the watchmen

"Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain." - Psalm 127:1

In today's world we have lost the value of roles in society. Everything now is run by governments and/or big business. But long before the systems of the world there was a different kind of ruling and authority established. Within that rule there were different roles given to individuals who the King perceived as worthy. We probably most commonly associate this with times when men wore stockings and women were beheaded. But there resides a kingdom which exist beyond our physical realm and yet is more real than the skin we live in. And there are those appointed in this kingdom with a very demanding job, to stand on the walls of the city and keep watch.

As the name suggest, watchmen are those few that are appointed to keep a watchful eye for anything unsuspected to occur. They work long hours and all through the night, as that's when the enemy likes to attack. This goes without saying that it's not easy staying awake while everyone else is sleeping. And I know I've fallen asleep on the job before. Who honestly enjoys being alone in the darkness? But what joy it is when you see the first sliver of day light and the sky turns from black to purple to blue to orange to yellow to blue with a slight shade of green in between.

"At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were wise. The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them. The wise, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps." ... "Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour." - Matthew 25:1-4, 13

As Christians we are all called to keep watch, in a sense being watchmen, but there is a distinction between watchmen of the city and those being mindful of their own personal actions. Please note that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ and this is something that was in my heart to share. I hope this blesses you.

bread alone

"He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord." - Deuteronomy 8:3 (Moses speaking to the Israelites)

"I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” - John 6:51

To this day I still don't fully understand the process of fasting. I understand it's simply giving up something for a certain period of time. But what I'm talking about is how do I know it's the right time to fast? Sure our religions have set apart certain times of the year where you pick something to obstain from for 40 days. They even made a movie on the topic. But unless we hear from God what He is calling us to give up isn't it really just torturing ourselves?

So up until last week I had not considered fasting for a long time. I think the last time I can remember was before the military. But talking with Jason about how The Lord was having him fast for his daughter really sparked something inside of me. And I wanted to hear what The Lord might be trying to tell me. Everyday last week I woke up thinking I should fast that day. But it wasn't until Friday that it hit me. And this is the cool thing that I found out, God doesn't strike you down if you mess up. Because I was pretty sure I needed to fast my breakfast, but I ended up eating some pop-tarts (which were so good). So I decided to fast for lunch. Also, another cool thing I learned is that God will honor our choices to obey Him even if we're off a little bit.

Now I can't claim to have fasted completely from all food for lunch that day because I know my body and how it reacts to low blood sugar, and I still had the rest of the day at work to finish. So this is where the bread ties into what God showed me. I asked The Lord what I could eat, and all I heard was bread. So I got two slices out of the fridge and then thought peanut butter would go good with it, but I heard "no, just bread". So I thought "okay Lord, this is weird."  Now there I was with two slices of plain wheat bread, feeling kind of silly, but as I sat down and began to eat The Lord began to unfold some things. He spoke to me about removing the sweet things, like peanut butter, and all the other things we pile on top of "bread" and going back to the simple piece of bread, the foundation of a sandwich. It was really pretty simple but something so profound at the same time that I still don't get it all.

I think the biggest thing that's come of this is the revelation that nothing is as important as my foundation, the bread alone. All the other toppings and condiments in this life are nice and full of flavor, but do not provide the real nutrients my body needs.

Looking forward with hope and faith

So there I was, staring at this flashing folder telling me that my hard drive is dead and I've lost everything on it. And I had a choice to make... There are a lot of things to worry about in this life; our jobs, our health, our finances to name just a few. And last night I was tempted to add one more to that list. While browsing Safari my macbook froze up on me. This has happened before so I took a break and came back to it about 10 minutes later. When I saw the "Beach Ball of Death" still spinning and unable to force quit any application I was forced to hold the power button down. (I hate doing that) After a cold restart the grey screen sat idle for a few minutes then flashed a folder icon with a question mark in the middle of it. I had never seen this error before so I turned to my trusty workhorse, the Power Mac G4 (Quicksilver edition), and googled the error. Come to find out, after all three troubleshooting steps on apple's support page failed, that my hard drive was dead and I had just lost all my data. And the answer to your question is no I didn't have a backup.

There were no real emotions involved. God had given me a peace that it was okay and the choice to trust God was instinctive. I feel God is giving me a fresh start and doesn't want me to dwell on the past. He is calling me to look forward with hope and faith.

This actually goes far beyond the incident with my computer. That was just one parable God used to show me what He's really talking about. He was speaking to the deep parts of my heart that hours before were feeling sad about being away from Japan and missing the people and times I had there. I feel He's speaking about how temporal our lives are and while memories are important they are also fleeting and momentary. The important thing is that while we live here in a momentary lapse of time we have a God who is eternal and will always be with us, even when we suddenly crash like my hard drive did last night.

Re-Connecting with God

Today we went to visit a new church. I haven't been to church in a long time. Partly because I've established an idea of what I think "church" is and also because the churches within the military are not very open to the Holy Spirit. But now I'm home, finally settled in, and I know it's time to get my life and marriage back in-line with God's word. Not that I've been living outside of his word, at least I don't think so. But not being around other believers has been incredibly hard on my spiritual health.

Going in this morning I had a slight pessimistic view of how I thought the service would be. (And it probably didn't help that the inside looked like an IKEA showroom.) But I was surprised with the morning bulletin at how well designed it was. Not that this matters to probably 90% of other people. But to me, a creative individual, I tend to scrutinize the design of almost anything. So I was happy to see a beautifully constructed piece of print in my hands.

I know God is in the details and I can't stand it when churches sacrifice good design for mediocre clip art that was popular in the 1990's.

Moving on, the worship was very refreshing and I felt a good connection with God as I sang praise to Him. I really spent a lot of time focusing on His blessings in my life these past few months. And every time I really focused on delivering my praise to Him and not just singing I was struck with tears in my eyes. Which is something I honestly miss, as weird as that may sound. But really, the closest times I've ever been to God have been when the tears poured from my eyes like waterfalls.

The message this morning was on Jeremiah 29:1-7. It spoke exactly of my recent 3 years in Japan. How God placed me in a foreign land where the ratio of Christians to Buddhist is something like 1 to 10. I wish I could have been more faithful with the time I was given there though. I feel like I just lost hope a lot of the time. And the rest of the time I feel like I was just waiting for my time to end in Japan. So I guess the big difference between me and the Jews is that I knew my date of exile from the foreign land. However, I realized I don't have to be on the other side of the world to be in a foreign land. Because, in reality, this earth is a foreign land compared to where my real home resides, in Heaven.

I hope this finds you well today. Remember that it's never to late to start anew and get back in touch with the One who is always willing to listen. God Bless.

-stay creative-