish to call anything in those veins that I might write.
I'm passionate about words; how they fit together and what they express. I don't believe in definitions; I believe in the supple arbitrariness of language, gaged by the understanding of the readers- so I strive for accuracy, but hate when people make arguments based on definition or mis-definitions. Words don't mean anything I don't mean them to because if they did I wouldn't use them as I did. The only reason knowing what a word means means anything at all is just so you can interpret what I'm trying to say. But you'll never quite know because you're not me. Nor will I ever know what you read when you read what I write because I'm not you. Italicized words mean much less when you use too many of them. It would hold then, that an italicized word has no real meaning on its own; just like the rest of language.
I don't know really, what that means for The Bible. I actually change my opinion on that every day it seems. But I do know that the meaning the Bible signifies is the word of God. What the Bible says, however, is a different matter. Most would say you can't divorce the two, but I don't see how to do anything else. If there's not meaning bigger, broader, larger than the words on the page, I don't know if I could believe the Bible as such. It's just another book at that point. Words don't do anything if they're not signifying a meaning apart from themselves.
There's a lot of hubbub about "accuracy" in translations of the Bible, but I don't quite understand why. Actually, I do understand why, but I hate the fact and would rather pretend not to acknowledge it than give it the thought-space in my brain. I don't really care, what the Hebrew says or what the closest English equivalent is or has been. I care what the Hebrew is signifying, and I want the best way to express that to a reader or hearer. But every reader/hearer is different. We're similar enough that we don't need personalized Bibles. But we're different enough that just reading the Bible isn't enough.
And so the circular castle circles back on itself and I've only got one thing to say: It all comes back to community. God created us all in his image and we're not going to find that on our own. He gave us his Bible but we all read it with unique eyes. Our best hope is to go at it together. Our best hope is to go at life together. Then we'll get closer, but not just because we'll know the Bible better together. It's actually a bit different, to some degree. When we're doing that, we're doing what I'll shout to the day I die: we're meant, above all else, to love one another. Love is done best in community. God didn't make language ambiguous because he's got it out for us. He did it because we need to love one another.
-Zack
"I swallow the sound and it swallows me whole"
-Florence and the Machine
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
The only Word I could Say
For just about one year now, I've been thinking about what it means to be a Christian, in the simplest terms. I've been thinking through our systematized theology. I've been thinking through how we let it shape how we live. I don't have many real answers yet, but I'm finding that we've made up our own set of qualifiers, our own language, our own definitions. I'm coming to realize that we're not necessarily off-base biblically, but I don't think the reformation is done yet, if I could even claim what I see as happening, at least in my own thinking, as something joined to the long-line of reformers.
I read a blog-post by someone I respect dearly the other day that was a walk-through/series of meditations on the Sheep and the Goats passage from Matthew 25. If you read that passage (verses 31-46), Jesus talks about how the sheep, the true followers, are those who visit prisoners, feed the hungry, clothe the poor. The blog post describes this passage as a "hard passage" because it seems to fly in the face of the Evangelical "By-Grace-Alone" mindset. This blog's author goes on to rationalize this passage with the grace-alone tenet by saying that said actions making one a sheep and not a goat are the sign of an inner-change. Maybe that's true. But I don't see where it says that in this particular passage, and I don't see how people are judged for their works in the grace-alone passages. This isn't to say there isn't an inner change that can lead to good works. But Jesus doesn't count those who don't do his work among his true followers. As he says near the end of John: "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." But what are Jesus' commandments? Are they to "have a personal relationship, keep a quiet time, hand out bulletins, teach sunday school, run a soundboard, lead a bible study?" Unfortunately, outside of a very broad interpretation of one word in the great commission, none of those general Christian expressions of good works and service to God are actually commanded by Jesus, even in their 1st century equivalents (whatever those may be). The greatest commandment is to Love God. The 2nd is to love others. What really, are the things Jesus does command- to meet the physical needs of others, as he does, to put others over self, to seek peace at all costs, to bring the disenfranchised into the fold- but expressions of love for our neighbors? Jesus' way is the way of love. That's all he did, all he could do. It's, per the 3rd chapter of John, the reason he came and his constant exhortation for all of us. I'm not sure what I'm saying because I'm not quite sure what to make of all of this, but I know, for certain, that even a hint of greed is the opposite of Jesus' way...and what's more, not just greed, but doing anything at all that comes at the expense of another, is not Jesus' way.
When I look at all Jesus did, the sorts of things he said, what often strikes me much of the time is how he seems to choose the people with whom he disagrees. The rich, who refuse to surrender their place of power from wealth. The synagogue leaders, scribes, pharisees, sadducees...though all different sects in their own way, they all refused to give up their power as religious leaders. But he never had beef with someone because they were a sinner. I imagine they were repentant sinners, but there are actually few accounts of repentance and I can't recall any where Jesus actually require it. By encountering Jesus; who he is, how he acts, what he says; those are when stories of repentance come about. I can't help but think it has much to do with the lack of judgment and condemnation he with which he handled them. It's about love. It's all about love. Jesus' love transformed people. Even at his sternest, he expressed love for the downtrodden.
Maybe I'm selectively reading. Maybe I'm just missing something. But I can't find a single instance wherein Jesus commands anything but love. This isn't to say he gives license to sin. If anything, it's more and more an implication of grace. Jesus seems to speak so little of specific sins simply because he openly acknowledges that everyone is a sinner. But even so, as such, as anything, they are in need and deserve love. In fact, as far as I can tell, it seems "evil" is most often identified by Jesus as an infringement upon another, less fortunate person. This isn't to say that personal sin doesn't matter to Jesus. But Jesus is much less concerned, it seems with the "personal relationship stuff" we've essentially fabricated through systematic theology in the last 80 years, than he is with proclaiming a new way, a new thing...the Kingdom of Heaven, come to earth and demarcated by the way people love one another and love God. It seems to me we've stripped the Gospel Jesus actually preached of much of its potency, of much of its point. Yes, Jesus said believe in me and you'll have eternal life. But more often than that, he told people about the Kingdom of God and urged them to live as if it's real and can be realized here and now in even some small way, ever increasing til the end of days. But that's not the Gospel we preach. We, I, InterVarsity, most churches, teach that Jesus came so we could go to heaven. He came so he could die so we could be made right with God. That's all true, it is, it happened, it's the result of his life on Earth, resurrection, and ascension. But it's so small a part of the larger story, at least content wise...and I can't help but think that that matters. It matters, it seems, that Jesus told people to love one another and to love God in real, tangible ways, but never told them "believe in me, do all you can to get close to me, and when I'm done, you'll go to heaven" He expressed something like that and it goes something like this "When I was thirsty, you gave me water, when I was hungry, you gave me food, when I was in prison...." yeah, the sheep and the goats thing. It's how we express our devotion to Jesus, beyond all else. If that weren't true, if Paul came along and set the record straight, as we often act preach in a twisted sort of way, why did Jesus say what he said? Yes, believing in Jesus, that he died for your sins and rose from the dead is all it takes to "get to heaven." But I don't just want to do what it takes to get to heaven. I want to actually follow Jesus. He said make disciples, not believers. Disciples do as their master did and as their master commands...and my master commands me to love. How that plays out varies depending on the person I'm engaged in loving at the moment, but I'm positive and convinced it means much more than a bridge or four circles.
-Zack
"When those men were ready to stone Magdalene, I hated them, I wanted to kill them. But the only word I could say was 'love'"
-Nikos Kazantzakis
I read a blog-post by someone I respect dearly the other day that was a walk-through/series of meditations on the Sheep and the Goats passage from Matthew 25. If you read that passage (verses 31-46), Jesus talks about how the sheep, the true followers, are those who visit prisoners, feed the hungry, clothe the poor. The blog post describes this passage as a "hard passage" because it seems to fly in the face of the Evangelical "By-Grace-Alone" mindset. This blog's author goes on to rationalize this passage with the grace-alone tenet by saying that said actions making one a sheep and not a goat are the sign of an inner-change. Maybe that's true. But I don't see where it says that in this particular passage, and I don't see how people are judged for their works in the grace-alone passages. This isn't to say there isn't an inner change that can lead to good works. But Jesus doesn't count those who don't do his work among his true followers. As he says near the end of John: "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." But what are Jesus' commandments? Are they to "have a personal relationship, keep a quiet time, hand out bulletins, teach sunday school, run a soundboard, lead a bible study?" Unfortunately, outside of a very broad interpretation of one word in the great commission, none of those general Christian expressions of good works and service to God are actually commanded by Jesus, even in their 1st century equivalents (whatever those may be). The greatest commandment is to Love God. The 2nd is to love others. What really, are the things Jesus does command- to meet the physical needs of others, as he does, to put others over self, to seek peace at all costs, to bring the disenfranchised into the fold- but expressions of love for our neighbors? Jesus' way is the way of love. That's all he did, all he could do. It's, per the 3rd chapter of John, the reason he came and his constant exhortation for all of us. I'm not sure what I'm saying because I'm not quite sure what to make of all of this, but I know, for certain, that even a hint of greed is the opposite of Jesus' way...and what's more, not just greed, but doing anything at all that comes at the expense of another, is not Jesus' way.
When I look at all Jesus did, the sorts of things he said, what often strikes me much of the time is how he seems to choose the people with whom he disagrees. The rich, who refuse to surrender their place of power from wealth. The synagogue leaders, scribes, pharisees, sadducees...though all different sects in their own way, they all refused to give up their power as religious leaders. But he never had beef with someone because they were a sinner. I imagine they were repentant sinners, but there are actually few accounts of repentance and I can't recall any where Jesus actually require it. By encountering Jesus; who he is, how he acts, what he says; those are when stories of repentance come about. I can't help but think it has much to do with the lack of judgment and condemnation he with which he handled them. It's about love. It's all about love. Jesus' love transformed people. Even at his sternest, he expressed love for the downtrodden.
Maybe I'm selectively reading. Maybe I'm just missing something. But I can't find a single instance wherein Jesus commands anything but love. This isn't to say he gives license to sin. If anything, it's more and more an implication of grace. Jesus seems to speak so little of specific sins simply because he openly acknowledges that everyone is a sinner. But even so, as such, as anything, they are in need and deserve love. In fact, as far as I can tell, it seems "evil" is most often identified by Jesus as an infringement upon another, less fortunate person. This isn't to say that personal sin doesn't matter to Jesus. But Jesus is much less concerned, it seems with the "personal relationship stuff" we've essentially fabricated through systematic theology in the last 80 years, than he is with proclaiming a new way, a new thing...the Kingdom of Heaven, come to earth and demarcated by the way people love one another and love God. It seems to me we've stripped the Gospel Jesus actually preached of much of its potency, of much of its point. Yes, Jesus said believe in me and you'll have eternal life. But more often than that, he told people about the Kingdom of God and urged them to live as if it's real and can be realized here and now in even some small way, ever increasing til the end of days. But that's not the Gospel we preach. We, I, InterVarsity, most churches, teach that Jesus came so we could go to heaven. He came so he could die so we could be made right with God. That's all true, it is, it happened, it's the result of his life on Earth, resurrection, and ascension. But it's so small a part of the larger story, at least content wise...and I can't help but think that that matters. It matters, it seems, that Jesus told people to love one another and to love God in real, tangible ways, but never told them "believe in me, do all you can to get close to me, and when I'm done, you'll go to heaven" He expressed something like that and it goes something like this "When I was thirsty, you gave me water, when I was hungry, you gave me food, when I was in prison...." yeah, the sheep and the goats thing. It's how we express our devotion to Jesus, beyond all else. If that weren't true, if Paul came along and set the record straight, as we often act preach in a twisted sort of way, why did Jesus say what he said? Yes, believing in Jesus, that he died for your sins and rose from the dead is all it takes to "get to heaven." But I don't just want to do what it takes to get to heaven. I want to actually follow Jesus. He said make disciples, not believers. Disciples do as their master did and as their master commands...and my master commands me to love. How that plays out varies depending on the person I'm engaged in loving at the moment, but I'm positive and convinced it means much more than a bridge or four circles.
-Zack
"When those men were ready to stone Magdalene, I hated them, I wanted to kill them. But the only word I could say was 'love'"
-Nikos Kazantzakis
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Who (or What) We Think We Are
Around Hillsdale and around InterVarsity, and around Christian circles altogether, we've created a ghost. We've created a standard not only impossible to attain, but impossible to define, at least correctly.
There are sermons.
There are books.
There are support groups.
But I'm beginning to think it might be a big mistake or at least a gross misreading.
I'm pondering the idea of "Biblical Masculinity" and I'm a bit puzzled as to from where the idea springs. I don't have a seminary degree, I'm sure there's a lot more I have to learn about the Bible, but other than the instructions in Ephesians for men to "Love their wives," I'm not so sure there's a lot for us to base an idea of what it means to be a man, biblically speaking.
"There are men in the Bible we can look to because they're called holy and Godly!" you say.
Yes, but outside of Christ, none of them are perfect and none of them are praised for things delineated as specifically good because they are men. Indeed, most of the lauding of people like David (an adulterer) or Gideon (a idolater later in life) have to do with where their hearts lie and their motives...absolutely nothing about "manly character." All of that being said, it's not even taking into account the fact that our Biblical stories exist because God wanted us to have a record about his faithfulness...not so we'll have people to pattern our lives after outside of Christ. If, in fact, we're striving to be like anyone aside from Christ, that's very near sin and extraordinarily unbiblical.
So where does it come from? If you have any insight, let me know. I have my suspicions though, and, as always, they're steeped in the ongoing lie the western church buys wholesale known as modernity.
As I outline within the first few pages of my I.S. (and onward), modernity is the increasingly defunct ideological pursuit of the best possible version of everything. It relied on ideas that things had thingness and they were at their best when best reflecting the truest version of that thingness. That is a load of crap, of course, as Foucault and Derrida would tell us. But still the idea persists and gets applied across the board. As it applies to the false gender dichotomy, the idea that something could be "more" manly than other things emerged, (or, of course, more "lady-like"). That was always incorrect because the idea of man and woman being intrinsically different was created for a patriarchal hegemony, but it somehow survived, especially in the Church. From the idea that something could be more masculine than something else the Church decided that wasn't always helpful but, if we baptize it in enough churchy jargon, maybe we can keep petting the ego of men by telling them they can still be more masculine than others, if they do it biblically. Newsflash: That's still harmful and has led to woman hating themselves, gay people being hated by the church, and men who are less up to the (totally baseless) standard we've established hating themselves too. So who benefits? As always, the patriarchal hegemony. That's not Christlike. That's the last thing Jesus would have ever wanted. And yet...it's what we call a biblical model. There are virtues we identify as manly, of course...how could those be bad? They aren't...but they're virtues if women have them too. Taking charge and being in control of a situation are completely gender neutral and should be...but we don't let them be...because that wouldn't help the hegemony.
Our Regional director in InterVarsity has a life's principal, that he'll never let a racially disparaging comment go unanswered. I try to do the same. I think I'm going to start striving to call shenanigans on the principal of masculinity, wherever it's found while I'm at it...it's harmful too.
-Zack
"Tell me tell me, could you ever really comprehend what goes on in his head?"
-Sons of Adam
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
laissez
This time of year, students start to fade into the woods a bit. They're busy and their minds are less and less on ministry with each passing day. As staff, it's basically my job, this time of year, to keep them excited and to keep pressing onward, through Chapter Focus Week.
But this year, that's hard, because my mind and heart aren't really in the ministry right now either. The impending leaving of Hillsdale (and the unnatural amount of energy it takes for me to connect with a typical Hilldale student) pushes my heart to a different place. The coming wedding fills my hope for the future more than planning for a year I won't be a part of at Hillsdale. I know I should care more. I know I should love the people God's called into my life for me to serve at this time. But I just don't.
I can see, looking back over the last two years, how God has used my time at Hillsdale to steer my life.
But that feels over. The usefulness of Hillsdale in my life and very nearly my usefulness around here all feel spent. I honestly don't know how I'm going to have it in me to come back for a month in the fall, to say nothing of trying to care when its very far from the most important thing in my life over the summer.
But it's the task at hand. I've got to perform. I'm spent.
But thankfully, God's storehouses are always full. He can still pour out mercies and grace and rest. I've got to lean on him entirely right now, because honestly, I've got nothing inside of me to give to this place anymore.
-Zack
"We may make it through the war if we make it through the night"
-Portugal. The Man
But this year, that's hard, because my mind and heart aren't really in the ministry right now either. The impending leaving of Hillsdale (and the unnatural amount of energy it takes for me to connect with a typical Hilldale student) pushes my heart to a different place. The coming wedding fills my hope for the future more than planning for a year I won't be a part of at Hillsdale. I know I should care more. I know I should love the people God's called into my life for me to serve at this time. But I just don't.
I can see, looking back over the last two years, how God has used my time at Hillsdale to steer my life.
But that feels over. The usefulness of Hillsdale in my life and very nearly my usefulness around here all feel spent. I honestly don't know how I'm going to have it in me to come back for a month in the fall, to say nothing of trying to care when its very far from the most important thing in my life over the summer.
But it's the task at hand. I've got to perform. I'm spent.
But thankfully, God's storehouses are always full. He can still pour out mercies and grace and rest. I've got to lean on him entirely right now, because honestly, I've got nothing inside of me to give to this place anymore.
-Zack
"We may make it through the war if we make it through the night"
-Portugal. The Man
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Writing about Writing
It's not been the most uncommon occurrence for me to say something, on this blog or its past incarnations, like this :"I've been feeling, lately, like I should write more."
I even went as far, at the beginning of the year, as making "write more" one of my new year's resolutions. If you're an at all frequent reader of this thing, you'd know that I've mostly failed that one. Actually, "frequent readers" don't really exist right now, unless they're more like "re-readers," because I just don't update all that often. Maybe I average once per week, maybe...but even then , it's irregular. Right now, obviously, it's Sunday. Last week, it was Monday. I don't honestly remember my last post prior to last Mondays, but it was probably a week or so prior to last Monday. That's my rough, poor, schedule.
But it doesn't mean any of the feelings have subsided. Actually, they just increase. It's oftentimes the only thing I can say I feel "right" doing. If I'm doing anything else, it probably feels like it's less of what I'm supposed to be doing. That can't apply across the board, but it's pretty close. Most of the time, I spend m days feeling like I'm not doing enough, feeling like I'm failing to some extent. But never, not once, in my entire life, have I felt like writing was a waste of time. I used to post on here every Thursday between getting off work at 11 and our Stewardship meeting at 12. I never once used that time for homework, but I never once felt like I should have either.
Everyone's got their thing like that, and I think mine is writing. But I don't know what that means right now.
-Zack
"Til we get our freedom we got to get over, we steady on the grind"
-Dead Prez
I even went as far, at the beginning of the year, as making "write more" one of my new year's resolutions. If you're an at all frequent reader of this thing, you'd know that I've mostly failed that one. Actually, "frequent readers" don't really exist right now, unless they're more like "re-readers," because I just don't update all that often. Maybe I average once per week, maybe...but even then , it's irregular. Right now, obviously, it's Sunday. Last week, it was Monday. I don't honestly remember my last post prior to last Mondays, but it was probably a week or so prior to last Monday. That's my rough, poor, schedule.
But it doesn't mean any of the feelings have subsided. Actually, they just increase. It's oftentimes the only thing I can say I feel "right" doing. If I'm doing anything else, it probably feels like it's less of what I'm supposed to be doing. That can't apply across the board, but it's pretty close. Most of the time, I spend m days feeling like I'm not doing enough, feeling like I'm failing to some extent. But never, not once, in my entire life, have I felt like writing was a waste of time. I used to post on here every Thursday between getting off work at 11 and our Stewardship meeting at 12. I never once used that time for homework, but I never once felt like I should have either.
Everyone's got their thing like that, and I think mine is writing. But I don't know what that means right now.
-Zack
"Til we get our freedom we got to get over, we steady on the grind"
-Dead Prez
Monday, March 28, 2011
you know what it I.S.... (black and yellow and a number and your class year and a tootsie roll on the side)
It's I.S. Monday. Thanks to last Monday I've been thinking about Wooster a lot lately. Heck, thanks to a movie I watched Saturday night, I've been thinking about my I.S. a lot lately even. (A Serious Man. It's like they read my I.S. and don't want to prove me wrong or something....). Today, thanks to a conversation that was pretty "Wooster-centric" that I had last week, I even kind of changed a students life with a story.
But that's not surprising. It should be the least surprising part to any of the previous paragraph. Wooster changes lives right? That's what Loren Pope said at least, in his book.
I can't argue with him. Who I am today, I am because of Wooster, perhaps more than anything else.
Check it:
I wouldn't be the Christian I am today without WCF. I don't even know if I'd still be a Christian. Maybe I would. Maybe, if I went to OSU and got involved in InterVarsity, my life wouldn't be THAT different. But who knows? I went to Wooster, and that's where I found out how to follow Jesus with my life and not just my words.
I wouldn't have ever met Alexandra. "But you met her at home!" you could argue. But I met her through a connection I made at a church I went to because I went to a church...in Wooster.
I wouldn't be moving to Cleveland. I wouldn't love Cleveland.
I wouldn't value everyone as a human. I wouldn't try to love everyone. I wouldn't look for the good in everything, if there' any to be found.
I wouldn't feel like someday, I could write a book. Why do I feel this way? Because, to some extent...I already have. It's 100 pages long and it's called "The Dude Abides: Exploring Post-Modernism Through the Films of Joel and Ethan Coen by the Decentering of Modernist Aestheticism in Le Politique Des Auteurs".
But all of that is just a list of things that immediately come to mind. There's more...much more. I'm more well adjusted to life. I'm probably smarter. I'm sure, really, I don't know all of the ways Wooster changed me, for better or for worse. Most of the time, I can't actually convince myself there was any "worse."
There's just a connection; an ever-present, overwhelming sense of communality and unity. "I Did It!" and so did you...even though I don't know your name or understand your topic or agree with your thesis of your thesis. You did it. I did it. We did it.
I miss Wooster a lot. Hillsdale is not Wooster, not by a longshot. I get told, far too often, that my education wasn't as good because it wasn't "Hillsdale." If that's true, then I'd rather have a worse education, because I wouldn't trade what I did have for those four years for anything in all the world, or for everything I am and have now because of them.
But I.S. Monday, then graduation, they're a starting line. Upward and onward, to somewhere and something...it's why we went at all, it's why we wrote at all, and it's where we're headed.
Today is about, primarily, the class of 2011. But to every single Wooster alum from years prior, it's our day too.
How quickly two years have gone...
-Zack
#27, class of 2009
But that's not surprising. It should be the least surprising part to any of the previous paragraph. Wooster changes lives right? That's what Loren Pope said at least, in his book.
I can't argue with him. Who I am today, I am because of Wooster, perhaps more than anything else.
Check it:
I wouldn't be the Christian I am today without WCF. I don't even know if I'd still be a Christian. Maybe I would. Maybe, if I went to OSU and got involved in InterVarsity, my life wouldn't be THAT different. But who knows? I went to Wooster, and that's where I found out how to follow Jesus with my life and not just my words.
I wouldn't have ever met Alexandra. "But you met her at home!" you could argue. But I met her through a connection I made at a church I went to because I went to a church...in Wooster.
I wouldn't be moving to Cleveland. I wouldn't love Cleveland.
I wouldn't value everyone as a human. I wouldn't try to love everyone. I wouldn't look for the good in everything, if there' any to be found.
I wouldn't feel like someday, I could write a book. Why do I feel this way? Because, to some extent...I already have. It's 100 pages long and it's called "The Dude Abides: Exploring Post-Modernism Through the Films of Joel and Ethan Coen by the Decentering of Modernist Aestheticism in Le Politique Des Auteurs".
But all of that is just a list of things that immediately come to mind. There's more...much more. I'm more well adjusted to life. I'm probably smarter. I'm sure, really, I don't know all of the ways Wooster changed me, for better or for worse. Most of the time, I can't actually convince myself there was any "worse."
There's just a connection; an ever-present, overwhelming sense of communality and unity. "I Did It!" and so did you...even though I don't know your name or understand your topic or agree with your thesis of your thesis. You did it. I did it. We did it.
I miss Wooster a lot. Hillsdale is not Wooster, not by a longshot. I get told, far too often, that my education wasn't as good because it wasn't "Hillsdale." If that's true, then I'd rather have a worse education, because I wouldn't trade what I did have for those four years for anything in all the world, or for everything I am and have now because of them.
But I.S. Monday, then graduation, they're a starting line. Upward and onward, to somewhere and something...it's why we went at all, it's why we wrote at all, and it's where we're headed.
Today is about, primarily, the class of 2011. But to every single Wooster alum from years prior, it's our day too.
How quickly two years have gone...
-Zack
#27, class of 2009
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Getting there
I'll be getting married in about 8 months and 2 hoursish. I don't know how or when that will fully sink in (maybe in about 8 months and 1 year....)
But!
We have an apartment, officially...We're going to start moving Alexandra in on May 2nd....my move in date is over 6 months after that. But it's a step...and we're getting there, to the fullness we'll eventually embrace.
But even so, in between, there is so much to look forward to right now...in 45 minutes, Wooster plays in their first ever national championship game. I'm grateful for streaming live video today. I like when my teams at least get to the championship round...at least they get a shot and "could have beens" aren't applicable....in that vein, I've got high hopes for Ohio State's basketball team right now too...
But I'm also disappointed, very much so, in Ohio State's football team right now. I don't care how they do...I just hope the rules-breaking ends...
Today though, is festive...
Go Scots!
-Zack
"Don't say it's over, cause that's the worst news I could hear"
-The Avett Brothers
But!
We have an apartment, officially...We're going to start moving Alexandra in on May 2nd....my move in date is over 6 months after that. But it's a step...and we're getting there, to the fullness we'll eventually embrace.
But even so, in between, there is so much to look forward to right now...in 45 minutes, Wooster plays in their first ever national championship game. I'm grateful for streaming live video today. I like when my teams at least get to the championship round...at least they get a shot and "could have beens" aren't applicable....in that vein, I've got high hopes for Ohio State's basketball team right now too...
But I'm also disappointed, very much so, in Ohio State's football team right now. I don't care how they do...I just hope the rules-breaking ends...
Today though, is festive...
Go Scots!
-Zack
"Don't say it's over, cause that's the worst news I could hear"
-The Avett Brothers
Friday, March 11, 2011
I'm journeying into Cleveland this weekend, to look at apartments, hopefully picking one where we'll live, after we're married. It's a step, kind of a dream, and a step toward a dream.
It's fitting, then, that this is also the weekend of the Cleveland Urban Plunge. If it weren't for that InterVarsity urban experience (3 year veteran as a student myself), we wouldn't be moving to Cleveland at all, I don't think...or at least it played a big role, on my end, to not just being okay with it because that's where Alexandra's job is going to be, but actually being uncontrollably excited about it.
Already, God has been faithfully bringing in new funds to help jumpstart the ministry at Cleveland State. He is faithful.
-Zack
"cause I need freedom now, and I need to know how to live my life like it's meant to be"
-Mumford and Sons
It's fitting, then, that this is also the weekend of the Cleveland Urban Plunge. If it weren't for that InterVarsity urban experience (3 year veteran as a student myself), we wouldn't be moving to Cleveland at all, I don't think...or at least it played a big role, on my end, to not just being okay with it because that's where Alexandra's job is going to be, but actually being uncontrollably excited about it.
Already, God has been faithfully bringing in new funds to help jumpstart the ministry at Cleveland State. He is faithful.
-Zack
"cause I need freedom now, and I need to know how to live my life like it's meant to be"
-Mumford and Sons
Friday, March 4, 2011
Some things, they just don't make sense
According to the majority of Americans who voted in November (If I'm supposed to believe that democracy works...), it's better for less than 1 percent of them to have 3 percent less taxes to pay on their hundreds of millions, but it's not right for teachers to negotiate for higher wages on top of their less-than-$50,000.
In fact, if teachers get to negotiate, surely, our economy will crumble...and yet, allowing a millions of dollars to come into the national treasury would be a wrongful infringement on the select-few's rights.
For one, that's not democracy. There are a lot more teachers than multi-millionaires in this country.
Further, Democracy, as the ruling party would proclaim, means letting the majority do what they want because they're the majority.
But what if the majority is wrong?
I don't know how to say they weren't, last November.
Capitalism and Democracy don't even jive with each other when it comes to worker's rights...Labor is the majority.
I could rail, and will continue to later, hard against the masochistic tendencies of the electorate, but what's the use?
The Kingdom of God is the only perfect society, and Jesus wouldn't have come if you could simply regulate its rule into existence. It's just so painful, that so man fellow-participants, or, should-be-participants in God's Kingdom align themselves with political policies that crush the equality and welfare of the disenfranchised. Greed and stepping over and on top of the less powerful are the name of the game in our "free-market democracy." If Jesus was for that, we're reading different Bibles.
" Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." -James 1:27
-Zack
In fact, if teachers get to negotiate, surely, our economy will crumble...and yet, allowing a millions of dollars to come into the national treasury would be a wrongful infringement on the select-few's rights.
For one, that's not democracy. There are a lot more teachers than multi-millionaires in this country.
Further, Democracy, as the ruling party would proclaim, means letting the majority do what they want because they're the majority.
But what if the majority is wrong?
I don't know how to say they weren't, last November.
Capitalism and Democracy don't even jive with each other when it comes to worker's rights...Labor is the majority.
I could rail, and will continue to later, hard against the masochistic tendencies of the electorate, but what's the use?
The Kingdom of God is the only perfect society, and Jesus wouldn't have come if you could simply regulate its rule into existence. It's just so painful, that so man fellow-participants, or, should-be-participants in God's Kingdom align themselves with political policies that crush the equality and welfare of the disenfranchised. Greed and stepping over and on top of the less powerful are the name of the game in our "free-market democracy." If Jesus was for that, we're reading different Bibles.
" Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." -James 1:27
-Zack
"You could still be who you wish you is; it ain't happened yet and that's what a tuition is"
-Kanye West
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The Middle
The future starts today. Though I think of those who read this as a sort of ambiguous cloud, I recognize that I actually know most of you in person and the bulk of our relationship is completely offline. I prefer that, so that's not at all shocking to me. But even so, I feel like I make things unofficially official by writing about them on here. It's like a place to make announcements but it's off the beaten path of the information superhighway so that it's not like a facebook status or even a tweet (depending on who you are or how you roll, your own signposts, depending where they land, will differ....a celebrity's twitter is his or her most public form, probably followed by his or her blog, then facebook, provided he or she has all of those). So this is a bit of a cop-out, but I felt like I had to make it known so I could really get down to brass-tacks:
Today, I'm officially making real steps toward my future on staff in Cleveland. In a conversation with my supervisor, he suggested I step away a bit from duties at Hillsdale so I could concentrate on fundraising toward Cleveland. That doesn't mean a huge change...a few less hours on campus really. But it means I'm starting to craft the resources, make the contact, communicate the mission, for a new place.
But I'm very much in the middle; in between the here and now and the future.
The here an now is keeping on with the ministry through the beginning of Octoberish. The future is planting and building a ministry at Cleveland State.
The result is a task-list mixed with supporting and developing, as I can, what's here, and developing the support base for Cleveland. The other result is a bag of mixed emotions, even more mixed.
Here's a concatenation of a rundown:
-leaving Hillsdale (+) this is a hard place to work and students often seem to wish I wasn't around
-leaving Hillsdale (+) there is literally 0 financial support to be gained in the larger community. Alumni distrust InterVarsity and the town of Hillsdale is impoverished.
-Leaving Hillsdale (+) Capitalism is next to godliness here, and I believe, in reality, capitalism is the #1 reason American Christianity is growing more and more impotent, and we increase our embrace of the unbiblical and idolatrous ideology it truly is.
-leaving Hillsdale (-) There are some brilliant students here and working with them has been a joy
-leaving Hillsdale (-) I'll have poured 2+ years into this place and I'm leaving it for something unestablished
-leaving Hillsdale (-) I'm walking away from a ministry on the verge of exploding (in a good way) that didn't even exist when I got to campus..it's like sending Warren Buffet to college, if you're Warren Buffet's parents.
-Going to Cleveland (+) it's my favorite city in the world and living there, being there, breathing, eating, working there feels like something I was created to do.
-Going to Cleveland (+) I have friends there! Alexandra has a job there! Only an hour from Wooster!
-Going to Cleveland (+) I know people who care about Cleveland! I can fundraise all over the state I come from by working in the for which everyone has some kind of sympathetic city!
-Going to Cleveland (-) Chapter Plant! From 300 to 0. Yikes.
-Going to Cleveland (-) New church, new house, new routines, new...life. New things bring stress.
-2011 (+) New wife New life New beginning...can't count out the value of a fresh start and the excitement of getting to spend the rest of my life with the most incredible person I've ever met...
I don't know if those are balanced or what....It's a bit more complex than that, as shades of negative and positive seep in on every attribute. It does not matter though...I'm not trying to make a decision...this is a multi-faceted reality that I'm mostly very excited to embrace.
Today, is the beginning.
I don't know if what I do at Cleveland State will transform the city, but I pray it does. I pray that even one student I work with will decide to start working in the city for the Kingdom of God...one is better than none, and from one, is two so much? It's a snowball, but right now, it's barely a flake....
-Zack
"I’ma part of the problem, my problem is I’m peaceful
And I believe in the people."
Today, I'm officially making real steps toward my future on staff in Cleveland. In a conversation with my supervisor, he suggested I step away a bit from duties at Hillsdale so I could concentrate on fundraising toward Cleveland. That doesn't mean a huge change...a few less hours on campus really. But it means I'm starting to craft the resources, make the contact, communicate the mission, for a new place.
But I'm very much in the middle; in between the here and now and the future.
The here an now is keeping on with the ministry through the beginning of Octoberish. The future is planting and building a ministry at Cleveland State.
The result is a task-list mixed with supporting and developing, as I can, what's here, and developing the support base for Cleveland. The other result is a bag of mixed emotions, even more mixed.
Here's a concatenation of a rundown:
-leaving Hillsdale (+) this is a hard place to work and students often seem to wish I wasn't around
-leaving Hillsdale (+) there is literally 0 financial support to be gained in the larger community. Alumni distrust InterVarsity and the town of Hillsdale is impoverished.
-Leaving Hillsdale (+) Capitalism is next to godliness here, and I believe, in reality, capitalism is the #1 reason American Christianity is growing more and more impotent, and we increase our embrace of the unbiblical and idolatrous ideology it truly is.
-leaving Hillsdale (-) There are some brilliant students here and working with them has been a joy
-leaving Hillsdale (-) I'll have poured 2+ years into this place and I'm leaving it for something unestablished
-leaving Hillsdale (-) I'm walking away from a ministry on the verge of exploding (in a good way) that didn't even exist when I got to campus..it's like sending Warren Buffet to college, if you're Warren Buffet's parents.
-Going to Cleveland (+) it's my favorite city in the world and living there, being there, breathing, eating, working there feels like something I was created to do.
-Going to Cleveland (+) I have friends there! Alexandra has a job there! Only an hour from Wooster!
-Going to Cleveland (+) I know people who care about Cleveland! I can fundraise all over the state I come from by working in the for which everyone has some kind of sympathetic city!
-Going to Cleveland (-) Chapter Plant! From 300 to 0. Yikes.
-Going to Cleveland (-) New church, new house, new routines, new...life. New things bring stress.
-2011 (+) New wife New life New beginning...can't count out the value of a fresh start and the excitement of getting to spend the rest of my life with the most incredible person I've ever met...
I don't know if those are balanced or what....It's a bit more complex than that, as shades of negative and positive seep in on every attribute. It does not matter though...I'm not trying to make a decision...this is a multi-faceted reality that I'm mostly very excited to embrace.
Today, is the beginning.
I don't know if what I do at Cleveland State will transform the city, but I pray it does. I pray that even one student I work with will decide to start working in the city for the Kingdom of God...one is better than none, and from one, is two so much? It's a snowball, but right now, it's barely a flake....
-Zack
"I’ma part of the problem, my problem is I’m peaceful
And I believe in the people."
-Lupe Fiasco
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Of Diaries and Lockets
I've decided that writing is a Voldemortian experience, but the opposite. It's like, for me, creating horcruxes. As I go about the process, it's like splitting up my soul and injecting a bit of it into whatever I'm writing. But it doesn't kill. For me, it gives life. Honestly, it feels like the best use of my time, at any given time. I don't know what that means and it's not really the entire truth because it's not like it's my job or anything. But I do know that, for my whole life, I've often felt like I'm wasting time. Playing video games, reading, even sometimes when I'm doing what I'm "supposed" to be doing because it is my job..it just feels like I'm taking time away from something else...that sounds vague, I know, but I'm not sure how to describe it. It just feels like I'm meant to be doing something else, a lot of the time, no matter what I'm doing. It's a semi-fleeting feeling when it happens, but it's not altogether uncommon, especially when I'm doing truly useless things, like watching television.
But I'm doing well with my sort-of-a-new-year's-resolution to write more. When I find time, which is thankfully common enough, I spend time writing. I've got about 4 "projects" going right now and it's alright, very alright. When I'm writing I feel like I'm fulfilling a purpose inside of me that's always been there. I have no idea what that means for my life, but it's nice, just to have the deep desire or instability gone from my inner being. Part of me wonders if I didn't decide to come on staff, at least in part, because it fed my subconscious will's necessity to write. I don't know if or really think that I'll ever make a career of writing, especially because that normally means writing for the sake of a magazine, newspaper, or television event. I could do that, but I don't think it would satiate the monster I've managed to put to sleep this year. I just feel like I'm a better person when I'm regularly writing, even if that just means I'll have a bunch of practically useless word files containing stories and parts of stories on my computers for the rest of my life. I don't care, not in the slightest, because it's the only real way I've found that answers a deep question that, up to now, had been spoken in an internal language I couldn't consciously decipher. I honestly think it may have been a sort of personality sickness that has always been a threat. Since graduation, I don't know that I've been the person I was or could be at college...maybe it's incorrect, I'm still learning myself. But up until May 2009, I had to write on various occasions, for classes. When that left my life, I think a part of me left with it in a more horcruxial way than writing is now. For whatever reason, I have to express myself in writing to survive, I have to splinter my soul in some way and insert bits of it into text documents on my computer...it's just how I was made when I was knit together in my since estranged mother's womb.
-Zack
"At the start, he was there"
-David Crowder
But I'm doing well with my sort-of-a-new-year's-resolution to write more. When I find time, which is thankfully common enough, I spend time writing. I've got about 4 "projects" going right now and it's alright, very alright. When I'm writing I feel like I'm fulfilling a purpose inside of me that's always been there. I have no idea what that means for my life, but it's nice, just to have the deep desire or instability gone from my inner being. Part of me wonders if I didn't decide to come on staff, at least in part, because it fed my subconscious will's necessity to write. I don't know if or really think that I'll ever make a career of writing, especially because that normally means writing for the sake of a magazine, newspaper, or television event. I could do that, but I don't think it would satiate the monster I've managed to put to sleep this year. I just feel like I'm a better person when I'm regularly writing, even if that just means I'll have a bunch of practically useless word files containing stories and parts of stories on my computers for the rest of my life. I don't care, not in the slightest, because it's the only real way I've found that answers a deep question that, up to now, had been spoken in an internal language I couldn't consciously decipher. I honestly think it may have been a sort of personality sickness that has always been a threat. Since graduation, I don't know that I've been the person I was or could be at college...maybe it's incorrect, I'm still learning myself. But up until May 2009, I had to write on various occasions, for classes. When that left my life, I think a part of me left with it in a more horcruxial way than writing is now. For whatever reason, I have to express myself in writing to survive, I have to splinter my soul in some way and insert bits of it into text documents on my computer...it's just how I was made when I was knit together in my since estranged mother's womb.
-Zack
"At the start, he was there"
-David Crowder
Friday, February 11, 2011
How we aspire
I heard, on the radio yesterday, an off-handed comment about people younger than 30...in this particular broadcaster's opinion, there hasn't been a great thing to come out of anyone born in the last 30 years apart from facebook.
Whether or not that's true, I don't actually care. Whether or not I agree, that too, I don't care about. Actually, I think he's probably not too far off, all things considered.
"Great" is a loaded word that can easily mean "oppressive" as much as it means "exemplary." They say we don't have great novels the way we used to; like people just can't write now like they could 80 years ago or something. It's true, James Joyce hasn't been equaled in my mind for aesthetic skill, but there wasn't anyone prior to him that did either. The question isn't about greatness, it's about perception.
I believe the greatest living writer is Salman Rushdie and I'd say that 's nearly an objective truth. I don't really care to argue it though, at least not for the sake of actually determining who is the greatest author. Dave Eggers is up there too, but AHBWOSG is grossly overrated and "What is the What" is far from enough for him to stage any sort of coup, in my mind, for the title.
I'm not writing this right now in order to discover who the greatest living author is or isn't..I'm trying to get to the bottom of something, something about this concept of greatness that people my age or younger, or a bit older, supposedly don't grasp or at least don't accomplish.
We could argue merits of different artists and craftspeople and maybe we'll prove that facebook isn't the end of the story for our generation. Even so, new buildings are rarely architectural wonders. Function is over-coming "greatness." It's about ease and efficiency now...but who is to say there's nothing great about that? Even so, I'm kind of old-school about some things, and I lament the sorts of video games I grew up on no longer being made because things like farmville and angry birds are outselling everything. But it's all marching onward...ease and efficiency, not too much time, not too much commitment...just gratification in the fastest and most accessible way for the masses.
That probably sounds like a bit of an indictment, but I'm not convinced it is....We're the first generation to internalize post-modern ideals (misleading many to label us a post-modern culture...post-modernism is an idealogy, not a culture or a set of values..it's a set of assumptions about truth and reality), and one of them, perhaps my favorite of them, post-modern ideals that is, is the value and worth of all humans. People (colleagues and students of mine in particular) often accuse all things post-modern as a rejection of all in any objective form...there are those among us, the post-modern thinkers, that do that, but it's rarely actually the case. What's actually happening is a process of decentering...instead of centering on societal ideals, like the preminence of white men, the democratization of ideas, and the objectivity of experience, we break out of molds and let what actually is emerge. What I mean is that instead of thinking everyone ought to like something because it is "great," acknowledging that cultural artifacts are products of culture and they are understood through culture...meaning some may appreciate, and some may not...it's not a deficiency, it's just a real difference. Even educational advantages in art history are a part of the culture of art history when it comes down to it.
That's a fairly complicated way of saying that while facebook may be our greatest thing, it itself is great because it allows people to be themselves or try to be whomever they want to be...how people use it may be wrong and I do have strong feelings about the place of children on facebook or attention-seeking through it...but at the end of the day, it's a place where people can choose to claim their own voice and it is, for that reason, great. But it also establishes other ways for things to be great...sure, no one is ever going to write huck finn again, but we will write things that acknowledge that we can only see the world as we can with our own eyes...that's both a higher form of art, more generally appealing, truer, and ultimately, greater.
To those who have not internalized post-modernity as many of my generation have, it looks hazy, it looks lazy, it looks sub-par. But just because they don't have the eyes to see why it's great doesn't erase its greatness. Of course they are entitled to their opinions in the same way I am my own. Not understanding or seeking to do so though, will never be an excuse to criticize.
-Zack
"I couldn't bare it, to live for fear "
-Yo La Tengo
Whether or not that's true, I don't actually care. Whether or not I agree, that too, I don't care about. Actually, I think he's probably not too far off, all things considered.
"Great" is a loaded word that can easily mean "oppressive" as much as it means "exemplary." They say we don't have great novels the way we used to; like people just can't write now like they could 80 years ago or something. It's true, James Joyce hasn't been equaled in my mind for aesthetic skill, but there wasn't anyone prior to him that did either. The question isn't about greatness, it's about perception.
I believe the greatest living writer is Salman Rushdie and I'd say that 's nearly an objective truth. I don't really care to argue it though, at least not for the sake of actually determining who is the greatest author. Dave Eggers is up there too, but AHBWOSG is grossly overrated and "What is the What" is far from enough for him to stage any sort of coup, in my mind, for the title.
I'm not writing this right now in order to discover who the greatest living author is or isn't..I'm trying to get to the bottom of something, something about this concept of greatness that people my age or younger, or a bit older, supposedly don't grasp or at least don't accomplish.
We could argue merits of different artists and craftspeople and maybe we'll prove that facebook isn't the end of the story for our generation. Even so, new buildings are rarely architectural wonders. Function is over-coming "greatness." It's about ease and efficiency now...but who is to say there's nothing great about that? Even so, I'm kind of old-school about some things, and I lament the sorts of video games I grew up on no longer being made because things like farmville and angry birds are outselling everything. But it's all marching onward...ease and efficiency, not too much time, not too much commitment...just gratification in the fastest and most accessible way for the masses.
That probably sounds like a bit of an indictment, but I'm not convinced it is....We're the first generation to internalize post-modern ideals (misleading many to label us a post-modern culture...post-modernism is an idealogy, not a culture or a set of values..it's a set of assumptions about truth and reality), and one of them, perhaps my favorite of them, post-modern ideals that is, is the value and worth of all humans. People (colleagues and students of mine in particular) often accuse all things post-modern as a rejection of all in any objective form...there are those among us, the post-modern thinkers, that do that, but it's rarely actually the case. What's actually happening is a process of decentering...instead of centering on societal ideals, like the preminence of white men, the democratization of ideas, and the objectivity of experience, we break out of molds and let what actually is emerge. What I mean is that instead of thinking everyone ought to like something because it is "great," acknowledging that cultural artifacts are products of culture and they are understood through culture...meaning some may appreciate, and some may not...it's not a deficiency, it's just a real difference. Even educational advantages in art history are a part of the culture of art history when it comes down to it.
That's a fairly complicated way of saying that while facebook may be our greatest thing, it itself is great because it allows people to be themselves or try to be whomever they want to be...how people use it may be wrong and I do have strong feelings about the place of children on facebook or attention-seeking through it...but at the end of the day, it's a place where people can choose to claim their own voice and it is, for that reason, great. But it also establishes other ways for things to be great...sure, no one is ever going to write huck finn again, but we will write things that acknowledge that we can only see the world as we can with our own eyes...that's both a higher form of art, more generally appealing, truer, and ultimately, greater.
To those who have not internalized post-modernity as many of my generation have, it looks hazy, it looks lazy, it looks sub-par. But just because they don't have the eyes to see why it's great doesn't erase its greatness. Of course they are entitled to their opinions in the same way I am my own. Not understanding or seeking to do so though, will never be an excuse to criticize.
-Zack
"I couldn't bare it, to live for fear "
-Yo La Tengo
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
It always rolls.
The Packers won the Super Bowl for the second time in my life on Sunday. That's the highest accomplishment for my favorite team in the NFL and it makes me happy, but I don't know if it makes me happy enough. It's definitely better than the alternative, but I feel like I should be happier.
Honestly, though I root for the Packers and always will, I might have been happier if the Browns had won it, for Cleveland's sake. Some things are bigger than football, and though sports aren't everything, a break-through for a team from Cleveland would mean a lot more to me no matter what team it was than even the Packers winning.
That probably means I'm taking my first steps toward "fan conversion" but I don't believe that. I can't imagine not being a Packers fan...but I honestly feel a little bit guilty for it, as I probably identify with the Cavaliers as my favorite team in all of sports more than any other right now.
The day after the Packers won the Super Bowl, the Cavs set the record for most losses in a row outright...they had set the record for most losses in a row within a single season on Saturday.
Though they have nothing to do with each other, I've definitely allowed the Cavs horrible year to poison the Packers' accomplishment. Honestly, I was more excited when the Packers beat the Eagles in the first week of the playoffs than I was at any other point. I honestly felt entitled to that Super Bowl victory because I didn't believe any team in the league was actually better than the Packers...being a Cavaliers fan, that kind of made me a Miami Heat fan translated onto an NFL skin. That's ridiculous...but it's sub-conscious.
I honestly believe losing hurts worse than winning feels good, which makes sports a sucker bet, as only one team can be champions at the end of the year in any given sport....the feeling of not-losing and not-winning, which can only come from not-caring is the "safest" way.
It's probably too late to stop caring now, and I'm moving to Cleveland next year so not caring about sports isn't really an option. I'll deal with it...
I think a bit of it might have to do with community too though...I'm not a part of the larger Packer-fan community...I'm not from wisconsin and I don't know many other Packers' fans around anywhere I spend time, much less am I friends with any of them. There's something special that happens when Ohio State wins and a big part of that is the fact that almost everyone I know loves the Buckeyes and I can enjoy it with them.
Indeed, I think that means I'm wrong...the glory of winning probably does outweigh the hurt of losing. Last June I watched the U.S.'s last second win in a world cup game in a room full of people who cared. I don't really care about soccer, but I couldn't help get caught up in the moment and cheer on our guys...heck, I don't even like the U.S. as a country very much a lot of the time....but it didn't matter then.
It always rolls back around...community, others, people, friends, love...those are why we live...they make sports better, they make life better...they make living equal more than some vapid dollar sign in the end.
I am happy the Packers won. I am hopeful that the Cavs might someday win again. Indeed, I am hopeful that Ohio State could win the Basketball championship this year. I'm in the midst of what could be the best year of my life...I'm getting married for one...and the Packers won the Super Bowl.
If anything, I just need to stop and realize that.
-Zack
"So I'm counting on your fingers, cause you've reattached the twitch"
-Bon Iver
Honestly, though I root for the Packers and always will, I might have been happier if the Browns had won it, for Cleveland's sake. Some things are bigger than football, and though sports aren't everything, a break-through for a team from Cleveland would mean a lot more to me no matter what team it was than even the Packers winning.
That probably means I'm taking my first steps toward "fan conversion" but I don't believe that. I can't imagine not being a Packers fan...but I honestly feel a little bit guilty for it, as I probably identify with the Cavaliers as my favorite team in all of sports more than any other right now.
The day after the Packers won the Super Bowl, the Cavs set the record for most losses in a row outright...they had set the record for most losses in a row within a single season on Saturday.
Though they have nothing to do with each other, I've definitely allowed the Cavs horrible year to poison the Packers' accomplishment. Honestly, I was more excited when the Packers beat the Eagles in the first week of the playoffs than I was at any other point. I honestly felt entitled to that Super Bowl victory because I didn't believe any team in the league was actually better than the Packers...being a Cavaliers fan, that kind of made me a Miami Heat fan translated onto an NFL skin. That's ridiculous...but it's sub-conscious.
I honestly believe losing hurts worse than winning feels good, which makes sports a sucker bet, as only one team can be champions at the end of the year in any given sport....the feeling of not-losing and not-winning, which can only come from not-caring is the "safest" way.
It's probably too late to stop caring now, and I'm moving to Cleveland next year so not caring about sports isn't really an option. I'll deal with it...
I think a bit of it might have to do with community too though...I'm not a part of the larger Packer-fan community...I'm not from wisconsin and I don't know many other Packers' fans around anywhere I spend time, much less am I friends with any of them. There's something special that happens when Ohio State wins and a big part of that is the fact that almost everyone I know loves the Buckeyes and I can enjoy it with them.
Indeed, I think that means I'm wrong...the glory of winning probably does outweigh the hurt of losing. Last June I watched the U.S.'s last second win in a world cup game in a room full of people who cared. I don't really care about soccer, but I couldn't help get caught up in the moment and cheer on our guys...heck, I don't even like the U.S. as a country very much a lot of the time....but it didn't matter then.
It always rolls back around...community, others, people, friends, love...those are why we live...they make sports better, they make life better...they make living equal more than some vapid dollar sign in the end.
I am happy the Packers won. I am hopeful that the Cavs might someday win again. Indeed, I am hopeful that Ohio State could win the Basketball championship this year. I'm in the midst of what could be the best year of my life...I'm getting married for one...and the Packers won the Super Bowl.
If anything, I just need to stop and realize that.
-Zack
"So I'm counting on your fingers, cause you've reattached the twitch"
-Bon Iver
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Ethnicity 3: Heritage
I'm sitting in the "Heritage Room" at Hillsdale right now. It's a fancy room off the side of the library here with semi-comfortable (although not terribly) seats, lots of "key books" which means hyperbolic, dogmatic, propaganda about how great the constitution is or was or how awesome the United States could be or (the worst) how capitalism is the best.
Heritage, they call it.
But I think that's as far off-base as you could get, thinking about what this all really is, and what heritage actually is.
Perhaps, as Americans, this is our heritage...a "celebration" of our past through the lens of the "great" things that make America America. That...and a lot of Eagle statues...I think there are about 12 of them in a room that's around 15 by 20 feet. I guess I can buy that. But I'm not sure I'm a fan of the assumption that all Americans, as Americans, necessarily share the same Heritage. Actually, I am positive that we do not. Indeed, it is one of our overlooked strengths as a country that we do, indeed, not share said Heritage.
That being said, it's an easy heritage for upper middle class white people to embrace. The Swiss-German side of me doesn't care that much about the Swiss-German part of my past (save for the oppressed Anabaptist bit), so why shouldn't people who are fully white and usually rich for generations embrace, fully, a heritage defined by a country that writes its own history as victors?
Well.....the truth, probably, would be a reason why that shouldn't be the case. I don't see any pictures of oppressed people groups on the walls...no paintings of the trail of tears or land traded for a few small pox blankets and a bottle of whiskey...I don't see any signs of slavery or any African men with but two-thirds their face. The American heritage, which is not just lauded but heavy-handedly worshiped here at Hillsdale, was built upon the backs of people who "don't look like us."
I'm probably being unfair, just because I'm sitting in this room. My own belief that ultimately nothing good can come from capitalism doesn't help. But there aren't even any signs of celebrated diversity in here. For a school that has nearly as many lincolns as they do eagles, Jim Crow is de facto the modus operandi.
As I try to figure out, more and more, what it means for me to be a person of mixed race, I'm beginning, more and more, to feel at least slightly more out of place at Hillsdale. Most of the time, I'm the least white person in the room. For anyone that has seen me or met me, that should be a joke...but it's almost always true.
I know I probably won't get to do or see much changing around here, but for the present moment, I'll be conscious of what it does mean to be who and what I am while I'm here..and I won't let an opportunity slip that could at least steer one or two student's ethnic journeys.....we're all on them or should be and the first step is acknowledgement.
-Zack
"If ever I wasn't the greatest...I musta missed it"
-Kanye West
Heritage, they call it.
But I think that's as far off-base as you could get, thinking about what this all really is, and what heritage actually is.
Perhaps, as Americans, this is our heritage...a "celebration" of our past through the lens of the "great" things that make America America. That...and a lot of Eagle statues...I think there are about 12 of them in a room that's around 15 by 20 feet. I guess I can buy that. But I'm not sure I'm a fan of the assumption that all Americans, as Americans, necessarily share the same Heritage. Actually, I am positive that we do not. Indeed, it is one of our overlooked strengths as a country that we do, indeed, not share said Heritage.
That being said, it's an easy heritage for upper middle class white people to embrace. The Swiss-German side of me doesn't care that much about the Swiss-German part of my past (save for the oppressed Anabaptist bit), so why shouldn't people who are fully white and usually rich for generations embrace, fully, a heritage defined by a country that writes its own history as victors?
Well.....the truth, probably, would be a reason why that shouldn't be the case. I don't see any pictures of oppressed people groups on the walls...no paintings of the trail of tears or land traded for a few small pox blankets and a bottle of whiskey...I don't see any signs of slavery or any African men with but two-thirds their face. The American heritage, which is not just lauded but heavy-handedly worshiped here at Hillsdale, was built upon the backs of people who "don't look like us."
I'm probably being unfair, just because I'm sitting in this room. My own belief that ultimately nothing good can come from capitalism doesn't help. But there aren't even any signs of celebrated diversity in here. For a school that has nearly as many lincolns as they do eagles, Jim Crow is de facto the modus operandi.
As I try to figure out, more and more, what it means for me to be a person of mixed race, I'm beginning, more and more, to feel at least slightly more out of place at Hillsdale. Most of the time, I'm the least white person in the room. For anyone that has seen me or met me, that should be a joke...but it's almost always true.
I know I probably won't get to do or see much changing around here, but for the present moment, I'll be conscious of what it does mean to be who and what I am while I'm here..and I won't let an opportunity slip that could at least steer one or two student's ethnic journeys.....we're all on them or should be and the first step is acknowledgement.
-Zack
"If ever I wasn't the greatest...I musta missed it"
-Kanye West
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Wanna play with my Tesla Coil?
The White Stripes officially broke up today. That might not mean much of anything to most of you. Really, it doesn't ultimately much to me either. The recordings still exist and life goes on. But it's kind of a passing era for me, personally. I've liked bands that have broken up already and whatever. But the White Stripes were, if there was any, the band of my high school years. They, more than any other band, are forever linked to those times for me. I remember downloading videos of them playing live (pre-youtube...) and feeling like my mind was completely expanded by their free-wheeling, tight, explosive sound...from two people..one of them simply being a genius that, no matter how simplistic the concept, continuously provided a sound that was unique and refreshing....and unrelentingly artistic. They led me to the blues which led me to classic rock and to the blues...somewhere in that whole interchange I released all genre-allegiances and started listening to anything and everything. It probably wasn't that simple, but I know I wouldn't be the music listener I am today without the White Stripes...who knows, I might not be the person I am today.
While I was in China, there were two songs that I sort of clung to...one, which absolutely revolutionized how I listen to music was "X Gon give it to ya" by DMX, which got me listening to Hip Hop at all. But the other was Icky Thump by the White Stripes...probably their last great song (on an admittedly lackluster album).
There might not be another band made up of a divorced couple with no other members that somehow has a stage rapport with one another bordering on the intensely intimate.
And....well, there's this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8V4O9wBQc4
And this:
Anyway you cut it....it's a passing of a band that I let impact me, that I let, to some degree, become a part of me. I also realized recently that I'm as old as my mom was when I was born.
I'm getting older.
And yet, there is so much to look forward to....
-Zack
"Why don't you kick yourself out you're an immigrant too"
-The White Stripes
While I was in China, there were two songs that I sort of clung to...one, which absolutely revolutionized how I listen to music was "X Gon give it to ya" by DMX, which got me listening to Hip Hop at all. But the other was Icky Thump by the White Stripes...probably their last great song (on an admittedly lackluster album).
There might not be another band made up of a divorced couple with no other members that somehow has a stage rapport with one another bordering on the intensely intimate.
And....well, there's this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8V4O9wBQc4
And this:
Anyway you cut it....it's a passing of a band that I let impact me, that I let, to some degree, become a part of me. I also realized recently that I'm as old as my mom was when I was born.
I'm getting older.
And yet, there is so much to look forward to....
-Zack
"Why don't you kick yourself out you're an immigrant too"
-The White Stripes
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Identilation
I feel like yesterday's post needs a bit of clarification because it's founded in a couple of days of training and a couple of basic assumptions.
The first assumption is that every person on the face of the planet is created in the image of God, no matter their ethnicity or gender. Indeed, it is the only biblical stance to take that every ethnicity and gender are required to fully encompass the fullest image of God.
This means, of course, that those of us who can identify as multi-racial individuals are every bit as made in the image of God as anyone else.
But if every ethnicity is expressing a certain aspect or aspects about God's image, we've got to know how to identify as whole members of every ethnicity we're a part of in order to be fully identified within God's Kingdom. He created me as the multi-racial person I am, and to that end, I can't become a fully realized human being in his Kingdom without knowing exactly what that means for me.
What's also true is that God has placed every person on the planet into a certain place that has a dominant culture and it's that culture to whom each and every Christian is called to be a minister. Our ability to function within a dominant culture is measured in what we call assimilation. An individual's ability to own his or her own ethnicity is identified as identity. People generally fall on a spectrum of identity and assimilation co-ordinates on a graph where one is the x axis and the other the y.
All of that means that the most useful people in God's Kingdom are those who can fully embrace the person God made them to be, including their ethnicity and the gifts it brings (so, having a high identity) and also those who are able to to function within the context of the dominant culture...having high assimilation. Because I look and was brought up white, I'm very high assimilation, and I can mostly claim to be a high identity white, but my failure to fully claim the wrongs of the white race in the past (specifically as they pertain to the oppression of native people on this continent) because I feel like a good bit of that was oppression against my own ancestors means I can't be a truly high-identity white person...and that means I've got to figure out how to have any degree of "highness" in my native identity.
I hope that clarifies some.
-Zack
"I put in work and it's all for the kids, but these cats done forgot what work is"
-DMX
The first assumption is that every person on the face of the planet is created in the image of God, no matter their ethnicity or gender. Indeed, it is the only biblical stance to take that every ethnicity and gender are required to fully encompass the fullest image of God.
This means, of course, that those of us who can identify as multi-racial individuals are every bit as made in the image of God as anyone else.
But if every ethnicity is expressing a certain aspect or aspects about God's image, we've got to know how to identify as whole members of every ethnicity we're a part of in order to be fully identified within God's Kingdom. He created me as the multi-racial person I am, and to that end, I can't become a fully realized human being in his Kingdom without knowing exactly what that means for me.
What's also true is that God has placed every person on the planet into a certain place that has a dominant culture and it's that culture to whom each and every Christian is called to be a minister. Our ability to function within a dominant culture is measured in what we call assimilation. An individual's ability to own his or her own ethnicity is identified as identity. People generally fall on a spectrum of identity and assimilation co-ordinates on a graph where one is the x axis and the other the y.
All of that means that the most useful people in God's Kingdom are those who can fully embrace the person God made them to be, including their ethnicity and the gifts it brings (so, having a high identity) and also those who are able to to function within the context of the dominant culture...having high assimilation. Because I look and was brought up white, I'm very high assimilation, and I can mostly claim to be a high identity white, but my failure to fully claim the wrongs of the white race in the past (specifically as they pertain to the oppression of native people on this continent) because I feel like a good bit of that was oppression against my own ancestors means I can't be a truly high-identity white person...and that means I've got to figure out how to have any degree of "highness" in my native identity.
I hope that clarifies some.
-Zack
"I put in work and it's all for the kids, but these cats done forgot what work is"
-DMX
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Highs and Lows
This week I've become estranged to myself.
We've been talking about ethnicity at InterVarsity's fourth "Formation" for new staff training event in Great Lakes East.
Today, I realized that I haven't a clue how to deal with my identity.
Perhaps I'm white. But that entails owning White privilege and I can't quite do that...because 1/4 of who I am, biologically, was oppressed near the point of obliteration...and I don't identify as Native because of that oppression, but in light of that, I can't quite own white privilege, I can't quite identify as fully white....probably because I'm not fully white.
But how can I identify as Native when I don't even know where to begin in saying much more than that it's 1/4 of my biological makeup.
So I'm in between, I've come up liminal in a discussion struggling to own what we are, because I feel like nothing.
But it's a lie, too, to say that I can't own white privilege. I look, act, and was raised to be white.
So I guess I've found myself on a journey now...someday, I'll find out what that means, as soon as I can figure out where to start.
-Zack
"If everything comes down to love, then just what am I afraid of?
-Addison Road.
We've been talking about ethnicity at InterVarsity's fourth "Formation" for new staff training event in Great Lakes East.
Today, I realized that I haven't a clue how to deal with my identity.
Perhaps I'm white. But that entails owning White privilege and I can't quite do that...because 1/4 of who I am, biologically, was oppressed near the point of obliteration...and I don't identify as Native because of that oppression, but in light of that, I can't quite own white privilege, I can't quite identify as fully white....probably because I'm not fully white.
But how can I identify as Native when I don't even know where to begin in saying much more than that it's 1/4 of my biological makeup.
So I'm in between, I've come up liminal in a discussion struggling to own what we are, because I feel like nothing.
But it's a lie, too, to say that I can't own white privilege. I look, act, and was raised to be white.
So I guess I've found myself on a journey now...someday, I'll find out what that means, as soon as I can figure out where to start.
-Zack
"If everything comes down to love, then just what am I afraid of?
-Addison Road.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
The Melody
I've realized that I have a strange memory. I don't know if it's altogether abnormal, natural, conditioned, extraordinary, or maybe even some kind of nuisance. I think it's unconsciously selective or at least subjective.
I remember all sorts of things well, very well. I can quickly take myself back to practically any day after a certain point in my life. As long as a distinguishing event took place, I can get there. Much of my life I have recorded, in writing, so maybe that helps. A lot of the time though, I just remember things. Certain types of things, I never really forget.
Sometimes, I lie to seem less extraordinary, or I withhold information. Maybe that sounds too pompous...I don't know. But it's true. In order to not be the person who knows everything all of the time, I often don't say anything when I remember exactly the fact being recalled.
Sometimes, it makes me pretty tactless. I remember details people don't, but I think I expect them to remember things just like I do. If you've been a victim of that from me, I apologize.
There are, of course, times when I remember things as they weren't, and that creates a problem as well; I rely too much on my memory and I argue, too quickly, too fiercely, for what I believe to be true even when it isn't.
But for some reason, I don't remember a lot of things. I'm not, however, sure if that's an issue with the content or my own effort. I often forget things I mean to bring along...very often. I often forget things I need to do. Generally speaking, I think I forget about thoughts and things having to do with the future. That probably makes me a less than spectacular planner from time to time. I'll resist delineating how that may or may not have to do with my MBTI preference, but it is unwaveringly certain that I'll rarely forget something that has happened but often forget things that have to do with events that have yet to take place.
So in light of, or perhaps retrospectively attached to, how well I generally remember things, I've started writing my life up to this point (or, perhaps, just as a designated end-point, the wedding on November 19th of this year). I figured out that it only takes me about an hour to write 1000 words about my life. That means I can write something novel length in just 50 hours, which means I can write for an hour each week and have something by the end of the year. What that, then, means, I have no clue. But I do know it will be an adventure. In some ways, I have bits of it written and have for years. In any event, I'm looking forward to looking back and tracing the line of God's faithfulness all the way through...that's probably the thought that makes it seem most massive.
-Zack
"When it comes to tools, fool, I'm a pep-boy"
-Rick Ross
I remember all sorts of things well, very well. I can quickly take myself back to practically any day after a certain point in my life. As long as a distinguishing event took place, I can get there. Much of my life I have recorded, in writing, so maybe that helps. A lot of the time though, I just remember things. Certain types of things, I never really forget.
Sometimes, I lie to seem less extraordinary, or I withhold information. Maybe that sounds too pompous...I don't know. But it's true. In order to not be the person who knows everything all of the time, I often don't say anything when I remember exactly the fact being recalled.
Sometimes, it makes me pretty tactless. I remember details people don't, but I think I expect them to remember things just like I do. If you've been a victim of that from me, I apologize.
There are, of course, times when I remember things as they weren't, and that creates a problem as well; I rely too much on my memory and I argue, too quickly, too fiercely, for what I believe to be true even when it isn't.
But for some reason, I don't remember a lot of things. I'm not, however, sure if that's an issue with the content or my own effort. I often forget things I mean to bring along...very often. I often forget things I need to do. Generally speaking, I think I forget about thoughts and things having to do with the future. That probably makes me a less than spectacular planner from time to time. I'll resist delineating how that may or may not have to do with my MBTI preference, but it is unwaveringly certain that I'll rarely forget something that has happened but often forget things that have to do with events that have yet to take place.
So in light of, or perhaps retrospectively attached to, how well I generally remember things, I've started writing my life up to this point (or, perhaps, just as a designated end-point, the wedding on November 19th of this year). I figured out that it only takes me about an hour to write 1000 words about my life. That means I can write something novel length in just 50 hours, which means I can write for an hour each week and have something by the end of the year. What that, then, means, I have no clue. But I do know it will be an adventure. In some ways, I have bits of it written and have for years. In any event, I'm looking forward to looking back and tracing the line of God's faithfulness all the way through...that's probably the thought that makes it seem most massive.
-Zack
"When it comes to tools, fool, I'm a pep-boy"
-Rick Ross
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
All you see is
Been here before. On either side. Feeling like I need to write and being totally in the dark about what to write. So I put on some Young Jeezy and listen to thoughts that might or might not be going anywhere...just like this.
I've started at least 3, maybe 4 or 5 entries now, since I last posted one. Part of that is because what weighs on my mind is unsayable, or unwritable, or unpostable, or all three. Or simply, in my limited powers, unexpressable.
This has been the longest Christmas break I've ever had. December 9th was my last day on campus. January 20th is my first back...and it's still 2 days away...but I don't have to tell you that...you can read a calendar. Part of me is anxious to get back, but part of me is also anxious about starting again and a little apprehensive. That's probably good....it's never good to be too overconfident going into anything. I kind of want this semester to be over as soon as possible. It's like a hump I've got to get over to get to the rest of my life.
But before I can get to the rest of my life, I have to get through it, and because of that, I'm pretty sure there's something worthwhile in my time remaining at Hillsdale. I'm struggling to rest in that reality because here, right now, I'm mostly looking past this semester. My work consists of getting ready for a wedding that's happening in November and in getting things ready for a semester that starts tomorrow. Disparity.
But there's something there. There must have always been or God wouldn't have called me to Hillsdale in the first place. I'm trying to figure out how to soak in the good, useful for the future bits of my time at Hillsdale, all while being useful, and also not dropping the ball in planning the wedding.
It's a juggling act that I might fail, but it will be impossible to really measure.
Ambiguity is an underrated gift from the Lord.
-Zack
"So much on my mind I just can't recline
Blastin holes in the night til she bled sunshine"
-Black Star
I've started at least 3, maybe 4 or 5 entries now, since I last posted one. Part of that is because what weighs on my mind is unsayable, or unwritable, or unpostable, or all three. Or simply, in my limited powers, unexpressable.
This has been the longest Christmas break I've ever had. December 9th was my last day on campus. January 20th is my first back...and it's still 2 days away...but I don't have to tell you that...you can read a calendar. Part of me is anxious to get back, but part of me is also anxious about starting again and a little apprehensive. That's probably good....it's never good to be too overconfident going into anything. I kind of want this semester to be over as soon as possible. It's like a hump I've got to get over to get to the rest of my life.
But before I can get to the rest of my life, I have to get through it, and because of that, I'm pretty sure there's something worthwhile in my time remaining at Hillsdale. I'm struggling to rest in that reality because here, right now, I'm mostly looking past this semester. My work consists of getting ready for a wedding that's happening in November and in getting things ready for a semester that starts tomorrow. Disparity.
But there's something there. There must have always been or God wouldn't have called me to Hillsdale in the first place. I'm trying to figure out how to soak in the good, useful for the future bits of my time at Hillsdale, all while being useful, and also not dropping the ball in planning the wedding.
It's a juggling act that I might fail, but it will be impossible to really measure.
Ambiguity is an underrated gift from the Lord.
-Zack
"So much on my mind I just can't recline
Blastin holes in the night til she bled sunshine"
-Black Star
Sunday, January 9, 2011
re:view
Today started out well enough, but I'll admit that I'm feeling a bit disappointed and frustrated right now at things that really aren't that big of a deal and in light of many little facts that are piling up on their own.
The national staff conference was great, to be certain.
But right now, I'm tired. I'm kind of hungry but just paid far too much for a bad sandwich, and because of that, I've decided that I hate the St. Louis airport. I can't find my gum...I thought it was in my pocket, and I'm pretty sure it was, but now I don't know where it is at all. I don't really want to buy more gum, but I'll probably have to..I'm also worried, increasingly so, that I'll miss the entirety of the Green Bay vs. Philadelphia playoff game because it's apparently been decided to not show it anywhere in the airport.
But that's all just pointless venting. I did just have a great few days...God definitely met us in St. Louis and the world is, I'm sure, going to be a better place as a result of the conference we just went through.
Even so...I'm tired and I can't wait to get home. But even now, the channel just switched to the game, and even for something so slight, I know God is good...and has always been so.
-Zack
"I'm well on my way to almost everything"
-Gnarls Barkley
The national staff conference was great, to be certain.
But right now, I'm tired. I'm kind of hungry but just paid far too much for a bad sandwich, and because of that, I've decided that I hate the St. Louis airport. I can't find my gum...I thought it was in my pocket, and I'm pretty sure it was, but now I don't know where it is at all. I don't really want to buy more gum, but I'll probably have to..I'm also worried, increasingly so, that I'll miss the entirety of the Green Bay vs. Philadelphia playoff game because it's apparently been decided to not show it anywhere in the airport.
But that's all just pointless venting. I did just have a great few days...God definitely met us in St. Louis and the world is, I'm sure, going to be a better place as a result of the conference we just went through.
Even so...I'm tired and I can't wait to get home. But even now, the channel just switched to the game, and even for something so slight, I know God is good...and has always been so.
-Zack
"I'm well on my way to almost everything"
-Gnarls Barkley
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Takeoff
I'm writing this in the midst of a two hour layover in Chicago's O'Hare airport, en route to St. Louis for InterVarsity's triennial National Staff Conference. This is my first time in Chicago, and it's sort of a bummer, to say the least, that I don't get to go out and see any of the city. I guess, in theory, I could, if I wanted to go through security again. But I don't, far from it.
So I'm here.
And I could read, but I've done a bit of that already and I know it rarely gets me motivated like writing does.
So I'm writing.
I'm looking forward to SC11 (as it's apparently going by these days), but I don't quite know what to expect beyond the descriptive marks on a page, a very ambiguous page, delineating our schedule for the extended weekend...or extended last half of the week, if this is work instead of retreat. Honestly, I'm not too sure how to think of it. In a lot of ways, I could say that a lot of the time in my job. Usually, I measure it by energy expended, so it's hard to tell. There's something intensely fulfilling about the "job" I do, but at the same time, it's often challenging work. I don't expect SC11 to be unchallenging by any stretch, but I don't know what to expect really, and i imagine it will be challenging in the best possible way. Right now, I mostly just know I'm looking forward to worship and to seeing people.
There's a guy a few feet from me practicing balance on one foot, dipping down to touch the floor. He's about 6'3", and I know he's on staff in the pacific northwest. I'm sure he doesn't recognize me, though I recognize him and a few others around from ONS. I'm probably being unnecessarily anti-social right now. I'll be plenty social the rest of the week.
A man just walked by, tall black hat set atop hopelessly fluffed out hair. Jewish, I imagine, and Hasidic. There was a time in my life when I had never been to an airport without seeing some Hasidic people somewhere. That wasn't true anymore after this past summer, twice, in Detroit and once, in Madison.
Of the seven books I'm reading, two of them are steeped in American Jewish culture, but are quite different otherwise. It's a culture I don't know much about, and it's also a culture I'll never really be able to wrap my mind around.
I do enjoy Klezmer bands though.....and like that, I distilled an entire race of people to a single thing I experienced once, in Wooster.
We've got to experience culture to be anything at all, but if we don't do it correctly, we'll start separating the people from the culture. So many people come back from other countries and talk about how they learned that no matter how far away you get, people, at the heart, at the same. That's true, but that heart is a lot deeper than we think sometimes. Most of the time, I think we immerse ourselves in a culture and try to figure out ways to cut away the culture and realize what lies beneath. But that's useless because, though something must lie beneath, we just cut away the things, mentally, that are different from ourselves, products of our own, often bigger and more prevalent, worldwide, culture.
Cross cultures to live. Cross cultures at your own caution.
And sometimes, stop the analysis and just be.
Abide in me, Christ said. We do far too little abiding and far too much attempting to ascertain.
But just abide. Just be. I'd tell you how to do it, but if it was something to "do" it wouldn't be abiding at all.
-Zack
"The system's broken, the schools closed, the prisons open"
-Kanye West
So I'm here.
And I could read, but I've done a bit of that already and I know it rarely gets me motivated like writing does.
So I'm writing.
I'm looking forward to SC11 (as it's apparently going by these days), but I don't quite know what to expect beyond the descriptive marks on a page, a very ambiguous page, delineating our schedule for the extended weekend...or extended last half of the week, if this is work instead of retreat. Honestly, I'm not too sure how to think of it. In a lot of ways, I could say that a lot of the time in my job. Usually, I measure it by energy expended, so it's hard to tell. There's something intensely fulfilling about the "job" I do, but at the same time, it's often challenging work. I don't expect SC11 to be unchallenging by any stretch, but I don't know what to expect really, and i imagine it will be challenging in the best possible way. Right now, I mostly just know I'm looking forward to worship and to seeing people.
There's a guy a few feet from me practicing balance on one foot, dipping down to touch the floor. He's about 6'3", and I know he's on staff in the pacific northwest. I'm sure he doesn't recognize me, though I recognize him and a few others around from ONS. I'm probably being unnecessarily anti-social right now. I'll be plenty social the rest of the week.
A man just walked by, tall black hat set atop hopelessly fluffed out hair. Jewish, I imagine, and Hasidic. There was a time in my life when I had never been to an airport without seeing some Hasidic people somewhere. That wasn't true anymore after this past summer, twice, in Detroit and once, in Madison.
Of the seven books I'm reading, two of them are steeped in American Jewish culture, but are quite different otherwise. It's a culture I don't know much about, and it's also a culture I'll never really be able to wrap my mind around.
I do enjoy Klezmer bands though.....and like that, I distilled an entire race of people to a single thing I experienced once, in Wooster.
We've got to experience culture to be anything at all, but if we don't do it correctly, we'll start separating the people from the culture. So many people come back from other countries and talk about how they learned that no matter how far away you get, people, at the heart, at the same. That's true, but that heart is a lot deeper than we think sometimes. Most of the time, I think we immerse ourselves in a culture and try to figure out ways to cut away the culture and realize what lies beneath. But that's useless because, though something must lie beneath, we just cut away the things, mentally, that are different from ourselves, products of our own, often bigger and more prevalent, worldwide, culture.
Cross cultures to live. Cross cultures at your own caution.
And sometimes, stop the analysis and just be.
Abide in me, Christ said. We do far too little abiding and far too much attempting to ascertain.
But just abide. Just be. I'd tell you how to do it, but if it was something to "do" it wouldn't be abiding at all.
-Zack
"The system's broken, the schools closed, the prisons open"
-Kanye West
Monday, January 3, 2011
In Retrospect: 2010
I've probably got a few long-term regular readers to be expecting this. For as long as I've had a blog, which is getting close, now, to half of my life, I've designated superlatives for different things in my life that have had any sort of significant impact in the last year. I think, generally, I've posted a lot less lately than I did at the end of 2009 and for most of 2010, though I've intended for the opposite to happen. That being said, I'm going to stick to this little tradition, even though right now I don't feel particularly up for doing it. But that's a terrible excuse, so I'm going to do it, because if I don't do it tonight, I'm not going to get to it. I leave for St. Louis on Wednesday, and I cannot wait to spend 4 days with the rest of the InterVarsity staff in the country. It sounds breathtaking thinking about it. All that being said, I might be most looking forward to reconnecting with staff I already know who are a bit more local. Perhaps that makes me less adventurous or something. I'm also feeling extraordinarily excited for our worship times, led by Andy Kim. He's my personal favorite worship leader, still on InterVarsity staff. He might be the best worship leader in the world though. The fact that he's in our biregion makes me a bit prouder than propriety would allow.
That's a lot of ado, so without further of it...my yearly superlatives.
Literature:
Book of the year: This is always the hardest decision. I read a lot of books and a lot of them mean a lot to me when I'm reading them. 2010 was typical to that end. I read a total of 51 books and over 16000 pages. My biggest accomplishment among them was War and Peace, but, though I read it for most of the year, I don't think I could quite call it my "book of the year," even thought it might influence my life and way of thinking for awhile. Near the beginning of the year, I read one of the most interesting, best written novels I've ever encountered. It stuck with me all year long, and I found myself comparing books to it all year long, always deciding that whichever book I was reading was never quite as good, the narrative never quite as strong or the characters as quirky and compelling. I think, perhaps in the easiest decision I've ever made for this title, The Ground Beneath her Feet by Salman Rushdie is my book of 2010
Runner-up: Peace Like a River, Leif Enger
Author of the Year: This is strangely new this year. Perhaps I never read enough in past years. But it just makes so much sense. I've taken to more series reading lately thanks, I think, to Harry Potter, so authors are more immediately important than they have been. That being said, I'm not picking an author of whom I've read a series this year. Salman Rushdie didn't just write my book of the year. He also wrote two other books I read in 2010, both of which were hot contenders for runner up (The Enchantress of Florence and Fury).
Runner-up: J.R.R. Tolkien
Motion Pictures:
Film of the Year: The first year I did this, I'm not even sure I had a movie of the year. I wasn't into movies and I was far from writing an I.S. about film. But things change and this is now one of my most contested awards. My film count has dwindled significantly since graduating from college. I watched over 150 movies in 2008, but just over 70 in 2010. Thanks to the Hillsdale Film Society though, I've been able to see some great films I wouldn't necessarily gravitate to on my own. I was especially surprised though, when they showed a film without any dialogue. It consists of montage and time-lapse photography to paint a picture of the chaos of modern life. It may not be the best way to spend a Friday night (or, as I learned, a Sunday afternoon) but Koyannisqatsi by Godfrey Reggio, more than any other film, impacted my life in 2010.
Runner-Up: The Terminator, James Cameron
Television program of the year: I don't watch much t.v. Indeed, short of the occasional sports game, I don't make it a point to watch anything. That being said, there are still a few things that I'll watch anytime I get the chance, and in 2010 Parks and Recreation was that more than any other show.
Runner-Up: American Pickers
Music:
Song of the Year:
This is incredibly hard. Actually, it's near impossible. I don't really know what direction to go with it and it's a chore of chores to decide a single song out of the hundreds I listened to last year. Music means a lot to me, as it does for a lot of people my age, and singling out a single song as my top for a single year is a preposterous proposition. But, even so, it is the proposition with which I am currently faced. Partly because it's so hard a task, but also because it's absolutely what I feel to have been the most important song to me this year, I've got to pick: Mystery, by Charlie Hall
Runner-Up: Airplanes, B.o.B. and Eminem
Artist of the year
With extremely varied taste, this is hard to pick. Depending on the time of day and my mood, I could enjoy something and someone radically different from one day to the next. Picking a person or band that illustrates a year of music listening for me will never be easy. That being said, I think, for his presence in so many places and for his re-emergence, I'm actually going to go with Eminem this year. I can't really believe it either.
Runner-Up: Phoenix
Album of the year:
And maybe the album of all time....My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kanye West is, perhaps, as I've said before, the best piece of musical art ever to emerge from the hip-hop genre, and perhaps since the jazz age. Kanye is an artist with a vision for his art and anyone who says otherwise, doesn't understand and hasn't taken the time to try.
Runner-Up: Dreaming Through the Noise, Vienna Teng
Sports:
Team of the Year: This always goes to the team I follow that has done the best in the calendar year. This year is actually simple. It's cut and dry. Teams were either completely unworthy or obvious choices. The winner is the Cincinnati Reds for making the playoffs for the first time in 15 years.
Runner-Up: Green Bay Packers
And that's all folks. I didn't really have the energy to do this tonight, but I pounded it out anyway, sort of for posterity's sake or something like that. I hope you enjoyed reading it! Happy New Year!
-Zack
"Sweet Jesus Christ, my sanity"
-Charlie Hall
That's a lot of ado, so without further of it...my yearly superlatives.
Literature:
Book of the year: This is always the hardest decision. I read a lot of books and a lot of them mean a lot to me when I'm reading them. 2010 was typical to that end. I read a total of 51 books and over 16000 pages. My biggest accomplishment among them was War and Peace, but, though I read it for most of the year, I don't think I could quite call it my "book of the year," even thought it might influence my life and way of thinking for awhile. Near the beginning of the year, I read one of the most interesting, best written novels I've ever encountered. It stuck with me all year long, and I found myself comparing books to it all year long, always deciding that whichever book I was reading was never quite as good, the narrative never quite as strong or the characters as quirky and compelling. I think, perhaps in the easiest decision I've ever made for this title, The Ground Beneath her Feet by Salman Rushdie is my book of 2010
Runner-up: Peace Like a River, Leif Enger
Author of the Year: This is strangely new this year. Perhaps I never read enough in past years. But it just makes so much sense. I've taken to more series reading lately thanks, I think, to Harry Potter, so authors are more immediately important than they have been. That being said, I'm not picking an author of whom I've read a series this year. Salman Rushdie didn't just write my book of the year. He also wrote two other books I read in 2010, both of which were hot contenders for runner up (The Enchantress of Florence and Fury).
Runner-up: J.R.R. Tolkien
Motion Pictures:
Film of the Year: The first year I did this, I'm not even sure I had a movie of the year. I wasn't into movies and I was far from writing an I.S. about film. But things change and this is now one of my most contested awards. My film count has dwindled significantly since graduating from college. I watched over 150 movies in 2008, but just over 70 in 2010. Thanks to the Hillsdale Film Society though, I've been able to see some great films I wouldn't necessarily gravitate to on my own. I was especially surprised though, when they showed a film without any dialogue. It consists of montage and time-lapse photography to paint a picture of the chaos of modern life. It may not be the best way to spend a Friday night (or, as I learned, a Sunday afternoon) but Koyannisqatsi by Godfrey Reggio, more than any other film, impacted my life in 2010.
Runner-Up: The Terminator, James Cameron
Television program of the year: I don't watch much t.v. Indeed, short of the occasional sports game, I don't make it a point to watch anything. That being said, there are still a few things that I'll watch anytime I get the chance, and in 2010 Parks and Recreation was that more than any other show.
Runner-Up: American Pickers
Music:
Song of the Year:
This is incredibly hard. Actually, it's near impossible. I don't really know what direction to go with it and it's a chore of chores to decide a single song out of the hundreds I listened to last year. Music means a lot to me, as it does for a lot of people my age, and singling out a single song as my top for a single year is a preposterous proposition. But, even so, it is the proposition with which I am currently faced. Partly because it's so hard a task, but also because it's absolutely what I feel to have been the most important song to me this year, I've got to pick: Mystery, by Charlie Hall
Runner-Up: Airplanes, B.o.B. and Eminem
Artist of the year
With extremely varied taste, this is hard to pick. Depending on the time of day and my mood, I could enjoy something and someone radically different from one day to the next. Picking a person or band that illustrates a year of music listening for me will never be easy. That being said, I think, for his presence in so many places and for his re-emergence, I'm actually going to go with Eminem this year. I can't really believe it either.
Runner-Up: Phoenix
Album of the year:
And maybe the album of all time....My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kanye West is, perhaps, as I've said before, the best piece of musical art ever to emerge from the hip-hop genre, and perhaps since the jazz age. Kanye is an artist with a vision for his art and anyone who says otherwise, doesn't understand and hasn't taken the time to try.
Runner-Up: Dreaming Through the Noise, Vienna Teng
Sports:
Team of the Year: This always goes to the team I follow that has done the best in the calendar year. This year is actually simple. It's cut and dry. Teams were either completely unworthy or obvious choices. The winner is the Cincinnati Reds for making the playoffs for the first time in 15 years.
Runner-Up: Green Bay Packers
And that's all folks. I didn't really have the energy to do this tonight, but I pounded it out anyway, sort of for posterity's sake or something like that. I hope you enjoyed reading it! Happy New Year!
-Zack
"Sweet Jesus Christ, my sanity"
-Charlie Hall
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Three black marks
Before we started walking, we were sliding down the slide. When you get to the bottom, you just go back to the top. You climb to the top because it's at the top that you ever find anything, ever see anything. But then down, on down, on down you go. Again, again, again. It was never a roller coaster.
Maybe it is waves. Peaks, valleys, frequencies. I do know it pulses.
The losses wouldn't be losses if they weren't lost.
Cut.
Then keep moving forward.
-Zack
"After all is said and done, build a new route to China if they'll have you"
-Gil Scott Heron
Thursday, December 23, 2010
As big as the sea...
There is scandal, mystery, and glory in Christmas. The darkness breaks and hope awakes in the heart once more. I sometimes feel odd, acting as if Christ isn't born at Christmas, or like he really just died on Good Friday. Neither are true and the emulative nature of our holiest observances is a little immature and cultic sometimes.
But we need it, that feeling of dawn breaking , that heart-taking, soul-rending birth of hope on Christmas. We need it every single day. We need it, at least, once a year. As play-acting as advent and Good Friday might be, without the birth of hope once more, without the renewal of knowledge as to what it really means, we miss so much of the point.
Darkness turned to dawn at Christmas, but sometimes, we forget that we're still living in that dawn. We're actually living in a more glorious dawn, closer now to the completion and the Kingdom than we were when Christ became man. But he took up dwelling among us for a time, and those 30-odd years were as magical as anything, as deeply and lightly as that word can be used when talking about Jesus. God was here. And yet, he still is. We can't touch him, indeed, but he never left.
And that's what Christmas is...a celebration but also a remembrance and a re-embrace.
-Zack
"O shepherds, find thy goal"
-French Carol
But we need it, that feeling of dawn breaking , that heart-taking, soul-rending birth of hope on Christmas. We need it every single day. We need it, at least, once a year. As play-acting as advent and Good Friday might be, without the birth of hope once more, without the renewal of knowledge as to what it really means, we miss so much of the point.
Darkness turned to dawn at Christmas, but sometimes, we forget that we're still living in that dawn. We're actually living in a more glorious dawn, closer now to the completion and the Kingdom than we were when Christ became man. But he took up dwelling among us for a time, and those 30-odd years were as magical as anything, as deeply and lightly as that word can be used when talking about Jesus. God was here. And yet, he still is. We can't touch him, indeed, but he never left.
And that's what Christmas is...a celebration but also a remembrance and a re-embrace.
-Zack
"O shepherds, find thy goal"
-French Carol
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
365
One year ago today, though it was a Tuesday then, I met the woman I am going to marry. I wouldn't have guessed it then. I wouldn't have guessed it even as late as this past May, when we started dating. Well, I probably could have guessed it then. Because I knew in early May that our relationship would be God-ordained and I knew he was asking me to take the step of faith entering into a relationship with her would be. But it was a step of faith not just worth taking, but one, I know, I was excited to take at the time.
But that doesn't mean it was going to be easy, and most certainly, it has not been. Loving her is easy. It's the easiest thing I've ever had or wanted to do. But it's not easy when she's away, when she has to be away, or when I'm away, because I have to be away.
But nonetheless, it has been a glorious year, a great predecessor to the year to come...which, I do believe, will be even more spectacular.
-Zack
"And I never thought I would find her here
Flannel and satin, my four walls transformed
But she's looking at me, straight to center
No room at all, for any other thought"
-Vienna Teng
But that doesn't mean it was going to be easy, and most certainly, it has not been. Loving her is easy. It's the easiest thing I've ever had or wanted to do. But it's not easy when she's away, when she has to be away, or when I'm away, because I have to be away.
But nonetheless, it has been a glorious year, a great predecessor to the year to come...which, I do believe, will be even more spectacular.
-Zack
"And I never thought I would find her here
Flannel and satin, my four walls transformed
But she's looking at me, straight to center
No room at all, for any other thought"
-Vienna Teng
Callling Birds
I spent my day making this. It was fun, but it wasn't much more than typing up stories I've already told 100 times. It's still fun and exciting though. It's all so fun and so exciting.
I've had to come to terms with something these last few days, although that's kind of a lie, because it's driving me nuts, so I haven't come to terms with it at all. I don't think I'm going to reach my goal of 51 finished books this year. The issue comes in grossly overestimating how many days I could read fully in December. I always reset my numbers for the month when I get to it, and though I had 25 days in for December all year long, in reality, I had less than ten, and my 20 pages per book I was hovering around jumped up to around 60. I'm at like 3 days to really read left in 2010 with 7 books to finish. That's, on average, 67 pages per each of the 7 books I'm reading right now everyday to the end of the year. I just don't think it's happening...I don't know if there's really enough physical time over 3 days to do that, to say nothing of the actual time I could allot for it. But we'll see....I'm close to the end of a few things...we'll see what happens. I'm not giving up, though I probably should. I'll be very cautious with December when I set up next year in a couple of weeks, and I'll be shooting for less books on the whole. 50 last year was inflated by a semester of Children's literature. Though I'm 7 books short right now, I'm well over my page total from last year.
I don't really have much of anything to say tonight. I just felt like saying something.
It's hard to believe 2010 is so close to finished. It's already winter. This year flew by, but I'm sure 2011 will be even faster. I'll be 24 before I know it. I decided today that I'm the laziest person I know. I'm going to try to change that, and updating this more often is part of that. I think I'm a generally better person when I write more. Experience doesn't lead to wisdom after all...it is reflected upon experience that leads to wisdom because there are plenty of old fools running around. Look at my mother...she's older than me, very much a fool, and absolutely running around. I'm sure, til the day either of us dies, she's claim that I don't understand because I'm so much younger than her. I guess I don't know is she's right or not...but understand or not, nothing she's done this year, or at least very little, could be judged as correct, no matter how much anyone understands. Her facebook religious views says "I have a relationship with my god" but that's a lie, even though her "god" is her self. If she was at all in touch with even that, she'd realize that she's on a path of deceitful destruction that will end with her acknowledging wrong or with an obstinate barren loneliness; refusing to admit anything but pitiful to all. C.S. Lewis said that there are, in the end, only two responses to God...you can tell him "thy will be done" or "my will be done." The constant insistence on the latter removes life and humanity, little by little, as a creature created for outward connection and love becomes more and more focused on its own self and therefore, less and less as it ought to be. The irony of sin is that it's so often done in the name of doing what one judges will bring his or her own self the most enjoyment, the best use of his or her own free will, but that very proclamation destroys the very soul who claims it.
Maybe I shouldn't post all of that on a blog. I don't know. But I'd rather not take it down now.
While I'm on the topic of self-centeredness, I officially withdraw any support I may have ever claimed of Senator George Voinovich...maybe I'm just uneducated, but I don't quite understand why extending basic rights to humans is bad for other humans who already have those rights. Someday we'll strike the idea of other from our vocabulary, but we're far from it and Saturday's vote on the DREAM act proved that. But we live in a broken world. I just wish I didn't live in a state represented by someone breaking it so fervently.
-Zack
"It's like that sometime, I mean ridiculous"
-Kanye West
I've had to come to terms with something these last few days, although that's kind of a lie, because it's driving me nuts, so I haven't come to terms with it at all. I don't think I'm going to reach my goal of 51 finished books this year. The issue comes in grossly overestimating how many days I could read fully in December. I always reset my numbers for the month when I get to it, and though I had 25 days in for December all year long, in reality, I had less than ten, and my 20 pages per book I was hovering around jumped up to around 60. I'm at like 3 days to really read left in 2010 with 7 books to finish. That's, on average, 67 pages per each of the 7 books I'm reading right now everyday to the end of the year. I just don't think it's happening...I don't know if there's really enough physical time over 3 days to do that, to say nothing of the actual time I could allot for it. But we'll see....I'm close to the end of a few things...we'll see what happens. I'm not giving up, though I probably should. I'll be very cautious with December when I set up next year in a couple of weeks, and I'll be shooting for less books on the whole. 50 last year was inflated by a semester of Children's literature. Though I'm 7 books short right now, I'm well over my page total from last year.
I don't really have much of anything to say tonight. I just felt like saying something.
It's hard to believe 2010 is so close to finished. It's already winter. This year flew by, but I'm sure 2011 will be even faster. I'll be 24 before I know it. I decided today that I'm the laziest person I know. I'm going to try to change that, and updating this more often is part of that. I think I'm a generally better person when I write more. Experience doesn't lead to wisdom after all...it is reflected upon experience that leads to wisdom because there are plenty of old fools running around. Look at my mother...she's older than me, very much a fool, and absolutely running around. I'm sure, til the day either of us dies, she's claim that I don't understand because I'm so much younger than her. I guess I don't know is she's right or not...but understand or not, nothing she's done this year, or at least very little, could be judged as correct, no matter how much anyone understands. Her facebook religious views says "I have a relationship with my god" but that's a lie, even though her "god" is her self. If she was at all in touch with even that, she'd realize that she's on a path of deceitful destruction that will end with her acknowledging wrong or with an obstinate barren loneliness; refusing to admit anything but pitiful to all. C.S. Lewis said that there are, in the end, only two responses to God...you can tell him "thy will be done" or "my will be done." The constant insistence on the latter removes life and humanity, little by little, as a creature created for outward connection and love becomes more and more focused on its own self and therefore, less and less as it ought to be. The irony of sin is that it's so often done in the name of doing what one judges will bring his or her own self the most enjoyment, the best use of his or her own free will, but that very proclamation destroys the very soul who claims it.
Maybe I shouldn't post all of that on a blog. I don't know. But I'd rather not take it down now.
While I'm on the topic of self-centeredness, I officially withdraw any support I may have ever claimed of Senator George Voinovich...maybe I'm just uneducated, but I don't quite understand why extending basic rights to humans is bad for other humans who already have those rights. Someday we'll strike the idea of other from our vocabulary, but we're far from it and Saturday's vote on the DREAM act proved that. But we live in a broken world. I just wish I didn't live in a state represented by someone breaking it so fervently.
-Zack
"It's like that sometime, I mean ridiculous"
-Kanye West
Monday, December 20, 2010
5 Golden Rings
It's nearly Christmas once more. I love Christmas, but Christmas blogposts are almost always, at least as I try to write them, about the past year and the coming year. Right now, that's exactly what I feel like I should write about. A lot happened this past year and a lot is happening next year.
But Christmas comes between. Christmas.
It's hard to even know what Christmas is anymore. Well, I know what Christmas is. It's the day we celebrate Christ's birth. But when was the last time Christmas was just a day? Christmas is bigger than a day, and probably rightfully so. But it's a feeling, it's a rhythm, it's a hanging in the air balance of the now and the not yet. It's advent, it's trees, it's lights, it's peace. It's gifts, it's love.
Wherever you find love, it feels like Christmas. Christmas is, and that is all.
Christmas is the ultimate binary. It's the breaking dawn, the coming day. Darkness cannot be where light is.
It seems like Christmas is the time when it's socially acceptable to be a Christian, and it makes me hopeful, but I'm not quite sure why. In China, they display pictures of Santa at churches, because it's an accepted Christian symbol, as a symbol of Christmas. I don't think we keep in mind how Christian Christmas is because we spend so much time focusing on how Christian it isn't. Not every does it for the right reason, that's for sure...indeed, far from it...but there's something somewhat exciting and hopeful about how the only day the world shuts down in the U.S. is to celebrate Christ's birth, even if so many people have no idea what that quite means and don't do anything quite in line with what he'd want.
To hear a lot of people talk, you'd think it'd be better if people didn't celebrate Christmas at all than to do it poorly. Last I checked though, there aren't other things, good things, we'd rather people not do than to do it with the wrong motives or style. I do with more people really knew Christ and could really celebrate Christmas with the right reasons and deference...but much like I'd rather people feed the hungry out of self-glorification than to not do it at all...I guess somewhere, in some ways, I'm alright with people observing a celebration of Christ's birth, even if for the wrong reasons.
So ultimately, I'm all for Santa, all for 24/7 Christmas music, all for Christmas movies and egg nog. You can say they detract from Jesus, but only if you let them. They, if nothing else, point to how big of a deal the celebration of Christ's birth is, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
As always though, I'm opposed to how Americans choose to spend their money. But it's much less how they spend it and much more how they don't. I couldn't care less about and indeed I'm completely for people giving gifts to each other. But that doesn't change how little it would take, in light of how rich we, as Americans, are, to change the world, and we, time and time again, choose not to help out. 50 billion dollars would go to fight poverty if we would spend ten percent of what we spend on Christmas gifts on charitable work. We're celebrating the birth of someone who said two things: love each other and feed the hungry. We could at least try to do that in his honor.
-Zack
"I wish you a hopeful Christmas
I wish you a brave new year
All anguish, pain, and sorrow
Leave your heart and let your road be clear"
-Emerson, Lake, and Palmer
But Christmas comes between. Christmas.
It's hard to even know what Christmas is anymore. Well, I know what Christmas is. It's the day we celebrate Christ's birth. But when was the last time Christmas was just a day? Christmas is bigger than a day, and probably rightfully so. But it's a feeling, it's a rhythm, it's a hanging in the air balance of the now and the not yet. It's advent, it's trees, it's lights, it's peace. It's gifts, it's love.
Wherever you find love, it feels like Christmas. Christmas is, and that is all.
Christmas is the ultimate binary. It's the breaking dawn, the coming day. Darkness cannot be where light is.
It seems like Christmas is the time when it's socially acceptable to be a Christian, and it makes me hopeful, but I'm not quite sure why. In China, they display pictures of Santa at churches, because it's an accepted Christian symbol, as a symbol of Christmas. I don't think we keep in mind how Christian Christmas is because we spend so much time focusing on how Christian it isn't. Not every does it for the right reason, that's for sure...indeed, far from it...but there's something somewhat exciting and hopeful about how the only day the world shuts down in the U.S. is to celebrate Christ's birth, even if so many people have no idea what that quite means and don't do anything quite in line with what he'd want.
To hear a lot of people talk, you'd think it'd be better if people didn't celebrate Christmas at all than to do it poorly. Last I checked though, there aren't other things, good things, we'd rather people not do than to do it with the wrong motives or style. I do with more people really knew Christ and could really celebrate Christmas with the right reasons and deference...but much like I'd rather people feed the hungry out of self-glorification than to not do it at all...I guess somewhere, in some ways, I'm alright with people observing a celebration of Christ's birth, even if for the wrong reasons.
So ultimately, I'm all for Santa, all for 24/7 Christmas music, all for Christmas movies and egg nog. You can say they detract from Jesus, but only if you let them. They, if nothing else, point to how big of a deal the celebration of Christ's birth is, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
As always though, I'm opposed to how Americans choose to spend their money. But it's much less how they spend it and much more how they don't. I couldn't care less about and indeed I'm completely for people giving gifts to each other. But that doesn't change how little it would take, in light of how rich we, as Americans, are, to change the world, and we, time and time again, choose not to help out. 50 billion dollars would go to fight poverty if we would spend ten percent of what we spend on Christmas gifts on charitable work. We're celebrating the birth of someone who said two things: love each other and feed the hungry. We could at least try to do that in his honor.
-Zack
"I wish you a hopeful Christmas
I wish you a brave new year
All anguish, pain, and sorrow
Leave your heart and let your road be clear"
-Emerson, Lake, and Palmer
Saturday, December 11, 2010
On down the lines of Difference
It's the last day of classes here at Hillsdale. It's the last day I'll be on campus this semester too. There's direct correlation.
To say it's been a good semester is the simplest way to describe what I've experienced these last 15 weeks. But it's far from that simple. Simply though, I'll just say that everyday gets better here, or at least every week does and the net average of how much I enjoy it at Hillsdale, trying to do ministry here, improves every Thursday night. I'm falling into some kind of comfort level with the students and I feel like I have real rapport with some key students in key situations. I won't say it's been my best semester of ministry, but I was far from this effective my second semester at Wooster. Of course, I wasn't on staff then either.
But it's not about my effectiveness, and at the end of the day it's far from about my own enjoyment of what I do. Everyone wants to enjoy their own job right? But I struggle to even call this my job. It's bigger than that. It's bigger than calling it my career even for that matter. It's, more, perhaps, than anything else, a place I am to be and a place I need to be. Our regional director always reminds us that we're not chapter staff, we're campus staff, and I feel more and more all the time like my call is a lot less to be here for the students doing ministry as much as it's to be here for the ministry going on amongst the students. There are enough Christians here that they don't need me, at all, to have a fellowship. Some of them are better leaders than I could have hoped to be as a student.
But I've found that a student, no matter how skilled, is always going to be a bit nearsighted. I'm sure I was as a student. I'm probably far from the best staff worker in the world, and I'm reminded of that all the time because my staff partner here at Hillsdale definitely could be, but that's not really a question even worth begging. If all I accomplish on any given day is helping students see things in a way they wouldn't on their own, then I've done something almost magical, and that's actually a fairly common occurrence. Talent matters, experience matters, calling matters more. But it's all a series of differences that we run along, that we base everything on. I'm "effective" on campus because of the ways I can challenge students in the areas I differ from them, because of the way I see things that they don't. I'm also effective on campus because there are enough things I can relate to students on. Both are required and in any given situation, in any given settings, your differences are a strength and a hindrance...but so are the commonalities.
I have no idea what the future holds. I have no idea what series of places I'll be or what situations I'll someday find myself in. But I'll have more or less similarities and differences with those around me and the crux will always be finding the leverage to do anything with them.
But it expands. It's cultural. It's values-system based. Without the deepest possible diversity, we're not playing with a full deck. And for that reason, I lament the separation in which we all live.
-Zack
To say it's been a good semester is the simplest way to describe what I've experienced these last 15 weeks. But it's far from that simple. Simply though, I'll just say that everyday gets better here, or at least every week does and the net average of how much I enjoy it at Hillsdale, trying to do ministry here, improves every Thursday night. I'm falling into some kind of comfort level with the students and I feel like I have real rapport with some key students in key situations. I won't say it's been my best semester of ministry, but I was far from this effective my second semester at Wooster. Of course, I wasn't on staff then either.
But it's not about my effectiveness, and at the end of the day it's far from about my own enjoyment of what I do. Everyone wants to enjoy their own job right? But I struggle to even call this my job. It's bigger than that. It's bigger than calling it my career even for that matter. It's, more, perhaps, than anything else, a place I am to be and a place I need to be. Our regional director always reminds us that we're not chapter staff, we're campus staff, and I feel more and more all the time like my call is a lot less to be here for the students doing ministry as much as it's to be here for the ministry going on amongst the students. There are enough Christians here that they don't need me, at all, to have a fellowship. Some of them are better leaders than I could have hoped to be as a student.
But I've found that a student, no matter how skilled, is always going to be a bit nearsighted. I'm sure I was as a student. I'm probably far from the best staff worker in the world, and I'm reminded of that all the time because my staff partner here at Hillsdale definitely could be, but that's not really a question even worth begging. If all I accomplish on any given day is helping students see things in a way they wouldn't on their own, then I've done something almost magical, and that's actually a fairly common occurrence. Talent matters, experience matters, calling matters more. But it's all a series of differences that we run along, that we base everything on. I'm "effective" on campus because of the ways I can challenge students in the areas I differ from them, because of the way I see things that they don't. I'm also effective on campus because there are enough things I can relate to students on. Both are required and in any given situation, in any given settings, your differences are a strength and a hindrance...but so are the commonalities.
I have no idea what the future holds. I have no idea what series of places I'll be or what situations I'll someday find myself in. But I'll have more or less similarities and differences with those around me and the crux will always be finding the leverage to do anything with them.
But it expands. It's cultural. It's values-system based. Without the deepest possible diversity, we're not playing with a full deck. And for that reason, I lament the separation in which we all live.
-Zack
Thursday, December 2, 2010
And back again...
8 years ago, I was a sophomore in High School and I had this feeling. Not quite eight years really. It will be 8 years in March. But it's close enough. Eight years ago, this basketball season. In many ways, eight years ago, tomorrow night.
8 years ago this past spring, the Ottawa Glandorf (my high school) boys basketball team lost two rounds before the championship round. LeBron James was the reason.
This past spring, the Cleveland Cavaliers, the NBA equivalent of my high school when it comes to rooting interest, lost, two rounds before the championship round. LeBron James was the reason in a different way, but he was on "our side" this time.
But now, tonight, the eve of the Ohio high school basketball season, I find myself in a similar sort of mindset I had going into the season my sophomore year. LeBron James is the reason.
For the past 7 years, the man that stood in the way of a title for my high school (we won it during his first year in the NBA) was the sole reason I had any hope my NBA rooting interest had any hope of a title. I was a turncoat, so to speak. He was the enemy while I was in high school, but he was the King as soon as he left. I have friends I graduated with that never liked him in the pros thanks to high school. I bet they feel vindicated now. Because I've turnedcoat once again. You could say he did too, but while I disagree with his decision that he can win better in Miami, if he believes that he can, I can't blame him. But I'm most severely the turncoat again.
I know what it's like to root against LeBron and his team from high school and today, that's where I am again. I thought, I think, I'm basically positive it will feel weird to see him on the other side, to see him going against "our guys." But really, there's nothing new about that at all. It's how I met him and it's how I'll leave him. He entered my life as the villain, with his team of tattooed superstars with names from literature (Romeo, Scion, Joyce), and he's become the villain once more.
I never felt guilty about my turning-coat. For 7 years, "we" had the best player in the world on our side and we had a shot. It seemed personal poetic justice then, that he'd redeem himself by bringing Cleveland NBA glory. But it was never to be.
There is still something poetic though, in his return to the other side. It's somehow more orderly, somehow more normal for Cleveland to be on the other side after all of this. .
But even then...
It was a good ride.
-Zack
"you got that big fame homie, and you just changed homie"
-Kanye West
8 years ago this past spring, the Ottawa Glandorf (my high school) boys basketball team lost two rounds before the championship round. LeBron James was the reason.
This past spring, the Cleveland Cavaliers, the NBA equivalent of my high school when it comes to rooting interest, lost, two rounds before the championship round. LeBron James was the reason in a different way, but he was on "our side" this time.
But now, tonight, the eve of the Ohio high school basketball season, I find myself in a similar sort of mindset I had going into the season my sophomore year. LeBron James is the reason.
For the past 7 years, the man that stood in the way of a title for my high school (we won it during his first year in the NBA) was the sole reason I had any hope my NBA rooting interest had any hope of a title. I was a turncoat, so to speak. He was the enemy while I was in high school, but he was the King as soon as he left. I have friends I graduated with that never liked him in the pros thanks to high school. I bet they feel vindicated now. Because I've turnedcoat once again. You could say he did too, but while I disagree with his decision that he can win better in Miami, if he believes that he can, I can't blame him. But I'm most severely the turncoat again.
I know what it's like to root against LeBron and his team from high school and today, that's where I am again. I thought, I think, I'm basically positive it will feel weird to see him on the other side, to see him going against "our guys." But really, there's nothing new about that at all. It's how I met him and it's how I'll leave him. He entered my life as the villain, with his team of tattooed superstars with names from literature (Romeo, Scion, Joyce), and he's become the villain once more.
I never felt guilty about my turning-coat. For 7 years, "we" had the best player in the world on our side and we had a shot. It seemed personal poetic justice then, that he'd redeem himself by bringing Cleveland NBA glory. But it was never to be.
There is still something poetic though, in his return to the other side. It's somehow more orderly, somehow more normal for Cleveland to be on the other side after all of this. .
But even then...
It was a good ride.
-Zack
"you got that big fame homie, and you just changed homie"
-Kanye West
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Shots across the sky
I think I've spent the last 11 months detached. It was probably less than that, but a best it's been since March. I've put my heart into very little and ended up with results. Some good, some bad, but I basically left those up to whatever happened. I haven't cared about much. At all. For a long time.
There are exceptions...the majority of my relationship that has turned into an engagement probably being the best example of that. Others are more shameful and include Harry Potter and soccer. But I've been spending a lot of time floating through things. I've always thought I'd get by on raw muscle-memory-like talent, like, for my whole life. I don't want to brag or anything (believe me, I think of this as far from it) but since graduation, that's basically what I've done, with my level of mental engagement dwindling ever more and more, each and every day, I think. It's why I've blogged less. It's why I'm not at full funding. It's why I completely lost steam by the end of ONS and why I probably won't finish my reading goals for the year.
I wish I could say that's over. I can say I hope it's over. I feel like it's over. Already today, it has been over.
I don't know that I can actually describe what happened, not here at least...but some things just finally broke through, last night and tonight, and I actually feel like I'm becoming, again, or for the first time, the person I was supposed to be all along.
This comes though, I admit, at a time when ministry is at its best at Hillsdale as it has ever been with me there. People actually want to participate in evangelism and that's not been the case for pretty much the history of the chapter with few (but extant) exceptions. That might be a part of it. But mostly, I just want to be real to more people than myself. I want to be who God created me to be.
Today is World Aids Day and it reminds me of one of my favorite lines on Kanye's new album...in the second verse of the second track, Gorgeous, he says "I'm going to treat this money like the government treats aids; I won't stop til all my [people] get it" I don't exactly know what that means because he's not naive enough to believe the government actually gives black people aids, but I think his sentiment might be eerily accurate...as Lil Wayne elucidates in the last track on Tha Carter III, 1 in every 9 black men are in jail, often for selling crack, which is prevalent in poor areas....globally, the darker your skin, the more likely you'll have aids, statistically speaking, but it's not because of race....it's because of poverty and a lack of education. Why is there so much poverty? I'm going to be blunt: selfish white republicans and a few assimilated non-whites and successful asian americans. Right now, in Congress, they're trying to renew the Bush tax cuts. For someone making minimum wage, that's trying to "save" them about 200 bucks a year, maybe, which they'd get back anyway in such a low tax bracket. On the other end, those making millions save tens of thousands. All the while, they're fighting to cut unemployment benefits, basically telling struggling people they aren't allowed to feed their families. All the while, they're supposed to be the party of "Christians" at least according to them. I'm sure Jesus wants them self-identifying with his title after all, when they're saying they'd let him starve and get aids...."what you do to the least of these, you do unto me." What does this have to do with aids? Aids is prevalent amongst the poor because treatments and protection aren't as readily available. Beyond that though, I'm going to jump back to Congress. In the past decade, we've spent billions of dollars on wars that shouldn't have happened (In my opinion, that's all war), given billionaires tax cuts, and descried everything that might help humankind as "socialist."
But who is to blame? We all are. Why are people selfish? They aren't actually serving Christ. They aren't actually putting others above themselves. I understand that people work for the money they have, it's "earned," but seeing human suffering you could do something about and choosing not to is its own kind of evil, regardless of how one received or earned money he or she has. This is to say nothing about the advantages the successful have that have nothing to do with their own hard work, especially considering the cultural currency simply being white affords us people who are white. In "Hell Yeah" by Dead Prez, the rapper claims "to me this isn't welfare, I call it reparations." Honestly, we couldn't do reparations because no amount of money can pay for the destruction of hundreds of years of culture, thousands of years of honor, and lifetimes worth of pain. If the U.S. took the cost of both Iraq wars and the Afghanistan conflict and wrote a check for that amount to all of the people oppressed during the past 236 years, it wouldn't scratch the surface of what's due.
But we're capitalists. We make our own way. I'm not even white by technical definition but I benefit and act like I am because that's how I was raised. I can't begrudge it, it is what it is. But if nothing else, I can start with myself and help others get decentered too, as I constantly decenter myself.
Post-modernism is not a culture. It is not a release of truth. It's almost nothing you've ever heard it to be. It's a decentering and acknowledgement that the truth isn't something we can boil down to. It's something so much bigger.
-Zack
"See I'm a poet to some, a modern day shakespeare...but that ain't the case"
-Eminem
There are exceptions...the majority of my relationship that has turned into an engagement probably being the best example of that. Others are more shameful and include Harry Potter and soccer. But I've been spending a lot of time floating through things. I've always thought I'd get by on raw muscle-memory-like talent, like, for my whole life. I don't want to brag or anything (believe me, I think of this as far from it) but since graduation, that's basically what I've done, with my level of mental engagement dwindling ever more and more, each and every day, I think. It's why I've blogged less. It's why I'm not at full funding. It's why I completely lost steam by the end of ONS and why I probably won't finish my reading goals for the year.
I wish I could say that's over. I can say I hope it's over. I feel like it's over. Already today, it has been over.
I don't know that I can actually describe what happened, not here at least...but some things just finally broke through, last night and tonight, and I actually feel like I'm becoming, again, or for the first time, the person I was supposed to be all along.
This comes though, I admit, at a time when ministry is at its best at Hillsdale as it has ever been with me there. People actually want to participate in evangelism and that's not been the case for pretty much the history of the chapter with few (but extant) exceptions. That might be a part of it. But mostly, I just want to be real to more people than myself. I want to be who God created me to be.
Today is World Aids Day and it reminds me of one of my favorite lines on Kanye's new album...in the second verse of the second track, Gorgeous, he says "I'm going to treat this money like the government treats aids; I won't stop til all my [people] get it" I don't exactly know what that means because he's not naive enough to believe the government actually gives black people aids, but I think his sentiment might be eerily accurate...as Lil Wayne elucidates in the last track on Tha Carter III, 1 in every 9 black men are in jail, often for selling crack, which is prevalent in poor areas....globally, the darker your skin, the more likely you'll have aids, statistically speaking, but it's not because of race....it's because of poverty and a lack of education. Why is there so much poverty? I'm going to be blunt: selfish white republicans and a few assimilated non-whites and successful asian americans. Right now, in Congress, they're trying to renew the Bush tax cuts. For someone making minimum wage, that's trying to "save" them about 200 bucks a year, maybe, which they'd get back anyway in such a low tax bracket. On the other end, those making millions save tens of thousands. All the while, they're fighting to cut unemployment benefits, basically telling struggling people they aren't allowed to feed their families. All the while, they're supposed to be the party of "Christians" at least according to them. I'm sure Jesus wants them self-identifying with his title after all, when they're saying they'd let him starve and get aids...."what you do to the least of these, you do unto me." What does this have to do with aids? Aids is prevalent amongst the poor because treatments and protection aren't as readily available. Beyond that though, I'm going to jump back to Congress. In the past decade, we've spent billions of dollars on wars that shouldn't have happened (In my opinion, that's all war), given billionaires tax cuts, and descried everything that might help humankind as "socialist."
But who is to blame? We all are. Why are people selfish? They aren't actually serving Christ. They aren't actually putting others above themselves. I understand that people work for the money they have, it's "earned," but seeing human suffering you could do something about and choosing not to is its own kind of evil, regardless of how one received or earned money he or she has. This is to say nothing about the advantages the successful have that have nothing to do with their own hard work, especially considering the cultural currency simply being white affords us people who are white. In "Hell Yeah" by Dead Prez, the rapper claims "to me this isn't welfare, I call it reparations." Honestly, we couldn't do reparations because no amount of money can pay for the destruction of hundreds of years of culture, thousands of years of honor, and lifetimes worth of pain. If the U.S. took the cost of both Iraq wars and the Afghanistan conflict and wrote a check for that amount to all of the people oppressed during the past 236 years, it wouldn't scratch the surface of what's due.
But we're capitalists. We make our own way. I'm not even white by technical definition but I benefit and act like I am because that's how I was raised. I can't begrudge it, it is what it is. But if nothing else, I can start with myself and help others get decentered too, as I constantly decenter myself.
Post-modernism is not a culture. It is not a release of truth. It's almost nothing you've ever heard it to be. It's a decentering and acknowledgement that the truth isn't something we can boil down to. It's something so much bigger.
-Zack
"See I'm a poet to some, a modern day shakespeare...but that ain't the case"
-Eminem
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