Cool Clear Water

Dan, can ya see that big, green tree?
Where the water's runnin' free
And it's waitin' there for me and you?

Cool, clear, water
Cool, clear, water

-"Cool Clear Water", old cowboy song

Life is like a clothing item, say a nice comfortable shirt, which we're tasked with keeping clean. Unfortunately, due to the winds of life blowing to and fro, "stuff" gets on it and it gets dirty. It's tempting to try and brush the dirt off myself, or to think that I can keep myself clean. However, left out in the open, slowly the color fades into the color of soil. Soil that varies based on the locale I'm spending time in, but soil nonetheless.

Conversely, if my life is constantly held under the pure running water of time with God, all the dirt, from dust particles to big ol' dirt clods, is washed away.

One of my Shift friends talks frequently about his need to talk to God every morning, daily giving his life and decisions to the care of God. Since it works for him, I decided to try it some time ago. It's amazing; there's a nearly one-to-one correlation between remembering to talk to God right when I wake up and the overall tone of the day.

Every day, my life needs re-immersed in the stream God provides. The clear, cool, constantly-running stream that slowly and steadily washes me clean once again.

Maybe I should have quoted Talking Heads instead.

Take me to the river, drop me in the water
Take me to the river, dip me in the water
Washing me down, washing me down

- "Take Me To The River", Talking Heads

All is Grace

"How much easier it is to edit a book than edit a life!"
- Philip Yancey, foreword to All Is Grace

"And I don't know if I can do it"
- R.E.M., Losing My Religion

I admit that the blog has been quiet and I've gotten out of practice of writing. The past week has been a week off of work, intended to clear the to-do list and recover a sense of perspective. Thus far, I have rather succeeded at this purpose - so here's writing!

Thursday started with a strange mélange of music in my head. Megadeth's A Tout Le Monde, Within Temptation's Utopia, and R.E.M.'s Losing My Religion would seem to have nothing in common. However, I started illustrating my mental state using lyrics drawn from each:

My life passed before my eyes
I found out how little I accomplished
All my plans denied

Moving on is a simple thing
What it leaves behind is hard
You know the sleeping feel no more pain
And the living all are scarred

Help us we're drowning
So closed up inside

Why does it rain, rain, rain down on Utopia?
Why does it have to kill the ideal of who we are?
Why does it rain, rain, rain down on Utopia?
And when the lights die down, telling us who we are?"

I'm searching for answers
not given for free
They're hidden inside, is there life within me?
You're holding my hand but you don't understand
So I'm taking the road all alone in the end

Every whisper
Of every waking hour
I'm choosing my confessions
Trying to keep an eye on you

I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try

But that was just a dream
Try, cry, why try
That was just a dream
Just a dream

I was in a rather odd place. Equal parts dismal, content, and hopeless. Borrowing from Within Temptation, why does everything perfect have to sour? Why does all the "try, cry, fly" end as a dream? And why do our lives seem to accomplish little?

I didn't have any answers to any of these questions.

For Easter, I received a copy of Brennan Manning's memoirs, "All Is Grace". Although the book has taken a couple car trips where I meant to read it, I'd never actually cracked it open. Since reading is an activity I don't often get to partake in and the week has been a time for "catching up on things I'm usually too busy for", Thursday spontaneously seemed like a good day to read about Mr. Manning.

Manning's writing style intrigues me. In his memoirs even more than in his theological writing, he writes immediately, passionately. Openly. Although I'm still learning, I still feel that I could add more of these traits to my writing.

Manning's story is convoluted, complicated, and generally not "happy". He talks about his times of passionately following God and his times seeking comfort at the bottom of a bottle, including how that destroyed his life time after time. He talks about high points of his life and low points of his life. At the end of the book, after his chronic alcoholism destroys almost everything else in his life and starts to ravage his body, he talks about how his life seems pretty plain - he's now divorced, his speaking career is practically over, and he can't travel any more as the disease seeps into his brain. Yet, he ends with a poem emphasizing his title statement: life may be rough and we might be a disaster but in the end, all is grace.

During his narrative, he quotes a verse that threw all my thoughts into sharp contrast. "Christ is all, in Him is everything." (Colossians 3:11, version unknown) Alcoholism, confusion, dismal outlooks on uncertain futures, and doubt-filled decisions - none of it matters in the long run. Christ is all and "all is grace". All is grace - all has been covered by the death of the only One who could fix me and Brennan and anyone who chooses to accept such a repair.

In that light, all my mutterings and putterings went from nearly all-consuming to calm and placid. While I have responsibility for my decisions and actions, truly all is grace and doing my best to follow God one step at a time is the most important. My position twenty steps down the road isn't what matters, just the next one.

In this truth, I live. Knowing that I'm loved for who I'm made to be, not who I (and the surrounding world) tend to degrade me to. Knowing that all is grace, all is justified (a fancy word meaning "paid for"), and all works for good.

He is everything. Nothing else really matters. How freeing is that?