Article 02 - Our First Step.

THE ANTS.
Once there were four ants. Each had the other's thorax (so to speak). They were always on the same page, always in pursuit of common betterment, and always interested in finding an ultimate, good life. They were the embodiment of "all for one and one for all."

LOUIE AND AMOS.
Now the ants had all come from different parts of the yard. Louie and Amos were from somewhere roundabout the water spicket. It had been a challenging life for most of their youth. Despite the ever-present trickle of cool water, the very presence of sustenance brought every beetle and cricket from the breadth of the house to camp out near the drip. It was crowded to say the least. And while some of the brutes were harmless, others had a penchant for pinching the lesser beasts in half should they happen to get in the way. After dodging pinchers for most of their youth, Louie and Amos finally agreed that they had seen enough. Even water wasn't worth the constant terror. So they set out for a better life, into the deep and towering grass forest.

CARMINE.
Carmine was from beneath the dog house. It was a relatively safe and uneventful life. But when the news came that the family dog had lain into the neighbor kid, it was all over. They never saw the dog again, nor felt his deep and rhythmic breathing through the night. He just disappeared. When the dog food was no longer deposited into the bowl and the water had long since dried up, everyone took to eating the doghouse from the inside out. It didn't take long before the ramshackle shell of a home was ripped up by the humans and grass seed and poison was spread along the ground. Carmine lost most of her family that day. But she was spared and forced into exile among the towering blades of the grass forest.

LANCE.
Lance already lived in the thick of the green. His home had always been in the crab grass just beyond the sprawling sea of Kentucky Blue that comprised most of the yard. It was a spot free from the threat of the deadly, spinning knives which were known to slice through the top of the forest with an incredible wind and noise, on a near-weekly basis. But it was safe here. Not even the weed slasher had regularly darkened this corner of the yard. It was a paradise of sorts and Lance had lived here his entire life, at the base of the Obelisk.

THE OBELISK.
The Obelisk was a thing of legend among ants. All of the ants had heard of it and regarded it highly. Black ants, red ants, big ants, and small ants... each one's culture had a legend that foretold of the mighty Obelisk. And while most had never actually lain antennae on it, all were certain of its existence. Despite the nearly universal agreement upon the existence of the Obelisk, the opinions regarding its nature, size, and purpose were as distanced from another as the tree side of the yard was from the pool. The masses, despite their lack of personal experience with the Obelisk, would swear by its nature and wage wars with disagreeing factions of ants and even beetles and crickets who didn't see it in quite the same way.

FOUR BELIEVERS.
By the time these four ants (Louie, Amos, Carmine, and Lance) had really grown to love one another, they too had formed many formulations concerning the Obelisk. Most of their beliefs would amount to not much more than twists on the tales that each had brought with them. Family history, legend, speculation of the forefathers, and outright mythology had collided to create what each now held to be bona fide, absolute truth. To further the concentration of their faith, they lived at the foot of the Obelisk. Over half of every day was spent within its shadow.

IF NOT FOR CARMINE.
They all seemed to be genuinely happy. But darn it if Carmine didn't have to go and screw it all up. She eventually got the crazy idea in her head that the Obelisk was not infinitely thick as pretty much everyone had agreed. Perhaps it was longer than it was thick. This was her speculation. Among friends, it was not much more than silliness to suggest that the ominous Obelisk was somewhat less than what the millions of ants that had gone before would write of, pass down in their stories, and even die for. But Carmine and her damn hunches... she was trouble.

EVERYTHING CHANGED.
On the day that Carmine dared to pass into a small crevice at the base of the Obelisk, everything changed. For not only did she find the Obelisk to be no more than two or three ants thick, she found an entirely different spread of grass beyond it. There were more ants there. And as she had suspected, the Obelisk was longer than it was thick. In fact, it seemed to wrap infinitely around the yards, with no definitive beginning or end. It was not the thick mass her forefathers had always claimed it to be, though there was no doubt, it was still infinitely huge and perhaps now more than ever, more amazing than she had dared to imagine.

WHAT DIFFERENCE DID IT MAKE?
Had the Obelisk been as thick as all had suspected, Carmine would have been wrong and everyone else would have been right. But it just so happened that she lucked out that day. She was the one who was right. Louie and Amos and Lance were thrilled to be numbered among the enlightened few. They danced and played and reveled in Carmine's apparent victory. But Carmine quickly stopped them and reminded them that her discovery didn't ultimately matter.

"Now we only know better that we didn't know," Carmine snipped. "Do not be so foolish as to think that we finally have it. We are merely on a new path of mystery. To think that we can know this path more assuredly than our forefathers knew the path behind us would be unwise. The importance is not in knowing. The importance is in a total willingness to not know but accept whatever truth might come our way... comfortable or scary, cold or warm, profitable or costly."

OUR STARTING POINT.
As Carmine noted, perspective is everything. One cannot afford to forget this simple fact... ever. Very often, our need to fight with one another over differences of opinion is as silly as two kids arguing over the goodness of pudding. Perhaps pudding is ultimately good. Perhaps it is ultimately bad. But there remains the possibility that pudding is neither good nor bad... it's just pudding. For Billy, pudding initiates feelings of joy and love and sunny days gone by. For Amy, pudding is the substance that uncle Frank often used when molesting her. So Billy thinks pudding to be good while Amy sees it as nothing but bad. Assuming that pudding is a genuinely neutral substance (neither good nor bad), it is easy to see in this example that who we are and what we have experienced can easily influence what we believe, both in the physical as well as in the spiritual world around us. Furthermore, we can see through this example that our beliefs might say nothing about the object of our beliefs but infinite volumes about us. We learn something about Billy and Amy... but ultimately not much about pudding.

GOD & DESSERT.
Now I am most certainly NOT comparing God to a butterscotch dessert treat. The pudding doesn't really stand for anything. In the story, it just gets to be pudding. The point of the example is not to then switch out the pudding for a more meaningful substance, in a clever act of word-play. On the contrary, the pudding already contains all of the meaning that we need it to have for this example. You see, the point of this article is not to prove the existence of God, define whether God is male or female, or argue about God's facial features. The goal is far less grand, though terribly important nonetheless.

THE SUMMATION.
One of the very first things I have to clear out of the way is the idea that our perspective (or the perspective of our entire collective of human ancestry) can in any way grasp every angle of an infinite being. The point of saying this is not to say that we should stop wondering. The point is not to say that we should give up on our quest to find God because it's all futile anyway. The point is simply to say this... CHILL OUT.

CHILL THE HECK OUT.

Even if you lived at the foot of an infinite God for the better part of your life, your collection of ideas about that God would be tremendously lacking (at best) because you are not God. You are a lesser being observing a greater being. You CANNOT expect to contain God. Not even on your best day. You will always fall dreadfully short of the complete picture. To think otherwise is as silly an idea as a bridge crossing a car or a book writing a person. Lesser beings do not beget greater beings.

ELBOW ROOM.
One of the craziest challenges that I have heard in my quest to believe in a more loving God is this... "What makes you think that the millions of people who have gone before you have gotten it wrong and you are getting it right?"

It's a fair question. But do not mistake the power of the question to be its own answer. The question is not, in fact, rhetorical as it may seem. It has an answer.

The answer is this... "At one time, there were no cars, airplanes, medicines, books, languages, or laws. Things change. I am experiencing a revelation. To deny me this possibility on the grounds of your own personal discomfort is to deny Benjamin Franklin his kite, Moses his staff, Elijah his chariot, or Jesus his cross."

When a fourteen year old stands up and says she's had it... she has been abused by her father since she was six and will not accept it as normal or good or proper any longer... what good person says to her "Honey, who do you think you are? Everyone beats their kids. Every kid gets beaten. It's as old as history itself. What makes you think that you don't have to put up with it? Who do you think you are to say that you understand better than millions of abusers and abused who have gone before?"

She looks at them and says... "I would not abuse another." And that, my friends, is a place to start.

- When I can imagine a better God than I find in books, then I will question those books and not my imagination.

I know that God made my imagination. I'm pretty sure books come from sin-stained fingers. Even the Bible is arguable at best. Some swear to its inerrancy while others call it a book of history and myth. This place is not a place where I will argue that with you. Concerning the myriad of views on the Bible, to prove one's point (a very scientific notion to begin with) is impossible. In the end, how you feel about the Bible is just how you feel ("facts" or no "facts")... which says nothing about the real nature of it at all. Sounds like girls and boys and pudding, doesn't it?

AND SO, I AM LEFT WITH THIS...
As René Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am." I can no more deny that I am than I can deny who I am (at least the parts I'm aware of). I cannot deny who I am: what I feel, understand, perceive and am compelled by. I know me. I know what hurts me. I know what scares me. I know what energizes me and makes me feel alive. I know the sound of that small but nagging voice in my mind. Morally speaking, I know when I am doing right and when I am doing wrong, without having to be told. That doesn't mean that I always do right. Many times I actually choose wrong. But I know about all of those moments just the same. I cannot hide from me. The soul-mirror that I gaze upon reflects back as much tarnish as it does sparkle. It's not perfection that I see. It's evolution.

With these articles, I am not interested in proving anyone wrong. I will try hard to speak from my base experience as a human man and work diligently to abstain from finding my footing on all that extra material that schools and religion and theology and doctrine throw in. Perhaps it is useful stuff... perhaps it is harmful... perhaps it is neither. I truly do not care. In the end, when I consider the least educated among us... the mentally handicapped... the unreached people groups... the deceived and the broken... and myself... I am convinced... absolutely certain at my core... that God (if He is truly good) must have built each man, woman, and child with the intrinsic and fundamental resources required to "make it" (spiritually speaking). By that, I do not mean that we are our own salvation. What child gives birth to his own father? To even be a child assumes our lesser nature. What I mean is better posed in a question.

Q: Why would a dad require something back from his children that he is completely unwilling to supply them with in the first place?

A: No loving father demands his children to do what they are forever incapable of doing. If that father does have certain expectations... then he alone can and (if he is truly good) will provide his children with the ability to meet them. What God needs me to have, I either already have or He plans on supplying me with. If God is good, then I can count on this. Who I am is enough because it's all God saw fit to make me. He didn't stop short. He didn't mess up. I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

FREE AT LAST!
I am only interested in knowing my daddy. My Abba Father. That's what these articles are about. If you can't tell, I take great care in writing them. These are not just hapless ramblings. These are experiential compilations of stories, thoughts, concepts, and provocations that have profoundly changed me for the better. They still are.

I'm finally proud to be my heavenly Father's son. I am finally growing more and more free to love. I can finally sit in a smoke-filled bar, gazing at all of the broken and empty people and see nothing but hope.

HOPE.

What could possibly be wrong with that?

Don’t get ahead of me here folks. There’s plenty more to come.
Cheers!
Luke

Article 01 - A New Beginning.

IT'S A BOY!
July, 2005 marks my 30th year of life on this planet. My goodness. What does a person do with that? Instead of sulking in the fear at the possibility that I might have crossed the half-way point of my life, I have decided to offer up a gift to all of you.

BABY STEPS.
I crossed the one-year mark on my blogging adventure not too long ago. After the significance of that milestone dawned on me, I slowly grew a tad dissatisfied with my apparent lack of a spine. Confession is good for the soul; I pussyfoot too much. For crying out loud, it's the friggin' Internet. You could learn how to deep-fry a cat out there (if you wanted to).

FROM MILK TO MEAT.
Truth be told, what I have written has not been much of who I am. From my perspective, that amounts to a biggie-sized waste o' time. So then, in the interest of leaving something behind for my children, I have decided to quit farting in the bathtub and just start saying something.

THE JOURNEY INTO HUMANHOOD.
The good news is, what I will write here is an amalgam of experiences and beliefs about those experiences which have influenced me very deeply. In that sense, it is your opportunity to know me better (you can thank me later). At the same time, there is no receipt for this gift. You can't hope for in-store credit if these words don't fit you. You can't complain about the workmanship of the wares. What you see is truly what you get. Take it or leave it. Just don't bother bitching. You'll be the only one listening.

I suppose if you were paying money for any of this, that would amount to a pretty crappy deal. Can't say I'd buy it any more than you would. But it doesn't cost a cent of anything but your time, so in that sense, it's worth risking a little disappointment (from where I sit).

ALL JOKING ASIDE.
In all seriousness, I wouldn't even bother with any of this mess if I didn't have a deep belief that some of you might be better for having read it. Along with that hope comes the near certainty that I'll wind up pissing off more of you than I care to. What to do? Do I see a few people set free at the cost of driving more away? Or do I selfishly bury and protect a freedom that could belong to everyone, just because I want people to say nice things about me?

To hell with the nice things. Pandering is poison anyway.
I would much rather be pitied by thousands and see a family member run free than return to the vomit of an abundant alternative... placating.

UNDERSTANDING THE MESSENGER.
So far, you may have noticed my language to be a bit silly, harsh, and perhaps even cynical. These would all be accurate reads on what has preceded. My hat is off to you if that's what you've managed to paint of me so far. Just don't be so foolish as to think for one miniscule second that you have me figured out by that same observation. For starters, you never know when I'm just playing the devil's advocate, or at the very least, acting a clown. Likewise, don't be so silly as to think that each post will read in precisely the same tone. I'm a human being... not a robot. I am changing and evolving on a daily basis. If you cannot handle the manner in which I might parlay this life-affirming mass of experiences and musings, then leave now. I don't want to offend you any more than you want to be offended. That's the truth. Just don't be so offensive yourself as to ask me to calm down, shut up, or speak in a language that is not my own. This is my house and you're welcome in it. But the beer chills in the fridge and the dog is allowed on the couch. When I come to your house, feel free to do things differently.

WHERE WE GO FROM HERE.
This has been step one. It's an announcement. It's an introduction. You've either been bored by it, hooked by it, or gagged on it. If you've made it this far, you might consider book marking it. Come back from time to time. I swear to you, I'm gonna put some stuff on here that will get you thinking. Most of it will be religious in nature. That's because I consider such issues to be supremely important in my life. The up-side to that is, I can speak of such things in a lighthearted and hopefully provocative way.

THANKS FOR CARING.
I'm flattered that you'd bother to bother with the likes of me. Thanks for caring. Now go do something amazingly good and undeserved for a stranger. You're probably on the computer too much as it is.

Cheers!
Luke