Txt Msg

Sometimes this is how I feel.

Also, I never text like this.

--

Txt Msg

God, why ddnt u

answer my txt?

I sent it ystrdy

at 2 pm

rght aftr I rolld out of

sin

It said

help me plz

bcs Ive lost my

step or my way

or wtvr

ppl say when

they do smthng

shitty

But u ddnt

evn rspnd or

evn notify me

that my txt ddnt

go thru like

ur sppsd to

whn theres silence

4 a while

To be human

people are just people
they shouldn't make you nervous
the world is everlasting, it's coming and it's going

--

People are just people.

I read in George Orwell's "The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius" that people are not just people, that people in England aren't the same people in America or in Germany or in South Africa. But I don't believe George Orwell - and I wonder if at the end of the essay he doesn't refute his own opinion.

I joined Preston and Claire who taught English last night at the Life Center. I had met a few students last week at the party, including Van's brother Ahmed, Zeba and her husband Amir.

The two-hour class is organized into two parts. It's an upper-level class centered on conversation, so each half of each class has a different discussion topic. The first topic was marriage.

What surprised me about our conversation about marriage with Kurds, primarily Muslim Kurds, was that nothing they said surprised me. Every answer sounded American. Everything sounded Christian, and not even ultra-conservative Christian. It sounded like something I've said about marriage or I've heard said about marriage.

Several of the students talked about respect: the husband respecting the wife, and vise versa; the wife respecting her husband's friends, etc. They talked about what they look for in a spouse: education, values, looks, honesty.

--

I'm writing this to expose my ignorance. I assumed a lot about this culture because of the books I read (A Thousand Splendid Suns) or movies (I'll be honest: Aladdin), but I've been wrong.

It's hard to know a culture without being immersed in that culture. I can read all I want, and still not grasp what a people group is all about. I can talk to Jessica and Jeremy about life in Kurdistan, without understanding what life in Kurdistan is really like.

I can't stop thinking of the Incarnation, and what it meant for God to step into our world in order to empathize with us.

He didn't just read about the world or watch movies about it.
He lived in our houses; he "moved into the neighborhood" as Eugene Peterson says.
He put on our skin; he put on our culture (he wore Klash!).
He died a death that we die: political, religious.

So when God says to me, "Girl, I get it. I know what you're going through."

He means it.


I'm beginning to understand that now.





Lauren

[* photo by Lydia Bullock]

Repentance, forgiveness, etc.

Last Sunday at my church, Westminster Presbyterian, Pastor Justin preached about the Prodigal Son, one of my favorite parables of Jesus. (Cliché.) But Justin taught it in a new way, a way that made me really, really angry at first. (Foreshadowing.)

What if the prodigal son was not repentant?
--

This blog is dedicated to Nick, who buys me Starbucks before church every Sunday.

--

Last Tuesday Haley and I upset Prof. Perry (our favorite IWU professor, no matter how long it takes him to grade our exams). We were on Facebook during class, which he hates more than anything, and our conversations popped up on his news feed. 

Yes, that was a huge FAIL on our behalf. If we're going to break rules, we need to be better at breaking them. 

Anyway, I felt horrible about it - the good kind of horrible. The kind that brings me to repentance (II Cor. 7:10). Because though I've been on Facebook during this class before and Prof. Perry has known, I have never repented. I haven't really been sorry.

Side note: I've noticed that these last two posts seem very guilt-driven, and they're not really. I felt guilty about how I treated my former crush only because I hadn't done anything about it (that is, repent). I will feel guilty about disrespecting my favorite professor as long as I continue to peruse Facebook during his lectures.

So I won't anymore. Hear me, Prof. Perry, I will not be on Facebook during your class anymore. It's done. My laptop will stay in my dorm room, no matter how inconvenient it is. 

--

I hate disappointing people. If anything is going to bring me to repentance, it's that watery look in your eyes.

--

So what if the prodigal son was not sorry? What if he only came back to his father because he knew he had no other option? It's as if I'm not going on Facebook in Perry's class because he banned laptops. But I can still bring my laptop to his class. I can still be on Facebook and post rude comments about his class on his wall. (Argg.)

But I'm not. (This is beginning to sound self-righteous; I'm aware of that.)

Pastor Justin used Luke 15:17-19 to back up this theory:

"When he came to his senses, he said, 'How many of my father's hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.'"

Jesus says that the prodigal son "came to his senses," but that's not the same as saying the son knew he was in the wrong. Yeah, duh eating from a feeding trough wasn't "sensible." You don't have to think you're in the wrong to know that. The text doesn't come out and say that the son was sorry, just that he knew he didn't want to be poor and hungry and dirty anymore.

Pastor Justin said that the phrase "I have sinned against heaven and against you" was meant to remind the Pharisees of the last time that phrase was used, with Pharaoh during the exodus (Ex. 10:16). I agree that this is probably true because Jesus has done this before ("My God, my God, why have you forsaken me," Ps. 22). And honestly, Jesus likes shocking the Pharisees. He does it a lot.

But what's interesting is that Pharaoh told Aaron and Moses that he had sinned against God and them, but he still wasn't repentant. He was just trying to get out of trouble. He didn't want another plague, but he wasn't about to let the Israelites free.

And finally, if the son was really repentant, do you think he'd really care to be a hired hand? He still wanted paid, probably to go out and go crazy all over again. Get more gambling money. Replenish the supply, so to speak. If he was sorry - truly sorry - wouldn't he be okay with being an unpaid slave?

Of course we don't know any of this for sure. And it's a little frustrating to believe that this could possibly be true if you've heard it one way your whole life. But if it is true, what does that say about Grace?

It says that God forgives us - he runs to us, embraces us, pardons us - before we ask for forgiveness. Before we even feel the need to be forgiven.

--

What's scary about asking for forgiveness is that no one has to forgive you. Not everyone is as gracious as the prodigal's father. No one is God.

I hate disappointing people because they aren't obligated to forgive freely. Prof. Perry could hold a grudge against me. I could've affected our relationship by my disobedience.

So ... I guess that's where we come in. That's where Christians come in. Freely we have received, freely we give.

It's up to us to forgive freely,
to hold no grudges,
to love unconditionally.



It's hard. I know.


ezek.

Title Track: Thanks, Postman

I find myself in a bit of a pickle.

See, it’s the middle of the semester: the time everyone just wants to give up and quit, letting grades slip and procrastination kick in. It’s almost spring break – one more day! – and I’m burned out.

So I watch TV. I want my brain to take a break from reading and writing to laugh at Jeff Winger on “Community” or get swept up in the drama of “Heroes.” I’d like to stare at the black box in front of me for an hour and detoxify from everything school-related.

But I can’t. I blame my major.

You know how professors warn you that “this class will kill your love for [insert your favorite major-related activity]”? I’ve heard it more than once. But as a communication major, my love for the media not only gets killed, but beaten relentlessly, kicked around and spit on. So much for detoxifying.

In my media and society class, we’re reading Neil Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death,” which is about how this generation’s prominent form of communication (the media, specifically television) affects the way we think and the way we discover truth. Because television is the predominant medium of our culture, we have become conditioned to certain things. Like, we expect information to be given to us in quick sound bytes and we expect to be entertained.

This doesn’t really sound like a problem, until you really start to think about it. It’s fine to want TV to be fast-paced and entertaining, but if you expect everything to be fastpaced and entertaining, there’s a problem.

Postman argues that our attention spans have been shortened by TV (and, though he wrote the book prior to the Internet, I’m sure he’d agree it has played a part). We can’t stay focused if the content isn’t entertaining.

Take sermons for example. During the school year I go to a liturgical Presbyterian church. The service bounces from prayer to song to Scripture-reading to homily pretty fast – only 20 minutes maximum for each section – yet still I find myself getting fidgety. I’m not the only one, either. The lady in the pew in front of us always does the kids’ word search in the bulletin.

The longest I have to stay focused is only 20 minutes, and still I cannot handle it. TV, what have you done to me? Or think about class: How long do we listen to the professor before we start perusing the Internet? Not very long.

Even as I write this, I see the truth in this. Every time I get writer’s block, I check my Facebook. I can only handle homework for short periods of time before I look for entertainment.

This is why I’m in a pickle. I feel too guilty to watch TV, but know no other way to rest my brain from school work. I wish I had never read Postman and could back to ignorantly blaming my lack of attention on undiagnosed A.D.D.

I’m left to wonder what I should do. How can I rest my brain without damaging it more with television?

I could read – but even I, an avid reader, don’t want to look at tiny print after I’ve spent hours writing a paper. I could play Sudoku – but even that involves a certain amount of math.

Maybe the problem is our time frame for rest. Most of us take sporadic breaks throughout the day between homework assignments. We spend Saturday mornings doing homework then have fun Saturday night.

What if we tried it the Jewish way – what if we worked really hard six days a week and left a whole day for rest, for Sabbath? Instead of taking minor breaks, what if we took one big break.

We wouldn’t need to squeeze in a television show here and there, but could spend the day shopping in Indy or taking a road trip to see friends.

Whenever I think about Sabbath, I get really uneasy. I’d much rather take smaller breaks every day than have one whole day of rest. But when I think about what I’m taking my breaks with – mindless television shows that do more damage than good – the idea of Sabbath becomes more appealing.

Because even though I like watching shows like “Community” after several hours of homework, I don’t feel rested once the episode is over. Most of the time I want to watch another episode and forget about homework completely.

So what do you think, do we try setting aside whole days for rest? Or do we continue bouncing from activity to activity to keep ourselves amused?

The post was originally printed in Indiana Wesleyan University's The Sojourn newspaper.