Gremlins (vs. God)

"And I'm chained like a slave, trapped in the dark
Slammed all the locks, death calls my name
And it seems I've been buried alive"
- "Buried Alive", Avenged Sevenfold

Saturday was one of "those" days. It's all been piling up for weeks; the stress, the subconscious discomfiture. It was supposed to be a day of relaxing and miscellaneous task cleanup. Instead, it was a day where life imitated vocation in a seeming mockery of sane people's desires.

I had a pretty low bar set for the weekend - some light housecleaning, a few tasks that needed focused attention, and a small pile of writing that I wanted to get done. I was excited - it was to be a chance to make measurable progress towards self-set goals.

Said progress and goals are a sad contrast to my current work environment. Work is currently a free-for-all brawl between the laws of physics, the limits of our infrastructure, and broken people lashing out in their frustration when an ideal, fantasy plan meets cold hard reality. Most of the project team is straining to make progress, yet the daily meetings are rife with exhortation and chastisement to work "faster". I've watched as initial excitement has given way to frustration, defensiveness, and finally despair and despondence as the goal line moves again and again.

In the background, this holiday season promises to be trying in a new way, for reasons that I've barely begun to ponder. (and am planning on a blog entry to elaborate) Amongst the annual idea-gathering/shopping routine comes additional complications at "other home" that I'm trying to understand and deal with.

This week at Shift, Lisa was speaking about benefits of recovery programs and how the holidays can often draw people's brokenness to the surface. One of the images she used that stuck with me was of an olive press.

In Biblical times, olive oil was a valuable commodity used for cooking, lighting, and many other purposes. Problem is, the oil is trapped in small little pores in the olive fruit. To harvest the oil, the olives are pressed between millstones until the pressure bursts the cells, allowing the oil to drain away. After that, some post-processing is required to separate the waste water and plant material, leaving only the pure oil for use or for sale. In the same way, God uses hard things to squeeze out the "bits" of God secreted in various parts of our life so that His work can be seen and glorified by ourselves and by others.

At the time, I was like "sure, work is like an olive press. I can hang with that. God is using this really tough time there to make me more like Him."

Then there was yesterday. Let's see, how did yesterday go? Oh yes, it started with me using the Internet to chase down something that had been stuck in my head for half the week in some possibly-misguided impression that God had something to say. That is, until my computer hung. Of course, with 6 Firefox tabs open (half unread), email I hadn't responded to yet, and the desired music of the day queued. All stopped, dead in the water. A reboot started a dreadful cycle of blue screens, reboots, hung explorer.exe processes, and more lack of response. Nice...nothing like a hard drive failure to liven my day.

After that, it was the realization that I would have to go to work today because someone's (unrealistically high) expectations meant that I had "charts and graphs" (which sounds suspiciously like arts and crafts) to put together for a Monday morning meeting. Normally, I take my laptop to amuse myself with music or podcasts. Oh wait-the laptop is dead because of the above-mentioned failure. And I got a late start to work because of the time I spent messing with the laptop.

From there, my day cascaded downhill. The order status phone call I've been trying to get through for weeks finally got answered, only to be told in a heavy almost-un-understandable accent that I have to call back Monday to speak with anyone who knows anything. My simple Old Town Arvada errand got delayed because apparently half the town wants to be in Old Town. Facebook hates me because I'm leveraging my accounts to do things they think I shouldn't. (Apparently signing in with correct credentials from a different computer is a security risk and deserves locking my account.) My phone decides that it only sends text messages sometimes.

I was arguing with God because my expectation of His timing is off and I want to "help" him figure out how to fulfill what He's said to me. My version of "helping" would have added to my schedule, running my time margins low.

After finishing my tasks at work, I decide that I'll just "give up" and go to church and sit and wait for God. Being a Saturday, I have the rare opportunity to go to Chick-Fil-A before church, so I decide to take it. Halfway there, I realize that a) my driving awareness needs raised from its everyday 3/10 to an >8/10 because half the roads and parking lots look like black ice. And I'm in an erstwhile-borrowed car which I want to take good care of. And the car has a standard transmission. I don't mind it because it makes it more interesting to drive, but after a few missed shifts, I worry if I'm driving it to the best of my ability. Really? All today, God? Do I really need this? Apparently.

Finally, I get my "dragon rear" to church (color commentary courtesy of Urban Dictionary today) and find a quiet corner to eat my hard-fought Chick-Fil-A. Not, however, before someone stops me in the parking lot and points out that I have a burnt-out headlight. (in my 'not-my' car, remember). Thirty minutes from home, in a borrowed car, in a town where the cops have a keen eye for detail/wrongdoing. Always something.

In all, it felt like a day from Emily's life, but with metaphorical poo rather than her often-literal deposits. A day full of gremlins.

The day wasn't quite a complete loss, though. I plopped down on an empty couch near the fireplace to finish my milkshake (peppermint chocolate chip milkshake FTW) and visited briefly with a couple nice people.

After finding my seat in the auditorium, I just couldn't muster much enthusiasm to answer Jenny-the-worship-leader's cheery "Good evening Flatirons! How are you doing?!?!" (It's a typical large-church enthusiastic greeting, but it always seems heartfelt. Come to Flatirons sometime and you'll understand the implied inflection) There were a few half-hearted cheers, but the only answer I felt like giving would have been rude. How was I? Tired, defeated, and herded into a quiet corner.

As Jay used to say, though, "Act your way into feeling, not feel your way into acting.", so I stood and pretended that I was psyched into worshiping as the lights dimmed and chords started resounding through the room. By the second verse of "Sing Sing Sing", my world started to look not quite as dark, and by the end of the second song, my life was almost worth a smile.

Jim was in high form this weekend. This weekend's part of Romans was the latter part of chapter 8, enumerating all the things that can't separate us from God. I promise I was listening (what else did I have to do? What did I come for?), but I don't remember all Jim said. I remember the important parts, though. Stuff like "Do you figure that God only loves you if He catches the bad stuff you think is coming? Do you think God doesn't love you if He doesn't catch the bad stuff?" And "If God had only sent you Jesus but never gave you anything else in your life, it would still be enough. It would be enough, because you would have Jesus. And if He gave you everything else, you know, 10 bucks here, a free pass on that traffic ticket there, but didn't give you Jesus, it would be no good. It would be useless."

I guess that landed pretty solidly. I have faith in God by the Flatirons definition; I believe that God is who He says He is and that He'll do everything He's ever promised. I try to add things on that I think He should promise me. I try to tell God when He should come through on His promises and how I think "doing everything [you've] ever promised" should look.

I forget that even if God never answers my questions (even the "easy" ones), it'll be enough. Even if I continue to hate showing up for work every day for the rest of my life, it'll be OK in some strange way. But I still bridle at why all the problems have to come into my life. Why am I locked into almost 2 full days of data recovery (rsync to the rescue) and without my main computer? Why can't stuff just work?

I guess it's just another indication that I'm at the right church. I'm apparently in a phase again where God is writing sermons just for me. I may be doing a poor job of relating why they're important, but each message is "landing" for me in my life.

And God beats the little gremlins every time, just not on my schedule or according to my template.