There is a Place

There's a place on the way to Glory
It's a place where all my burdens have been laid
It's the place where I keep stopping
To make sure that all of them are safe
There's a jar that keeps on cracking
The keeps of all my ugliness within
And it leaks out where it's broken
And drips onto my hair and off my chin

And I know a hard rain's gonna fall
And when it comes, there'll be nothing left of me at all

There's a light shines in my darkness
That make everything seen just as it is
And my eyes just keep on closing
Because that's only way to ignore it
There's a road that leads to Heaven
It's narrow and goes on without a curve
But my feet, they keep on walking
Beneath my knees and kick and twist and turn

And I know a hard rain's gonna fall
And when it comes, there'll be nothing left of me at all

There's a heart inside my ribcage
That breaks with every selfish word I hear
And the most selfish words that I've heard
These days have been coming from right here. (points to mouth)

And I know a hard rain's gonna fall
And when it comes, there'll be nothing left of me at all.

The Ice Storm

The semester is finished.  I'm 22 now.  I've realized how undisciplined I've become this semester and how much I've overlooked certain friends of mine that I have needed to not overlook.  22, 2009, and the spring semester are all good times to start over.

I found a place to stay in Chicago.  With two good friends.  Awesome.

God and I have been having this strange sort of contest.  I keep disobeying and He keeps forgiving me.  I said, "Jesus, how long are we going to go keep doing this?"  And He said, "Are you sure you really want to find out?  Let's go.  You'll keep on sinning, and I'll just keep extending grace to you, and I am so much more stubborn than you are."

GAH!

Bon Iver is playing in Chicago on my birthday in TWO DAYS.

WHO WANTS TO COME.

Finale

I have some things to finish up for Church History, a final for Intertestamental History on Tuesday, and a take home Hebrew final due on Thursday.

I had a sort of breakdown last night. I got incredibly confused about "certain things." I'm clearer now, though. It was a sort of release of thoughts I'd held in for too long.

I don't know why I have such a hard time confessing publicly that I struggle with sexual temptation. I expressed that struggle to some brothers, who all said the same thing. We're all angry at the hold that fight has in our lives and the lives of other men around us. And yet, there's such a reluctance to say clearly in the light of everyone's watching, "I am frail, I am weak, I am struggling, and this is how." And by 'everyone,' I explicitly mean a crowd that includes females. Because guys already know.

I'm coming to appreciate the Beatles' Abbey Road as one of the greatest albums ever recorded.

Obligatory Update

I don't feel like blogging right now, because I hate blogging when I don't feel like I have anything to say.
But I am.

The semester is coming to a close. I have one more class and a few more assignments and I'll be finished. Because I see how little I have to do, I just kind of feel like I'll continue to have time for it, so I push it back further. I'm so ambitionless this semester.

I feel like my time is too precious to give to anything (school, God, general adventures) and so I've just wasted so much of it. I don't know how it got this bad. That is definitely going to be something to change next semester. Even though I want to change it now.

Ho, hum.

I turn twenty-two in seven days. I'll be the oldest I've ever been.

A Series of Revelations made in the Past Week

along with a few other assorted thoughts.

I'm more of a sinner than I ever realized.
Jesus delights in forgiving our sins more than we could ever know.
We were not created to appease those around us.
We were created to love those around us.
I am incredibly blessed.
I don't know how to sleep without going to sleep defeated, and I've barely slept all week.
I don't feel comfortable praying out loud, because I don't use words. I pray in music.
I am more of a musician than I know.

"Jesus sought me when a stranger wandering from the fold of God/
He to rescue me from danger interposed His precious blood/
And how His Kindness yet pursues me, mortal tongue can never tell/
Here in flesh till death release me, I cannot proclaim it well."

"When Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within/
Upward I look and see Him there Who made an end to all my sin/
Because the sinless Savior died my sinful soul is counted free
For God the Just is satisfied to look on Him and pardon me."

Procrastination is a pain

But he's my good friend.