Thoughts on Life and Living
If you have not read my post, Let me tell you about my friend, Tracey. . . and her current journey, you might want to do so now.
I’m currently sitting in the corner chair of the Starbucks closest to my apartment. I have an appointment here in a few hours, but came early to have a place to simply sort out life and pray. I’m pensive and contemplative. Mostly, I am just hurting.
I awoke to a text from dear friend and brother in Christ and life, Craig Clarke. See the actual message on the right.
This morning, as I approached my car in the parking deck of my apartment complex, I noticed a “business card” lodged on the window of my driver side door. This is not an uncommon form of advertising here, so I didn’t think anything of it.
I picked up the card, glanced at it, and immediately realized it was a service that provided “pretty girls” for their clients, complete with a 24 hour service line to call. Unfortunately, I was not taken back, because this type of service is also not uncommon in this part of the world.
There are many emotions and thoughts as I get “business cards” like this one and the world they represent. Bondage. Depression. Desperation. Sadness.
“Get back in the car and drive off of the bridge!!!” These words broke the chaotic, rancorous silence as I anxiously shouted in the local language at our terrified cab driver. My world was in the process of crashing down. . . literally.
It was May 12, 2008 at 2:28pm. My good friend, Paul Quiros, was with me. I had been working with him all week in investigating the possibility of his law firm opening up a practice somewhere in this country. Our second leg of the journey landed us in the middle of a bridge, seemingly at the end of the world for most people in my life in America.
As we drove and talked and prepared for our next meeting, the bridge underneath us abruptly began moving. When I say moving, slamming back and forth is more like it. It was a packed road. There were buses and trucks and cars back to back as far as the eye could see.
EVERYONE panicked in abject fear, abandoned their vehicles, and ran. No one really knew where they were running, but frantically run they did. Paul had the presence of mind to yell that we had a better chance of survival by staying in the car and getting off the bridge than we did running.
I screamed at our driver to get back in the car and drive. His eyes were literally [Read more…]
As was the case a few weeks ago, I wanted to share another “open letter”. This one was to both the same girl from the previous letter (CLICK HERE to read it) and her best friend. In follow-up to the question about dating, they sent me the following questions regarding prayer and the Trinity. I answered their questions by explaining my principle in dealing with seeming contradictions of faith and the Bible.
I know this is more technical than any other post on this blog, but hopefully it will be helpful to someone with similar questions. Again, I do not claim to be a theologian, but rather a Christian who has wrestled with my own faith on many levels. This email is the product on some of my personal wrestlings.
As was the format with the letter on dating, the first part of this post is the email the two women sent to me. Following this is my response. These are both abbreviated, as I deleted the personal content of the exchange. (I have added some headings in this post to better assist in organizing it.) [Read more…]
In honor of Easter Week, I will write three posts over the next seven days more focused on Christ and the Bible. Here is the first.
When I came to faith in Christ back in college, my mind was rough, to say the least. It was packed with rapid fire emotions and thoughts of aggression, anxieties, lusts, and everything else which vie for the mind of men.
One of the practices I came to was a simple, yet profound act for me. I decided to physically kneel down in my room and pray Psalm 19:14 every night. There I was, hunched over a musty brown couch, in my tiny, dank room, on the second floor of my beer and sweat soaked fraternity house, praying nightly for the Lord to simply take over my thought life.
Thankfully my roommate was ALWAYS out way past my bedtime, so I was safe from him awkwardly walking in during this time!
Today, many years later, my prayers look and sound similar. This is my prayer today, but my heart for everyday…
Lord Jesus, please guide me this your day. You have given me this day as a gift, so please direct it at every turn. Please control my sinful urges, but unleash my God-given desires and [Read more…]