7/10/2014

From psalm 18 verses 1-5

Hey h,

I feel like it is always a genuine terror to wake up. Dreams are such an escape and since I rarely have nightmares, they are safe places to hide from the ugly shadow of the world. I know you think I do not like to face things. You are right. I would be asleep. I would rather dream.

I know I cannot live that way. I woke up today from a tangled web of sleep that included lusty hopes and limited quasi-happiness. I have always had an ‘other’ sense about me. A genuine idea that I was more than my name and more than the space, considerable right now, I take up in the world. That this is just a shell of me, a covering, some sort of weak armor, a conduit for what I have to say to the world and I know that sleeping through life is not the solution to finding who I truly am in this mass of flesh and terror.

To be sure, as a Christian, my identity comes from Christ. This is why I have the attempts at kneeling and the scripture above. I am no poster boy for what that is. I am too much in repair for anyone to look at me and say I am salt of anything and light of anywhere. In pride, I guess, I am surprised by my sinfulness. I am upset and discouraged by my major faults. I regret many things. Yet all that regret makes me unable to stop dreaming and start living. They are like a pre-destined noose around my neck and the more I strain the more I choke and the more I fall into the death of soul and spirit that comes from merely dreaming. It is that thing about hope that is endless; it breaks the heart. I need to wake up; H and I hope you can see this. All this is doing me no good. As my sponsor you may have to listen to some ugly things but be rest assured that all of this is recovery and not a relapse.

We always speak of those early days of glory where God seemed to walk with us in every step. Then it seemed like the great drought appeared and growing up seemed like falling down. I think now that the walk became natural. It is not a drought as much as it is being made up into something. A change of diet from milk to meat. A dose of radiation to fight the cancer of sin. Or maybe this is just what it feels like to finally wake up into God.

Amen.