Major/Minor

I’ve lost track of time. And in that time I’ve felt six months’ wages on my heart. And while I’ve been finding new ways of loving Jesus — ways I needed and ways I’m learning — there is part of this heart that’s since left.

I write that hurting.

There’s a vacancy. A void. An open-ness so wrong and painful.

As I write, Thrice’s album Major/Minor fills my ears. It’s the album that’s brought me here tonight. I’ve recently been traveling, and in more ways than one. Maybe wandering is a better word. The past six days I’ve driven from New Jersey to California across plains and over mountains, through snow and sun, in singing and in silence. And after driving three thousand miles I’m still not far from where I started.

I am the other prodigal, more crafty than his brother. For all my traveling, I am home in the worst way. I hope you understand. See, I wander without moving: the better son, the older brother. I’ve learned to leave without getting lost. I’ve found the grave and how to flirt with her, how to land a kiss and not die. But she’s had her wages.

Death is my mistress. And she’s wearing off on me.

I remember rare moments when my heart’s deepest dissatisfaction was met, however fragile its meeting, somewhere between the lines of that beautiful book, like some secret breathed beneath the page, hiding behind the words. I recall its haunting. I can feel my risen pulse on those nights the lines would rob my eyes of sleep and send waves of tears in exchange.

But I am someone else tonight. I am somewhere else. Bring me home, just the way you did at first, the way you’ve done before and again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QFD-PhJRsk  //  ”Words In The Water” by Thrice, Major/Minor.

I am praying this song, and am once more reminded of home, of you, of life. I’ve wandered, cheated, and died. Speak light into my darkness. Breathe life into this dust. I am dry and disappointed, lonely and derailed. I feel wounded and deceived by you, tricked into a hope you don’t mean to fill. I am afraid to stay with you, and only more to leave for good. But your quietness with me is so unsettling. You’ve become so hard to find, and I’ve become too weary to look. I’m hurt by you and your erratic, no-show tendencies. I hate your games. But I know you. You are horrible and beautiful. You wake the dead and heal the dying. I am both.

 

Choked Up.

Several people gathered together Saturday morning around some eggs, bagels, and the call we feel upon our lives to participate in the missio Dei. Our church is at the threshold of a spectacular journey following Jesus as communities of redeemed people intentional about redeeming the world around them. The ‘leaders’ of these emerging communities shared coffee, vision, and stories about what God is doing in, through, and around them. And we watched a short video about gospel-oriented, Jesus-centered communities sent to reach a world desperate to drink the kingdom to the dregs.

I am floored, over and again, by the voices of those who can hardly push past tears the deep, unsettling compassion they feel for a city they call their own, for people they live into and toward and for and among. They pour their lives out as a small huddle of broken people in order to see what beautiful thing Jesus might make of them. These are radically inclusive, embracing, accepting communities head over heels with Jesus and the world he so deeply loves, sincere about reshaping their lives around the missio Dei and not the other way around. Here, now, his kingdom is breaking in. Here, now, his life is fleshed by his people. Here, now, broken people are being healed in love.

It was refreshing to see someone weep over their city.

[ SOMA Communities // Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/22754743 ]

I, Peter.

Maybe it’s because of my seemingly perpetual status of singleness, but I have a love – a special appreciation, perhaps – for hearing people in love talk about their partner when they aren’t around. Sometimes it’s annoying, true. But mostly I love it, especially when I can feel it’s genuine. I’m sure you’ve experienced something like that before.

I’m not talking about the kind of heady, overly-blissful delusions many young dating couples find themselves lost in. I’m talking about marriages 25 years deep, rich with all the scars of a war veteran. I mean marriages just barely hitting the 3-year mark, thick with all the tension and difficulty of finances, insecurities, and in-laws. My sister and her husband are one such couple.

Hearing my sister talk about her husband, one might be tempted to think she’s being insincere or maybe even darkly sarcastic. But her authenticity is palpable, and hers are no empty words. She says “I love you” as one who’s been wounded and healed. And given the chance, she would talk about him – his good, bad, and ugly – with more love than you thought possible.

I love hearing people who love people.

People who love people talk about them. And it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re romantic.

Like the old man whose granddaughter, he would swear, has gifted the world in grace merely by her presence here. Or the little boy who knows that his dad, of all dads, can hit a baseball clear into outer space. Or the admiring daughter whose single mom, strong and selfless, works 80-hour weeks just to make the bills this month. Give any of them an opportunity to talk about the people that matter most to them, and it’s likely to inspire a bit of healthy jealousy in us. They love these people.

I find it hard to know that many Christians don’t like to talk about Jesus much. In some situations, if they manage to avoid talking about him and I was not so successful, I am made to feel sorry for bringing him up. Often, I’m on the other end, more than a little embarrassed to mention him. This week alone, I felt my own embarrassment of him. Twice. And it’s only Tuesday.

Pulling into the parking lot of Blockbuster, I was listening to The Almost’s “Dirty And Left Out” – specifically the part where Aaron Gillespie sings out, “Jesus, Jesus / There’s something about your name / Master, Savior / Jesus!” As I pulled in, I noticed someone I went to high school with but hadn’t seen in some time, suddenly felt self-conscious, and turned the music off. On another occasion, I sat in a Starbucks and was turning through the pages of the newest issue of RELEVANT Magazine. One page contained an ad for a new book that read in large text, “Jesus was weird.” I was careful not to linger on the page longer than I had to; someone might see.

I can’t help but think of Peter, whose self-proclaimed love for Jesus dissolved into shame around a fire. And as much as I’d like to make excuses for Peter (mostly because I’d be making excuses for myself), I wonder at Peter’s love for Jesus. Peter’s shame and Peter’s love were not unrelated. At least Jesus didn’t seem to think so. Pulling Peter aside in John 21, Jesus asks him three times, careful to parallel Peter’s denial: “Do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me?”

“Peter was grieved, because he asked him a third time.” (21:17)

From moment to moment I confess I am more like Peter than Jesus and mostly just assume my love for him. But in my most honest moments, I find him asking me the same: “Do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me?” And I grieve.