The Perfect Storm

I have recently relocated, and although I really don't want to, I've been looking for a new church closer to home so my gas tank isn't getting pummeled every time I try and go to church. A few weeks back, I went to a church that I had heard a lot of great things about, and so I went to check it out and see what all the hype was about. I was less than satisfied with the worship and when the preaching came I was a little unnerved that I tried to pay attention and not critique him the whole time. I prayed that I would be able to focus on the message and not anything else, and that however wrong I thought the preacher might be I wanted to get something out of it...which is where the title comes into play. The preacher was talking about how salvation is like being in a perfect storm, horrendous and powerful, and how God is in this Boat, and even tho the storm is strong and powerful, the Boat isn't phased. The preacher was saying being saved is being in the boat, and although the storm is there, we're safe. I think that the analogy is on track, but not quite accurate with Scripture...so let me try and revise this a little and maybe it'll help you.
There is a perfect storm, and we are out in the middle of it, helpless, hopeless, and in need of someone to come along and help us out. The Boat, it's there too, and God is in the Boat. But instead of us just magically appearing in the Boat and being safe from the storm, God sends out a perfectly sculpted Coast Guard Rescuer, Jesus. He has a rope tied to the Boat and on that rope is a Lifesaver. Jesus swims out to us and tells us that He loves us, and if we are to make it through this storm that we need to allow Him to help us get in the Lifesaver.

You see, the storm, this perfect storm is life, and Jesus comes along, and He does want to help us, but just because we're saved doesn't mean we're safe from the storm. If the wind and the waves were to over take us without His help, then we would die, we would sink to the bottom of the ocean, which I think for the analogy is Hell. Now, the Bible talks about how we're "being saved", Paul mentions it in Romans, I believe, as well as throughout the rest of the New Testament. So, I think it's fitting to say that if we're being saved then our life's journey is, if we are Christians, in the Lifesaver with Jesus toting us along toward the Boat. We never reach the Boat until we are gone from this world, and we don't know when that will be...only He knows.
Anyway, I'm not trying to say that the preacher was wrong for how he put the analogy, I just think that telling it this way would be a much easier way of understanding Salvation (Accepting Jesus with The Lifesaver), the Coast Guard Rescuer (Jesus), and being with God (The Boat).

The perfect storm never goes away, but it is suspended in time. It can't overtake us with Christ. We are subject to its ferocity and horror, and we will take a beating from it over and over again, but Christ has us in His arms. He is hanging onto us like never before, and even if we don't think He is, when we remember Who has us, the peace that overcomes us is indescribable.

DLSOYD

In an age where streaming across the television is teenagers driving Mercedes Benz and BMW's, it's pretty difficult to find sanity in it all. I mean, from birth we're pretty much taught and it's shoved down our throat that "success" is financial security. I have, and still very much do think that at times. It's as if I think that if I have a financial umbrella the showers of troubles will just disappear in my life. Worthless, that's what that is. That logic is absolutely worthless. I'm tired of this kind of mindset where if I don't have this watch or that car, or this house or that body. It's all materialism, and it's so unhealthy. I do want financial security, I do want to be able to provide for my family one day. But that doesn't mean that every single little Barbie Doll my daughter wants, or whatever girls want nowadays, or whatever video game my son wants he's going to get. I think that my generation has definitely lost the sense of how to earn something, myself included. Whatever happened to going out and earning something with your own blood sweat and tears? Society, television, the internet have all told us that it makes more sense to work for something through someone else, or push a button and "work" that way. I wish I could wake my generation up out of apathy and we...I would actually get myself up off my butt and do something about what this society, this economy is becoming. It's time to stop blaming the President or the government on the economic problems we are having a pull ourselves up above it and take charge.
This country is supposed to be a country of the people. Yes, I believe that a government is a good thing, but at the same time, I think that we lose sight of our own responsibility, we try to put blame on the government for where we are. We also forget to thank the government when they do help us out of debt and poverty and all that.
I guess I'm just another somebody on a soapbox, but I think that we've gotten so used to ourselves just sitting around pointing fingers that we need to finally take action. If we keep thinking that everything takes money, and we just don't have that little bit more than we'll always be discouraged and never want to venture out on our own. We'll never follow our dreams, we'll never amount to anything because we're too caught up on what we don't have, instead of focusing on what we do have.
I don't want you to go ask for a hand-out, so you can start some bogus company, and lose your motivation after 2 weeks of it. Really work that gray matter of yours and remember...think back if you have to...and remember that dream that you once had. Then talk to some people, people that are close to you, people that are going to encourage you and your dreams. You are capable of so much, and so many people want you to believe otherwise.

"Don't lose sight of your dreams."

That's really all that I have.

DK

Somewhere Within the Chaos and the Riffs Things Seemed to Click

It was Monday afternoon, and I had just tagged along with some friends to go to a store and pick up some stuff that had been on layaway for a little while. I guess before I get into that I should tell you that, more often than not, when I'm writing that I get so inspired by music playing in the background, or I'll be listening to the music and something will pop in my head...it's just how my brain was stitched together.
Back to the Monday car ride. I was sitting in the backseat, behind the driver, and I remember that Skillet was playing, and I started to think about the story of The Prodigal Son. Most people know about it, but for those of you that don't, here's a summery. Boy has rich father, boy tells father he wants his inheritance money, boy moves away and spends all the money, boy is broke and homeless and ends up taking care of pigs for money and then boy comes to and says that maybe he should go back to his father's house, boy asks for forgiveness and father welcomes him back.
Now, as my summery of the story has very much overlooked a lot of what went on in the story, the main part that really struck me, was the part of the father. In the story, the story being in the Bible, it talks about how the father sat and waited for his Lost Boy to come home. It was almost as if the father had known what was going to happen, in regards to the son getting to a point where we no longer had anywhere to go.
God is that father to us. He knows that we're going to mess up, He knows that we are going to make decisions that we'll later regret, or think "man, it would be so much different if I had done such-in-such instead of this." God doesn't want us to make poor decisions, but He does want us to know that we are welcome to come back "home" when we finally "come to."
There might seem to be a kink in the story to some of you. I understand that there are some of you that haven't ever been "home", that you haven't made that decision to follow Christ. Maybe you're thinking, "God will never accept me because of my lifestyle", well He doesn't want your lifestyle, you're right. But He does want you. He knows that you are struggling with this decision because you have made "so many mistakes". He doesn't expect you to be perfect, and He doesn't expect to you completely understand. If we completely understand God's ways, wouldn't He cease to be God?? He wants your faith, not your "know how".
If you are one of the one's that has been "home" and is wanting to go back, realize this. God wants you to come home. God wants you to take the steps to do so. He wants you to know that where you have strayed off to isn't where you need to be, but that He doesn't hold that against you. If you truly want to change as a person, and you are willing to change whatever it is that you're involved in because of wherever you're at, then that is the first step.
God is sitting at home, waiting on the porch for you to come over the hill. He knows you're weak. He knows that you need someone to carry you, and He's that Someone. He is ready to carry you wherever it is that you're meant to be. But you have to know that He's your strength, you're only Strength. He's ready and willing to accept all of your flaws, your human nature, your entire being, because He is completely and totally in love with you. He wants you to give up everything for Him. Giving up everything might be a scary way of putting it, but it's the only way to Him.
God isn't your Bible thumping parents, or that pastor that you remember that only seems to talk about money and how many are in service on Sunday. He is a loving God, that is jealous of your time. A loving God that loves you as if there were no one else in existence, and He wants you to come home. He is excited about everything you are going to share with Him. You are the Lost Boy, or the Lost Girl, and He is ready to welcome you back home as if you've never left.

You're so special.
Unique.
His arms are open and ready to pull you in close.

My Apologies...We've Forgotten Our Place!

How many things in life are completely illogical, but essential to our well-being or existence?? How often do we make decisions, good decisions based on logical information that we have retained over the years? In our studies? In our experiences? In or relationships? But we as a human race have found ourselves making serious mistakes because of what is logical to us. Maybe in the concern of self-preservation or maybe because we believe it's just the right thing to do, then later finding out that we couldn't have been further from the truth.
We as a human race are flawed, BIG TIME. We try to put ourselves at the forefront of our lives, and "be in control", when life isn't about being in control. Have you ever noticed that the more you try and take control of in your life, the more out of control it seems to get?? Maybe financially or relationally, or spiritually, or whatever?? Kind of interesting, huh?? But if we relaxed, realized that we will be taken care of, we will start to loosen up the tension and the knots inside of us, having been wound so tight for years and years. If we hand over control, and let go, things tend to go a lot better than we might have ever expected. Some may respond, "That decision/option is completely illogical, and because of that, I can't do that David". I'm not asking you to do that today, but I'm telling you, when all else fails and you doubt any other method, I promise you, this will work. I'm not saying let your finances go to the can, or just give up on your relationships, work as hard as you can, and strive to make those relationships healthy and working...the best working engine is well oiled, and it takes work to keep it that way...but instead of stressing out over those relationships and worrying about what might happen, realize that you really have no control over those things, you don't even have control over yourself. Do you even know what you're going to have for dinner tonight?? Do you know where you'll be a year from now?? I don't, and I'm sure that there are so many other people, because of this economy, that don't know that answer either, and that's okay. Stressing out or "being concerned" is not going to help matters...trust that you will be where you are supposed to be when you are supposed to be there.
As most of you know, and some of you are pretty sure of, I am a Christian. Now before some of you "exit out" or this window in your web browser, realize that I understand that some of you have an aversion to the term "Christian", and rightfully so. So many people have done things in the name of Christianity that should have never been stood for. They make me wanna puke, and I'm sorry. There are things that have been said to some of you by Christians, or a guy or girl wearing a W.W.J.D. bracelet, or a church shirt or something, and you're like, "that person stands for that?? I want nothing to do with that!" I UNDERSTAND!!! There are churches that I will never step foot in again because I know that it is a graveyard just waiting to be torn down. The cause for Christ has been FORGOTTEN!! And heaven forbid anyone stand up and say they're wrong. Our point of existence, as Believers in Christ is...excuse me...OUR SOLE PURPOSE IS THE GLORIFICATION OF GOD, and that is it. We aren't supposed to be superstars with 2.5 million church members, parading that Jesus wants us to be rich. We aren't supposed to be going around shoving the Bible in the faces of anyone that looks that maybe they don't have Jesus. Our job is not to judge people, OUR JOB IS TO LOVE PEOPLE. THAT GLORIFIES GOD, AND THAT IS WHY WE ARE HERE, PERIOD.

I'm sorry.
I'm sorry on behalf of the entire Church...not just baptists, or assemblies of God or Church of Christ...I'm not talking about a building or denomination, I'm talking about the church as a whole.
I'm sorry on behalf of the entire Church for not loving you.
I'm sorry for not sitting down with you and trying to meet you where you're at.
I'm sorry for not helping you when you're struggling through life day in and day out.
I'm sorry that we have completely forgotten about you and started shoving the Bible so far down your throat claiming that "we're doing this because we love you"...NO!! WE'RE DOING IT BECAUSE WE'RE SELF-RIGHTEOUS AND WE'VE FORGOTTEN OUR PLACE. We're are SINNERS BEING SAVED BY GRACE EVERY SINGLE DAY!!
I'm sorry for not loving you like we should.
I'm sorry for, in some cases, not loving you at all.

You are precious.
You are incredible.
You are made in the image of God Almighty.
You are the reason Christ was sent to this earth.
He wants to be with you.
He is the lover of your soul, and does He ever love your soul.
He wants to spend every waking hour with you, as well as every hour you are asleep. He wants all of your time, and He wants it now.
He loves YOUU!!
He is enamored with you!!

God Wants Our Time

Okay so, a few years back a really good friend of mine kept telling me to read book after book, and I think I understood the message of each book, but sometimes it was hard to follow and it was almost as if they could have just written one chapter and that would have sufficed because it just seemed like they were making the same point, just saying it in different ways over and over again. Does that make sense? And every book that I read said the same thing, so I felt like I wasn’t learning anything, or that’s just how I felt after the first twenty or so.
Sometimes I wish I could literally write down exactly what I mean to say, or what’s all bottled up inside, because I just feel like sometimes I write down things that I’m thinking, and this is the best way I can get the thought on the page. Did I lose you? I hope not. I just want to be forward, and say exactly what I feel God has impressed upon my heart, but it doesn’t always come out how I had planned it. And sometimes something completely different emerges, it’s just like that sometimes. I hope that this isn’t another one of those moments.
Have you ever asked yourself, “Why can’t the Bible be written in plain English?” Of course you have. Well it was, and I think that is why it can be so confusing. Because we try to understand it because it’s written in our language, when we should ask God to show us how to read it in His language. Not some mumbo jumbo speaking in tongues, but see it through His eyes. After all, it’s His love letter to us, so maybe we should try and fashion our reading to the writers pen.
I deal a lot with emotion, I guess because I’m an emotional person, but it’s just the way I was put together, both of my parents can be quite the water works themselves, if you know what I mean, so it’s in my genetic make-up, I don’t know. But what I’m getting at, is a lot of the time I write according to the way that I’m feeling, and so often I read in the same way. God is not limited to emotion, or pages and ink or even anything that we can imagine. He is God, and He is the only God, and when we even try to understand Him our brain flips upside down in our skulls and we feel even dumber. But instead of trying to understand a language or a love letter or a couple of paragraphs of the Bible, maybe we should pray, and pray and pray and ask God to show us how He would want us to read the Bible. That might even take us to go to someone we know for help on the matter, or maybe it’s locking ourselves in our room for hours and reading and reading and reading so we can maybe find a little key to the words. I know that I don’t always understand what’s going on, but I will say that often I realize that even if it is words that I don’t quite understand, it’s that time that God wants to spend with us, just all by ourselves.

Just me and God.

Just you and God.

Just us and God.

It’s almost as if we were just sitting out in a field enjoying the sky and the breeze and the tall grass without saying a word with someone we love and it isn’t the words that we have together, or the lack there of, but rather the time, the presence we have together. It’s not exactly the same thing, but I think you get the idea.

God wants our time.

...simple as that.
I think that we try to complicate things so much when it comes to our belief in Christ, because when we start to understand it in the slightest sense it makes us feel as though we’ve accomplished something, which is a sad fact, because it all comes back to pride, which is one of our greatest downfalls.

Can't Quite Identify The Feeling...

Have you ever felt hopeless??

Because that's definitely not what I feel right now. It might be described as things that might seem like hopelessness, but that's not what this is.

I'm not depressed.
I'm not alone.
I'm not powerless...in a sense.

My heart does ache, and I am here by myself, but not alone.

So often I intend to write a certain something, and it turns out to be this monster of a thing, or the exact opposite...

I'm being vague, and I suppose that's what I'm really shooting for anyway, so don't condemn this quite yet.

But back to what I'm feeling.

I'm David Kill, and as most of my former readers from MySpace (which I am no longer apart of) would know full well, is that I am very proud of who I am. I have, in so many ways, built up David Kill to be this person...The Persona of David Kill I would say. But David Kill is the name that my parents gave me, and I thank them for it, because otherwise I could have been named Courtney, and well, that might not have made the greatest of names...anyway, rabbit trail, I apologize.
Back to my name...I have built up this person, this air about me that demands things I have not yet earned, or claimed things that are still an arms length away. I have not attained any status or title or anything spectacular.

I am just David Kill as of this moment.

Living and breathing because God said that it would be okay for me to live another day.

My desire for anyone who stumbles across, whatever it is that this might become...these letters that form words, and words that have meaning...is that they might touch your heart, maybe in the slightest sense, but even still.

My faith: Something I hold very dear. Not because it's my faith, but because of Who my faith is in. I believe in Jesus Christ. I believe He is the divine Son of the Living God. I believe He died to save me from a punishment I deserved before accepting his FREE GIFT.

...and that is what I want to touch your lives...or if you are sitting there reading this alone...your life.

David Kill ceasing to exist or stepping out of any spotlight I might have placed myself in, and placing Christ there where He belongs.

FINALLY THE FEELING: I titled this blog "Can't Quite Identify The Feeling..." I know that you can read, but that is prefacing the next thing I'm going to say. I have been struggling through some things, as have a whole ton of people in this economy, and I've reached a point in my life, where I have nothing...nothing but family, and friends, and that's it. No, I'm not perfect, and I haven't always made the right decisions (AKA: Jan. 19th, 2006), but I am here on this earth and whatever I might do to touch lives, which is just a very small bit, I want to do.
I can't quite identify what I'm feeling right now, because I don't feel hopeless, I don't feel alone, I don't feel betrayed or denied or depressed...I can't identify this feeling because it relates to all of those, but is really like none of them. I feel incomplete without Christ, and without who Christ intended for me to share this life with. I'm not alone, but I am without...in a sense. But I truly have everything I need, and if I don't recognize that, then I suppose all could be lost.

Let's Play God

I find myself fascinated at how often I try and play God. Or maybe it's how often I try and put myself in His shoes and speak for Him instead of letting Him speak for Himself. I guess that's the same thing. I just got home a little while ago from taking a couple of my friends to the Atlanta Airport and they gave me a cup of coffee to keep me awake on my drive home I believe once I got home the caffeine kicked in and now I'm wired to go for a while. It's 6:24am. I tried to lie down and go to sleep but God kept speaking to me, not crazy audibly or anything, I was just restless and thoughts of writing this book kept coming to my mind. So, I got up, used the restroom and jotted down a few key points that had come to mind and here I sit.

Over and over again I catch myself questioning my beliefs. Not that there's a God, or if I believe in the right thing. But almost second guessing everything that I believe on a spiritual level. Tonight something profound was almost screamed in my ear while I was trying to get back to sleep. The voice, something from within said these words, "The only one that should ever make me question anything on a spiritual level is God." How true! So often I let circumstances or someone around me make me question decisions that I make because of "conviction" or my belief system. I know most people think I'm a nut job when I mention that I'm a Christian. It's a known fact that everyone around me, friends and acquaintances know what I believe and why. But that's not why I am writing this at such an odd time in the morning, running on an hour and fifteen minutes of sleep.
I sat down at the computer this morning because I have this urge to talk about how we play God so often. How we let ourselves get bogged down in our romance with ourselves. How we try and mentally or spiritually slip God's shoes on and say, "I know how I would handle this situation". As if we could ever comprehend anything that God would do. I guess this whole topic came up because I've been feeling rotten about my life lately. I've been feeling as though I could be leading a better life. Not that I should be drinking more water instead of soda. (I probably should, but that's beside the point.) But my spiritual walk has faded. It hasn't ceased to be, it's just taken a seat on the upper deck, actually further back in the "nose bleeds", where it doesn't belong. Conviction has taken a back seat with it as well. Guilt has set in, and I find that over and over again I beat myself down spiritually because I can't accept how much I fail. And so I have a theory on guilt, it's just a theory, but it came to me while I was using the facilities earlier. When we feel guilt it's almost as if say, "if I were God, I couldn't forgive me." But God is above our finite minds. He knows we are going to mess up. He did create us. We can't understand His forgiveness and understanding because we wouldn't be so forgiving and understanding. It all comes down to how enthralled we are with ourselves instead of God.

If we even tried to wrap our tiny little heads around how understanding God is, I believe they would explode. He isn't just going to let things slide. Sin cannot go unpunished. But He isn't that fatherly figure that is going to harp on our wrongdoing for weeks and weeks. God says in His Word to us that, "If we confess our sins He will remove them from His mind, as far as the East is from the West." The last time I checked East and West don't get anywhere near each other, and God is everywhere, so that idea in and of itself makes my brain turn upside down in my head.
It's so funny how we humans act. We try and understand things, or put an explanation on certain topics that we can't even scrape the surface of. I am in the midst of one of my favorite books right now and the author is talking about how it's almost an insult to God Himself to try and make up and equation for Him. I thought that was kind of nice considering I'm not the most brilliant mind on this earth. I like that idea mostly because it reminds me of when Christ talks about faith like children. As children we tend to except things "just because". No explanation required we just go along with it. Our minds aren't tarnished by politics or opinions of elders; we just take things as they are. I wish that our mindset would be like that for our whole lives, because once we begin to grow and mature that childlike innocence disappears and everything gets complicated. A couple of years ago my friend Bobby decided that He could put God into this really neat math equation, or maybe it was chemistry, something with numbers. He showed me the whole thing, about two words into it I was lost, but it sounded really cool. I went along with it because I didn't know any better, but when he would present it to somebody it just started to feel like we were salesmen for this company called "Christ Promoters" or something like that, and this company had just come up with this pitch that could "make your whites whiter and your colors brighter". After a while we gave up on the whole thing, but it kind of gets me back to the point of trying to prove God and putting Him in an equation is almost a slap in the face of Almighty God. Putting God in an equation is the same thing as putting Him in a box. It puts limits on Someone who is not held to limits. If we could understand this then maybe we would quit trying to wear His shoes too. We could quit trying to play God and let God be God and guilt wouldn't be sleeping in the bed with us at night, rather conviction. Tomorrow is a new day for all of us. And if you have confessed your sins, given them up and told God that you really want to change then you won't feel heavy about any wrong you have done. The heaviness is guilt and guilt is not God's doing.

You're not going to live a perfect life. You can leave that up to Jesus, because He was the only one that was able to do so. He was sinless. But what will reduce the gray hairs and wrinkles is repenting and letting Christ know that you want to live a pure and holy life. But don't let your sins get the better of you and make you feel worthless because you can't go a day without messing up in some area. It's a part of life. Think of sin as sticky note reminders that remind us of our place before a Holy and Righteous, Loving God.