"L" is for Lubbock

I went to the Lubbock Cotton Kings hockey game wearing blue paint with a guy in a Jason mask (see picture below) and some white dude who doesn't dance his color (see picture below). We made the news, on two channels. I'll tell you about it later. I'm going outside to play football.

Cotton Fro's  

we can do no great things, just small things with great love

I'm rewriting this last post because my abiguity has lead my father to believe I'm joining a free love, pot smoking, hippie commune and has caused my mother to do research on current cults in North America (ok I'm exaggerating, but the first thing my concerned mom said when I called her last night was, "Let me pass the phone to Dad, he wants to talk to you about your blog...").

Previously on Matt's blog...I wrote about The Simple Way, "a radical faith community that lives among and serves the homeless of Kensington, North Philadelpia". Something I ran across a couple days ago in an article by Christianity Today Magazine while at Mardel's, a mega-Christian bookstore in Lubbock that I normally avoid (I find a bigger, more beautiful and loving God in Barnes and Noble...and they have Starbucks).

I offered it as an alternative to the gospel "taught" by a lady in the Bible Translations section that day...While pretenting to read C.S. Lewis' The Magician's Nephew I overheard her explaining to a group of people why the KJV is the only inspired Word of God..."The King James is the only translation that captures the true name of God...Yahvey (emphesizing the "v"). All the other translations use Yahweh, which is inaccurate... Revelations (something or other...can't remember the chapter and verse she took out of context) states that the Word of God is the name of God and if you don't have the name of God right, you don't have the Word of God right" and "Actually, (she started to wisper, I leaned closer discreetly turning pages in my book) Satan is in the other translations...this is His doing".

Everything in me wanted to throw my book at her, point my finger in her face, and scream at the top my lungs for every one in the store to hear, "No, you are frickin' Satan! And there is a special seat in Hell where you can read your poop of a translation King James Bible for all eternity." But I calmly walked away...my outburst would have only provided her more opportunity to lie. While fleeing from this King James fanatic, I found myself on the other side of the store, reading about a differant kind of radical, one closer to the likes of the name they both bear...Christ-ian.

Shane Claiborne (one of the six original people who started The Simple Way community) found himself as an "ordinary radical alienated from secular activism and disenchanted with Christian inactivism." He began a search to find a Christian...someone who was asking the same question he was..."What if Jesus meant the stuff he said?"...someone who was taking Him at His word. His "Christian-hunt" took him to Mother Teresa and the Missions of Charity in Calcutta and to Gandhiji Prem Nivas, a community of lepers in India. Reflecting on his journey, Shane says:

"I had gone to search for Christianity, hoping to find an old nun who believed Jesus meant what he said. And I found Christianity, but it didn't just belong to Mother Teresa...I did indeed see Christ in Mother Teresa, but I also found Christ in the lepers, the children, the destitute, the workers...and even began to recognize that Christ lives in me."

Dad, Mom...Despite a slight curiosity,I'm not looking to smoke weed...or to live on the streets and leave you with all my college debt. I just want to believe that Jesus meant what he said. I just want to find Him. And begin to recognize that He lives in me.

If anyone else is feeling this way too and has a day or two or seven free in December, let me know. I want to visit The Simple Way. You can read about it here...http://www.thesimpleway.org/. Let me know ASAP if you want to go. They like a week notice for visitors.

And if you want the article I found at Mardel's. Click on this: www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/009/16.38.html

"We can do no great things, just small things with great love. It is not how much you do, but how much love you put into doing it" (Mother Teresa).

Two Weeks Notice

I rolled out of bed about 3:54AM this morning to the alarm of a mariachi band. I’ve found that 106.5 “something in Spanish” is the only radio station that will wake me up at such a God-awful, painfully unnatural time, where there is “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Twice I’ve turned the music off, rolled over, and continued my dream about conveyer belts, cardboard boxes, and labels. Once my grandmother woke me up and handed me the phone. It was Paula, my supervisor from UPS “reminding” me that I was supposed to be at work. That’s one of the perks of the job…if you “accidentally” sleep in, they’ll give you a wakeup call.

Today I broke routine. After my strawberry pop tarts and milk, I put on four shirts instead of one, two pairs of pants instead of one, and grabbed my gloves. It was about forty degrees this morning…that’s winter cold here and in this weather Texans chatter their teeth and wear big coats and stocking hats. I had forgotten what cold was and as I turned right off of Kirby Avenue toward the East side of town I made a circle with my lips like I was puffing a cigar, trying to see my breath. The street lamps illuminated patches of the cotton fields, now in full bloom and bright white. My eyes were not awake yet, trying to blink away the sleep, casting a mirage of fluffy snow off the side of the road. I pulled my hooded sweatshirt over my head. I was cold, but it felt good. And I enjoyed pretending the cotton was snow and believing it was as cold as the West Texans looked.

I’m looking forward to Christmas in Ohio…and sleeping like normal people.

I put my two weeks notice in at UPS Tuesday and at the Furniture Connection Wednesday. I’m leaving Lubbock. I have to.

Two very alive people, Anthony Riske and Kristen Miller, came through Lubbock last weekend on a road trip. We went to Graham Central Station where I embarrassed myself trying to learn to “country western dance”. Some guy named Tommy taught us the basics, but I just shuffled my feet around, smiled like I was drunk, and tried not to bump into anyone. Tommy was the man by the way, swinging girls around effortlessly like he was spinning pizza dough (sorry I couldn’t think of any other comparison…in other words, he had skills). If I were a girl and owned a pair of cowboy boots (or cowgirl boots…if those even exist) I probably would have fallen in love with him.

After we danced to “Hick Town”, Riske and I sang karaoke…“You’ve Got to Fight for Your Right to Party”. Sunday we went to Church, had tea, baked cookies, tossed the “b”, went to BBQ buffet, and sat in the back of my pickup on a mattress at the drive-in moving theatre. The grass was greener when they were here and the day after they left I was depressed…bad. I drove around on side streets around J&B coffee until I stopped crying. Once I got my green tea, I wrote this in my journal…

“Anthony and Kristen reminded me of the life I am not living. Reminded me of how lonely I am here…I don’t want to loose myself here, don’t want to grow content with anything less than what You have for me. I’m tired of this feeling. I’m tired of the darkness. Why am I here? God I need something loud. I need something clear, something tangible. Otherwise I’m gone, I’m putting my two weeks in and I’m gone. I need something bigger than my doubt , bigger than my fear…”

The only thing that has been loud is my desire to leave. I had been praying to God, “why am I here?” for so long, wondering with every new person I met or new church I walked into, if it would be the connection. Somehow I felt like if I didn’t find some roots here, the adventure would be a failure. I was afraid to leave, afraid to miss God by a day or two, afraid that I wasn’t listening hard enough. I became almost superstitious, over analyzing every conversation and circumstance, hoping to hear a whisper of God’s voice, trying to piece together some impossible puzzle of God’s will for my life, all the while he was the beat in my heart, the pounding that is drumming me to leave. I’m tired of believing God is allusive and confusing. He wants us to know Him more than we want to know Him. He wants us to love others more than we want to love others. He speaks louder than I can listen, more clear than I can think. His Spirit is in me and my heart beats to follow Him.

I think sometimes when I say I can’t hear God, I already have, but I just don’t believe that I have, don’t believe that I can actually hear Him. Doubt, not in God’s voice, but in my ears, leaves me deaf, dark, and alone. Maybe I have enough faith in God, but not in myself.

I know it is about time to leave, and that makes me smile…one of those smiles that sticks for awhile, one that won’t go away even if I wanted it to. Don’t get me wrong, the big blue sky has been good. I needed the sunshine. And the time with my family has been sweet…so sweet. I will cry and miss my aunts and uncles, cousins, and grandma. It won’t be easy to say goodbye to my UPS team, my friends from the Wesley, and First Community UMC in Canyon. For it was my heart that lead me out here. But somewhere between May and October I stopped following it…stopped believing that I could hear God’s voice. Not anymore. Thanks Riske and Kristen for driving in on your Honda Prelude ambulance with a siren of a muffler, to breath life into a dying man. Thanks for the reminder to follow my heart…and for going country western dancing me with, I would have never done it alone.


p.s. I’ve kinda of got some plans…I’ll be in Texas a couple more weeks, taking in every moment I have left with my family. Then I hope to visit some friends on the way out of Lubbock in Canyon, Colorado, Michigan, Indiana, etc. on my way home for Christmas in Ohio. In January I’m probably “moving” to North Carolina to make up the worship practicum I "failed" so I can finish my youth ministry degree. My supervisor will be the youth pastor at Kernersville Wesleyan Church. You may have heard of him…his name is Jared Bell. Summer? I dunno, but Asbury sounds good in the fall and Cooper’s looking for a roommate.