A Poem : "Turn Around Inside Me"

“Turn Around Inside Me”

The tide it crashes

Throwing tears to the wind

The wind and it’s howling

How did this all begin?

The wonder the labor

The sands sifting time

A rotting green tomato

12 requests for a lime

So the bandages bound

Try to hold back the pain

Each day burns the labor

To try and wash out the stain

The time comes to passing

So sweet and so precious

But they all have to end

The mirror though ruthless

How it never relents

Poses peace to my eyes

In my wrinkles that set

Like the tree and its rings

That tell the tall tale

I have my own memories

And all the smiles that prevail

A Thought: Living Forever

I have heard people say that they do not want to live forever and I have heard others say that they do. As a musician and someone who loves life I want to live forever. There is so much out there that I never want to die. I find life absolutely fascinating and I want to keep learning. Today I learned about patience. I was cutting some metal by hand and it seemed that the harder I worked at it the longer it took. Finally I had to ‘let go’ and not force the saw. I had to let the blade do the cutting and merely move it back and forth. Every time I pushed to hard it would hang up and I would have to reset my blade and build momentum again.

I am very guilty of doing this with God. I find something in life so interesting that I just want to jump in and get it done quickly. God doesn’t work like that. A lot of times the learning you need is in the journey. I may want to understand a certain scripture right now, but I learn so much more in the journey to finding my answer. I live in a life with a lot of instant access and it becomes second nature to expect it. “BOOM” and its here and I got it. 

The most important thing though is love and too love properly. To love God with all my mind body and soul and to love others as I love myself. I know that God loves me. I know that he wants me to want to spend time with him. I may not always get what I want but he is here helping me get what I need. I can store up money in the bank, I can make sure my pantry is full of food and I can keep my children at home all the time. But one day I will die, the food with rot, the money will mean nothing to me then and my children will be on their own. So I work to save for the future but help anyone I can when I got some extra money in my pocket. I make sure that I can feed my family but I also try to help feed those less fortunate. I try my best to teach my children about the world, how wonderful it is and what to watch out for so they can have happy safe lives.

I have accepted that there is a God. I have taken his son Jesus Christ as my savior. I reach his teachings and take communion to take him into me. For Jesus is the “bread of life” and with him I will have eternal life in heaven.

Am I perfect? No.

But I do try to learn from my mistakes. I ask for forgiveness and I try and be a better person and move forward in my learning of life. 

Do I have to do this? No.

God gave me free will. I have lived with him in my life and I have lived ignoring his ways. I choose to have God in my life because it makes me happy, because I want to goto heaven, because I want to keep learning. I could walk away at any point. I could amass fortunes and be greedy. I could do the drugs that make my mind feel a moment of temporary glee. I could slyly prey on women and have sex  with as many people as I could try and muster, but I would be empty. I would keep looking for that “high” and would keep falling short, and on that journey I would be empty from the absence of love. Love makes me happy and sex and drugs and money does not bring me love. It just gets me stuff and accomplishments that are never enough but with love I am satisfied. With love I feel full. With love I can stop and learn and share and keep making my life better and better. 

I get my love from God and I am thankful, so I worship him, I give him thanks for his great glory.

I dunno but that’s me.

A Poem: "Climbing Out"

“Climbing Out”

The dancing clown is chasing me

Smiling with that grin

He offered his sweet potions

To try and pull me in

I look away everyday

To keep safe what I have

But he is oh so persistent

And his lies don’t seem that bad

I try to shake my head so hard

To get out of this house

The mirrors are confusing 

And time is running out

Each turn I try to holler

And reach out for some help

But all I hear are echoes

Of the screams that I shout

Deep inside I find some peace

A second at a time

Without it I would probably fall

In chains I would reside

And most of all a shining light

That clown hates oh so much

Thats why he hides my matches

And my candles and the such

For all my aches and pains 

That slow me down each day

I gladly bear all of it

So that I can get away

A Thought: Why Doesn't the World Make Sense?

Sometimes the world just doesn’t make sense. Terrible things happen and I find that in my quest for answers that I can start thinking quite “micro”. I look for answers in my small world, the little ring that I call home that holds all the people and things that I know about. However the world is much larger. I will freely admit that there have been times when I have gotten quite angry with God. I just don’t understand his ways and why he would “let” things happen. 

But God does have a plan I know this for sure. I am the father of children and one of them recently got very mad at me. He was upset because I would not let him play video games. Video games make him happy and to him it didn’t seem necessary that he put his clothes away that very second. Video games make him happy, he had a video game at the ready and I should want him to be happy so to my child it was clear what should happen, he should play his video game. I know though that if I let him delay responsibility it will become habit. When he needs to rise and be a man and do something difficult instead of doing what he loves or desire it will be out of his discipline. I want him to choose to do the right thing instead of just he desires, as the Bible would say, “What his flesh desires”.

Will the world be a better place if I make my son put away his clothes right away, no, but by starting early I build a discipline in my son to do what is needed instead of wanted. 

We are given free will, we can do whatever we choose. We have been given the intellect to create a world around us to get what we need. With this ability we have also been given a great responsibility to take care of this world, to keep it from harm. Sometimes some men and women decide to do less that pure things. We could feed the hungry, save the beaten, house the homeless and teach the unknown. Why we don’t is still a mystery to me. Everyday try to keep my eyes open to help those in need and pray for courage to do so. Some people in this world find glee in bringing pain. Never forget or doubt that there is evil in this world. Do I believe in Satan? Yes, every time I see a coach, a teacher, a parent or a priest/pastor hurt the young and/or defenseless in this world I see evil at work. If you want to conquer good what would you do? I would take some of my followers and dress them as parents and cause pain so people would loose faith in parenting. I would dress others as teachers and coaches to build distrust and pain towards people of authority. Mostly I would have some of my most dedicated dress as clergy of all faiths and cause pain so that most of all God and his people would become untrusted.

We have free will and its our decision. Some make some bad decisions and some people are just evil.

I don’t want to be the man with all the answers. I don’t want to know everything cause its just too much for me to handle. God tells me to love and I love to love. I do it frequently, he says to love him with all my mind, body and soul. I do because I am grateful for what I have, where I am and the world that he created for me to live in. God tells me to also love my neighbor as I love myself. I don’t understand people most of the time but I love them. I love the little children to the elderly for because of them I learn and become a better person everyday when I pay attention. I believe it is my duty to love and help. I wish more got involved instead of passing the buck and letting others or faceless, soulless government organizations help. I wish more would help instead of just donating a dollar on payday to help feed people that they will never see. 

God sent his son to this world. Many thought that Jesus would be like King David and that he would be a military might that would make Israel a strong nation again. Instead he came to make Israel a strong nation by trying to teach them to love God, love each other and repent. Many got mad cause he wouldn’t do what they wanted. They wanted their own free nation free of Caesar. Many thought that Jesus was going to over throw the religious establishment and dethrone their power because he was teaching a different way of God that would take away what they wanted. So for those reasons and probably others and herd mentality of crowds they killed him. The called him names, the spit on him, the beat him, made him carry his device of death up a hill and nailed through his wrists and feet and hung him up and for good measure stabbed him in the side to make sure that he was dead. Jesus accepted this, he took our hate and rage and died for it. Instead of each of us having to atone for sin all we have to do know is to accept that Jesus is the son of God and take him as our savior. God knows that we are flawed. He knows cause he is the one that gave us free will. He wants us to CHOOSE him. He wants us to CHOOSE. We are not slave to God, but we are slave to our primal, selfish, flesh-like desires. He wants us to CHOOSE to walk away from that, to choose him, ask for forgiveness and repent and become baptized and to become born anew in the Holy Spirit.

Our “flesh” tells us to eat what we want whenever we want. Have sex with whomever whenever we want cause it feels good. Our “flesh” tells us to feed all of our desires and to just feel good. Drugs, okay, sex, okay, alcohol, okay, food, people, material possessions just get them all as much as we want. We see examples of what this mentality brings everyday on the news. Maybe we don’t “SEE” it but it is in front of our eyes.

Am I perfect. NO, I am not. I am a Christian but I am not perfect I sin everyday, and everyday I pray and ask for forgiveness and I as God to teach me to be a better person. Jesus is my hero even though to some he comes off as some hippie dippie guy I love him. I look to him on how to love others and how to treat them.

So if the world doesn’t make sense you are not alone, but there is someone with some answers. Spend some hang time with God. Read a bit of the new testament, go speak to that friend that you know is a “Christian”, if they don’t have the answers you want then to find a pastor together. Don’t give up. Everyone has the ability to grow to become a beautiful person and to make the corner of their world a bright loving place because we have free will and we get to CHOOSE. 

Dunno, thats just me.

Luke 24: 13 - 35
13	That very day two of them were going to a village named Emma'us, about seven miles from Jerusalem,
14	and talking with each other about all these things that had happened.
15	While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them.
16	But their eyes were kept from recognizing him.
17	And he said to them, "What is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk?" And they stood still, looking sad.
18	Then one of them, named Cle'opas, answered him, "Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?"
19	And he said to them, "What things?" And they said to him, "Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,
20	and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him.
21	But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since this happened.
22	Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning
23	and did not find his body; and they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive.
24	Some of those who were with us went to the tomb, and found it just as the women had said; but him they did not see."
25	And he said to them, "O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!
26	Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?"
27	And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
28	So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He appeared to be going further,
29	but they constrained him, saying, "Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent." So he went in to stay with them.
30	When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them.
31	And their eyes were opened and they recognized him; and he vanished out of their sight.
32	They said to each other, "Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?"
33	And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven gathered together and those who were with them,
34	who said, "The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!"
35	Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.