In the Clothes Closet

I realized again today that I've become rather closed. Not that I won't talk if people ask or whatever, but I've set myself up so that I don't really confide in people much. Every once in while when the strain's too much I find one of the people I trust and spill...but I don't have people involved in my life on a regular basis. I mean, I kinda do, but...I'm not really open with them. I've been closed for a few years now...I don't like it, but I'm not sure what to do about it. People know me, but only so much. Only as much as I want them to...and a bit more sometimes. Those who've known me for a while know me better than I might think I let them, but those have become increasingly few over the years...I'm not sure where to go with that, but I don't like it...

G. K. Chesterton and Romans

Romans 12:2 "do not be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind..."

Chesterton in Orthodoxy:

No one doubts that an ordinary man can get on with this world: but we demand not strength enough to get on with it, but strength enough to get it on. Can he hate it enough to change it, and yet love it enough to think it worth changing? Can he look up at its colossal good without once feeling acquiescence? Can he look up at its colossal evil without once feeling despair? Can he, in short, be at once not only a pessimist and an optimist, but a fanatical pessimist and a fanatical optimist? Is he enough of a pagan to die for the world, and enough of a Christian to die to it? In this combination, I maintain, it is the rational optimist who fails, the irrational optimist who succeeds. He is ready to smash the whole universe for the sake of itself.

It's an interesting, but almost self evident, thing that if one loves something properly, one loves it in a way that wants its best. This is what true realism is. Many pessimists say they're realists, but if they forget to love transformatively. I have missed this for a good while. I have seen the evil in the world and been appalled, but not till recently have I seen the beauty in it and loved it in a way that made me want to make things better.

This kind of passionate love is how God loves us. Chesterton talked earlier about how one loves something not for the features of something but for the sake of that something being what it was. I love my house not so much for any particular feature, but for the sake of it being my house. I love my siblings not so much because of any particular feature of their personality (though there are many good features), but because they're my siblings. In a similar way, God loves us not for any feature of ours, but because we're his. And because he loves us not for any particular feature, he's free to completely remake us without losing his love for us.

It is in this way that we should love the world around us. Not because of any particular feature of it, for there are many reasons to despise the world. Great evil, pain, and sorrow are all quite apparent. But we should love it because it's God's. It's his creation. So, in spite of how nasty the world is, It's still God's and he still loves it. Consequently, as his children, we should too. We should be made new by God's transforming love, and then let that love flow out to transform the world around us.

This also speaks to the issue of total depravity, but I'll leave that to another discussion...

Pride

Pride crops up in the stupidest places. I've been reading the Bible regularly. If I keep the pace I'm going at, I'll have read it through at least twice this year. That's a good thing, and excellent thing. God's been really really good that way. But it's so easy to feel better than others because of that. It's stupid. I KNOW I didn't do anything to get there. It just so happened that I had my bible and lunch in the car on a break at work at the same time, and I started reading. And I know it's been God who's kept me reading. But it's so easy to feel better than people who don't...

Today, I was talking with my counselor about what I find "flow" in. (basically, flow is when you're so wrapped up in something you forget yourself and the world around you). I find it in snowboarding and listening/playing music. He made the observation that it's more commonly found in more sterile environments. TV, video games, etc. And I KNOW that I used to be that way. I know that. But I felt proud that I was more connected to reality than that...It's absurd how insidious pride is. It dogs good things and then leaps at the opportunity to distort them...Would that I were actually humble...

Luke 14 and living in the Way.

Luke 14:25-33

²⁵ A large crowd was following Jesus. He turned around and said to them, ²⁶ “If you want to be my disciple, you must hate everyone else by comparison—your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple. ²⁷ And if you do not carry your own cross and follow me, you cannot be my disciple.
 ²⁸ “But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it? ²⁹ Otherwise, you might complete only the foundation before running out of money, and then everyone would laugh at you. ³⁰ They would say, ‘There’s the person who started that building and couldn’t afford to finish it!’
 ³¹ “Or what king would go to war against another king without first sitting down with his counselors to discuss whether his army of 10,000 could defeat the 20,000 soldiers marching against him? ³² And if he can’t, he will send a delegation to discuss terms of peace while the enemy is still far away. ³³ So you cannot become my disciple without giving up everything you own."

Don't begin until you count the cost. There is a cost to following Jesus. There's a cross to following Jesus. I didn't really pick up on that right away when I became a christian. I've seen a little bit what it's cost me over the years. TV, video games, and my emotional stability have all gone by the wayside in my following of Jesus. I don't really mourn those losses as I've seen the amazing things that have been a result of giving those things up, but I realized today that it's more than that. 

There's such a cost. To follow Jesus, to be his disciple, is a full time occupation. It costs not just my TV and video games, it costs everything. So much so that he warns us to count that cost before following him. To sit down and think about whether we're ready to commit to that. 

"You cannot become my  disciple without giving up everything you own." everything. If we commit to discipleship, it will change everything. Not just some things. Everything. How we talk, how we think. About people, life events, responsibility, family, community, the environment, food, war, life, death, exercise...everything.

I don't think I've given up everything. I think I've been a half-hearted disciple. I'm scared. I'm scared of counting the cost. I'm scared of what that cost might really be...I'm scared that cross reference isn't as figurative as I like to make it out to be.

If I am to be Jesus' disciple, his follower, then...

• I must hate everything in comparison. The people I love most in this world must be nothing compared to him and his way. My life must be nothing compared to him and his way.
• I must realize what the cost will be. And consider it carefully. He repeats that for emphasis. It's like he's saying "make doubly sure you know what you're getting into here." because...
•  I must give up everything. Everything. The things I hold dearest I must give up. He may give them back, may let me keep them. My friends, my music, my job, my comfort, my home, my desire for a spouse, my desires for anything...they must be his first, and mine second. 

It's scary as hell, but I'm convinced he's right, and that it's better...in my head at least. It needs to infuse how I live, still. Daily. Pray that it would.