Strangely Stunning

I have one annoying final left. It’s the one I’ve taken before (x2). Failing sucks.

I’m fairly sure people are made to be good at what they’re god at. My sister can do science and math without paper. But if I don’t have paper (or my phone) I’m almost worthless (if you don’t see me write it down, it’s not gonna happen.)

The brain amazes me.

My earth science class was full of ‘em. Some folks in there could tell you what the answer to question seven on test #2 was, while others had a terrible time trying to figure out how many 500 year floods could occur in 500 years.

Yet we all exist together, at the same time, interacting and laughing (and hating class) with each other. Funny how that works, isn’t it?

All our diversity and all our oddities and all the weird people (‘i’ before ‘e’ -- weird, right?) all together. Sounds like a mess -- cause it is.

So, while I write this on a break from Algebra homework and sit in Meads with all the characters inside and outside, it’s easy to say (while NEEDTOBREATHE pumps into my ears), “We are who God has made us, and is making us, to be.” (Which is no excuse to be lazy or dumb, cause shoot, God’s not lazy or dumb.)

Practically all us uniquely strange people are going to step on each other’s toes, break each other’s hearts, try to save some face, and do it all again.

A neat little spiral, which ought to lead us to one thing, one blaringly stunning perfect truth, Jesus saves us strangely sinful people.

Okay, now back to algebra...

Simply Complex

“Astoundingly simple yet infinitely complex.” This is the gospel we believe. For in a sense all that must be done is to believe, truly believe, yet in that same sense, “truly believing,” comes only from the changing of your heart. Being born again – made fully, and finally, alive.

For many they “cannot help but believe,” which for agnostics and atheists alike drives them nuts (and reasonably so). For some they must search out meanings and swim in the fathoms of the ocean of belief before they’re saturated to the heart with it. For others, they simply can’t believe.

“… If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Rom 9:9)” It is indeed astoundingly simple, this process of belief. Yet the complexities of it will resonate through the believer’s life until their death, and even then their eternity will be and already is being shaped by it.

“Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. (Isa 45:22)” Turn, some translations say ‘look,’ and be saved. What is more easy than looking? Yet what is more difficult than dying to self?

Astoundingly simply, yes - O my God yes - to believe my wretchedness redeemed is astoundingly simple (because I long to believe it). Infinitely complex, very much so, for why should God redeem my wretchedness? How do I die to myself? How do I see Jesus as more worthy of all of me than my stuff? (I’m sure the questions would fill this journal if I were to keep writing them, for infinitely means unending).