Hi, guys. Let's get the formalities out of the way first, and then I'll go ahead and move along with the reason that brought me back to this blog tonight.

I've really been neglecting this thing. Neglecting it, not forgetting it. I've gotten a lot of new friends since the last time I posted and this will probably be seen by more people on Facebook than on Xanga itself. If you're interested, click the link that brings you to the original post at the bottom of this message on Facebook. There are extensive archives of me running my mouth at the main site. Anyway, I'm going to start a legitimate effort tonight to post at least once a week, hopefully with something fairly meaty each time. This is too good of an outlet for me to let it go to waste. That and I've had my laptop back with a working keyboard now for about two weeks. I got tired of having to use that plug-in piece of crap when the onboard broke. It made me look really geeky to have to carry that thing around with me to class. Made my backpack really uncomfortable too. But anyway.

On to the reason that I came back tonight.

That's what she said. Anybody ever said that? That's a really funny joke- or at least it was. I have the kind of personality that gets addicted to something easily. The first time I heard a joke involving the "TWSS" factor, I was shocked beyond belief. I couldn't believe that someone could tell a joke that was potentially very dirty without actually saying anything dirty! The thought intrigued me. All I had to do was wait until someone said something that could be interpreted as nasty and then tack TWSS on the end of it, and it was an instant laugh riot. I didn't have to feel guilty because I hadn't actually said anything bad in and of itself. The first time I dropped one I was so proud of myself. It went over well. I enjoyed the laughter of the people around me and so I kept on with it. Eventually the mild ones were boring, so I set out to find the most off the wall, nastiest ones I could. It was a very taxing job, and so I had to listen for them constantly, through which I ended up finding even more mild ones. What the heck, if they were there I may as well call them out. But the times when I found a juicy one...oh man. Those seemed like the best ones, but the problem with them was they were easily recognizable, so I couldn't shout them out like I could the mild ones. I had to retreat back into a trusted few people to whisper them and hope that no one else heard me. I guess somewhere along the way peripheral dirty jokes allowed themselves in; being able to laugh at other course things like bad language and being desensitized to coarse humor in general. Eventually we didn't even have to say TWSS at all. All we had to do was pass a look across the room. The others got it because it had become part of our mindset.

Yesterday, I was woken up. I was knocked back to reality by a movie that is full of knocks. Fight Club.

It's been a couple of years since I saw Fight Club on DVD. The last time I saw it was on TV. What happens to an R rated movie when it comes on TV? It gets cleaned up; language-wise mainly. I was with a couple of my friends last night, both of whom are great Christian guys. Neither had ever seen the movie before and since it was just guys, we figured we'd watch a guy-type movie, involving explosions and fighting and such. Fight Club fit the bill. Since I'd seen it before, they asked me about content. The last time I saw it was on TV, so that's what I judged by for some reason. I told them it had the F-bomb in it a couple of times, but probably not more than 3. Then I proceeded to rent the movie from Movie Gallery and bring it over. Our ears were graced to 3 hours of the F-bomb. 3 Hours! I had taken something dirty and brought it into the light, and had the chance to see what it really was. I began to question myself. The last time I saw the movie was it edited, or was I just so desensitized to the content that I didn't notice it? I started feeling sick to my stomach. The thought of all the language hurt me physically. The thought of all the coarse jokes I had been telling suddenly struck me as disgusting. I felt dirty.

I described the feeling I had as this. I'm terrified of cockroaches. Most people I talk to have similar feelings, and even if they're not scared of them, they at least aren't fans of them. Maybe I'm scared of them because one fell on my head one time and then jumped off onto my chest. Oh well. Anyway, Imagine being in the center of your house, and your house is infested with cockroaches. Every room is full of them up to neck height except for the room you are standing in. They're trying to get in, but you fight them back. There is a constant flood of them. As long as you stay awake, you can fight them off, but eventually you start getting tired. The more tired you get, the more creep in. Eventually you fall asleep and begin to sleepwalk. Luckily for you, you sleepwalk right into the next room and are now neck-high in cockroaches. And then you wake up, not knowing how you got there but still vibrantly aware that you are buried up to the neck in cockroaches. Would you panic? Get sick? I'd probably do both.

That's what it felt like. I snapped awake after falling asleep and burying myself in filth.

"Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's." 1 Corinthians 6:19-20

So let's break this down. My body, my physical self, is a temple of the Holy Spirit, the Most High God. We'd been talking on Wednesday nights about communicating with God and hearing from God and how all of that works. I think this is another way He communicates with us. Christ sent the Holy Spirit to indwell us, seal us, and teach us. It only makes sense that if we start allowing His temple to get dirty, then He's going to react. It makes perfect sense to me that I would start feeling physically sick every time I watched or said something that offended Him. The jokes weren't funny to me anymore. The language wasn't bearable anymore. They disgusted me.

Don't take what I'm saying wrong. This is just where I'm at in my relationship with Christ. This is what He's teaching me. Maybe everybody doesn't struggle in this area and so it's not as big of a deal. But for me, I live my life through words and verbal expression. That's how I witness. It's my strength. I think the Holy Spirit convicted me in this area because it's both my strength when I'm pure and my weakness when I allow impurity to contaminate how I express myself, mainly words. I don't want anyone to think that I'm condemning them for anything. I'm honestly writing this from an internal perspective, not based on what anyone else has said or done. This is just me trying to express an internal dialogue between me and the Spirit. I really don't want anyone to think that I'm judging them. I hope that's coming across as clear.

I also don't think that this is a legalistic view. I hate legalism with every bone in my body. I don't know who's idea it was that Christianity is a list of do's and don'ts and if you don't follow that list to the letter you're going to hell, but it wasn't Jesus' idea of the faith. I feel like from now own I'll be abstaining from letting these things come out of me because they hurt my relationship with Christ. They take my joy away. He doesn't love me any less for my mistakes, but I feel bad for defiling His temple. The regenerate part of me has the mind of Christ and is appalled at these things, but the flesh part of me thinks they're hilarious. That's a conflict that I don't have to be in. It's miserable. Legalism is when you do or don't do something just because it's on some hypothetical list. There's not really a reason behind it. Maybe there was at some point, but it's so long in the past that nobody remembers it. Kind of like one of those old family feuds down here; the people have been at it for so long that nobody even remembers what they're fighting over. My abstention comes as a reaction to the Mind of Christ in me. It upsets Him, and therefore I'm upset and miserable. I feel that. It's not some arbitrary thing.

I think that just about wraps it up for tonight. Ben got a Myspace tonight and I told him that would be really cool because not only could he upload his sermons, he could simulpost his blog posts to the HBC website and to his Myspace. I think I'm going to take my own advice and simulpost this. Also, I'll leave you with a verse that Christ stuck in my mind while I was writing this. It makes a lot of sense with everything else that has been said tonight. The Pharisees accused Jesus of being wrong for letting his disciples eat without ritually washing their hands. The Pharisees said because they didn't wash their hands they were impure, unclean, defiled. Jesus told the Pharisees off and then later explained to the disciples what His comeback meant.

"So Jesus said, 'Are you also still without understanding? Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.'"

Let me tell all of you guys a secret. I had forgotten how good grace tasted.

I'm sitting here listening to Hillsong. There are two bands that I listen to that connect with me on a deeper level than others, and those two bands are Hillsong and Lifehouse. Hillsong plays a song called “Devotion.” The first time I ever heard that song I cried. Sometimes I still do, because it's my life in a song, or at least what I hope for my life to be. I understand what they mean when they talk about running, trying to be one who sees. Some things have struck me differently this listen though. One section of the lyric says that there is nothing better than being redeemed.

How obvious is that? As Christians, we spend day after day, Gathering after Gathering (for my fellow BCMers), Sunday after Sunday, singing about all the wonders of the grace of Jesus. We love to talk about everything He's done for us, but I've been doing something shameful as of late. I've been looking for more when there ISN'T anything better than being redeemed. For two semesters I've been unable to fully submit myself to Jesus and His will for my life because I've been too busy worrying about my will for my life. I've been spending so much time hoping for something, praying for something, something that I believe is a Godly desire in and of itself, that I've lost sight of what God may actually want me to do, the life God may actually want me to live. A Godly desire has become a god. C.S. Lewis put it best: “Love, having become a god, becomes a demon.” There's a reason that quote is on my Facebook main page. It was supposed to stay there as a reminder. I guess it failed.

And He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness." Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in the infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ's sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

2 Corinthians 12:9-10

I had forgotten how sufficient grace really was. Grace isn't supposed to give you the answer to a problem or a need. Grace is supposed to BE the answer to a problem or need. Jesus is enough. I'll be brutally transparent here for a second. I'm terrified of being alone. I don't really mind saying that, actually. Anyone who pays close enough attention to me for long enough will see it. I grew up with two parents, neither of which was my dad. I lived with my mom and grandmother. My grandmother recently died, which has left a huge gap in my life at home. It hasn't really even totally hit me yet that she's gone, but I know when I go home, I'll be one person closer to being alone. I'm constantly afraid for my mom's health. I worry about that constantly. And then there's the matter of dating/a relationship. I'm terrified of not being able to be the Godly man that I want to be for whatever woman will be my future wife. It's a legitimate need of mine not to feel alone. Why am I not ashamed to say this? Because I think everyone is afraid of being alone.

Paul said he took pleasure in a lot of things, and one of those things is need. That seems almost inhuman, doesn't it? A need should not be pleasurable. Go long enough without a need and you hurt. That's why it's a need. The lack of some needs lead to the inability to function psychologically or socially, and the lack of some needs can lead to death. I've come to the conclusion that Paul didn't take pleasure in the need itself. He took pleasure in the solution, which was the grace of Jesus. If that grace can take away the pain of a need, then it stands to reason that that grace is what we needed in the first place. A need only stops hurting when it's fulfilled, right? Paul teaches us that the weaker we are, the more infirmities we have, the more we get to rely on Christ to strengthen us through that. Every weakness is an opportunity for that grace to show up in our lives. Every need is a chance for us to be satisfied with the glory and mercy of God Himself. A very good friend of mine told me something one time that changed the way I pray. He told me that maybe we shouldn't pray for God to relieve us of our burdens; maybe we should pray for God to give us backs strong enough to carry them. That's grace.

There happens to be another section of the lyrics to "Devotion" that says a lot to me, too. Eventually the song gets to the point where this phrase is repeated over and over: “I will take up my cross and follow, Lord where You lead me. I will take up my cross and follow, wherever You go.”

It fascinates me that these words are repeated so often. I mean, the song repeats them over and over. I'll tell you the way that connects with me. I have to say those words over and over again because I keep dropping my cross. Let me explain.

Ask anyone who has ever been crucified; crosses are heavy. Jesus collapsed while carrying His cross to Golgotha and the Romans made another man carry it for Him. If taking up my cross means living my life according to the desires of God, then everything that I desire other than that (the desire for a relationship, for example) is excess weight. I can't carry both my excess burden and my cross. One of three things will end up dropping. If I let the grace of Christ work in my life, then I won't want to carry anything other than that cross. That is the best situation, living by the spirit instead of by the flesh. If I seek the Kingdom of God first, then God knows the desires of my heart and has promised to take care of that (Matthew 6:33-34). Unfortunately that's not what happens the most. Being a selfish human, more often the cross ends up getting dropped by the wayside and I try and carry the things I want. That only leads to misery and pain. With the Holy Spirit indwelling me, carrying that Cross and dying to myself is a need, not just a want. Without doing that, my spirit will be in pain. The third thing that could end up dropping is me completely. Jesus said that no man can serve two masters. If I carry my cross, I carry it exclusively. If I carry my own desires, there''s no way I can adequately carry the cross. Eventually my back will end up breaking if I try to carry both and then I won't be able to carry anything. I'll end up on the side of the road wondering why I'm paralyzed.

Maybe with these last three weeks left in the semester I can actually start living by grace instead of letting my own little plans control me. I'm sick of being in chains of my own making (and judging by my outlook on life for the past week or so, I'm a pretty good blacksmith). I'm sick of not trusting Jesus completely with my future. I'm sick of desperately believing that every plan I make has to succeed or it means I'm a failure. I'm ready to live in submission to God's plan. I'm ready to let His grace be sufficient.

I'm ready to remember that there is nothing better than being redeemed.

So here I am, officially November seventh. I'm more than halfway through my first semester at college. It's one thirty in the morning, and I'm writing. What else is new. Right now I'm chilling with some smooth jazz and wishing I had a cup of hot chocolate. This is really coffee type music, but I'm not really the coffee kind of guy. Come to think of it, I'm not really a smooth jazz type of guy either, but I think I could get to be. This stuff is really relaxing and catchy. Makes me miss my drum set.

    I should really be asleep right now, but I'm not. I've been wanting to write for a couple of days now, but haven't actually been in the mood or mindset to do so. I've been super stressed lately, which isn't like me. Most of the time people complain to me that I don't worry enough about my schoolwork. They tell me that my nonchalance is going to catch up with me and one day I'll realize I'm not putting much thought into it. Au contraire, mon freire- I put quite a lot of thought into my work. The problem I've been suffering from lately is TOO MUCH thought. I was starting to hurt, lose my appetite, and be tired all the time. With a bunch of folks on campus and in the band running around with Mono, a weak immune system is the last thing I need right now.

    Speaking of things making their way through the line, I'm not sure this is so prevalent and pressing, but I want to talk about it for a little bit anyway. It actually came up at BCM tonight (actually it was last night according to the clock now, but oh well) too, so it's fairly heavy on my mind. It's the whole idea of passing judgement on another person. It's not cool. The first thought that Christ basically implanted in my head when I got to college was: "Josh, nobody here can make you do anything, but at the same time, you can't make them NOT do anything."

    I say he implanted it there because I think it really hit my mind in a supernatural way. Normally, since I'm stubborn and spiritually deaf in one ear, God has to teach me things through repeated trials and troubles. You'd think I'd catch on after a while, but no. In this case, the realization just kind of hit me. It was a good thing too. College is a weird place. It's quite the departure from the way things were in high school. In high school, the concept of peer pressure exists where people give you crap if you don't go along with them. College...well, college is about as close to the polar opposite of that as you can get. If you drink, nobody cares. If you don't drink, nobody cares. If you go to church, nobody cares. If you lie to your parents back home and tell them that you're in church every Sunday, nobody cares; in fact, they may find it funny. I'm thankful that one of my parents is constantly with me. Dad never leaves me hanging and is always there, even when I'm stubborn and do something stupid because I think I know what's best, He's always there to pick me up, dust me off, occasionally give me a whuppin' for disobeying, and then tell me to get out there and get going again.

    After that super long tangent, back to what I was saying about judgment. Here's what I have to say about it, or rather what Jesus had to say about it:

"But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Now early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came to Him; and He sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst, they said to Him, 'Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. But what do You say?' This they said, testing Him, that they might have something of which to accuse Him. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger, as though He did not hear. So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first." And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, 'Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?" She said, 'No one, Lord.' And Jesus said to her, 'Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.' Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, 'I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.'"

John 8:1-12

I don't see any reason to over-complicate this. First let's look at the situation that the woman is in. She's brought up on charges- valid charges, mind you- of adultery, accused by the Pharisees. She was caught in the very act, and according to the law deserves to die. Admittedly, the law was supreme. She did actually deserve to die by Mosaic law. That's not hard to understand. Jesus, a man who claimed to fulfill the law in Matthew 5, says basically, "If you've never sinned, go ahead and stone her to death." If Jesus came to fulfill the law, why did He not exercise judgment right there? Because the lamb was slain before the foundation of the world. His sacrifice is eternal- not immortal mind you, with a beginning but no end. It is eternal; before time began and after time ends, his sacrifice will still stand. Jesus, basing His forgiveness of the woman on his own eternal sacrifice, says "go and sin no more."

    Now, how do we apply this? Well, first we should take into account that we don't have the right to pass judgment anyway; that much is clear. Only when we're sinless do we have the right to throw stones, and I'm willing to bet that none of us are sinless. At the same time, Jesus never denied that what the woman did was sinful. If what she did wasn't sin, there'd be no need for Him to forgive her. There's a fine line between accepting sin and forgiving sin. We cannot accept sin as Christians. It is against our new nature to accept sin. We are required to forgive others for their shortcomings though, because we've been forgiven of our own.

    It's easy to get into sketchy territory here, mainly when it comes to accountability. For non-Christians, accountability is a non-issue. I mean really, if they don't believe in Christ yet, what reason is there for them not to do what they want? Romans 8. It's against their nature to want to please God. That doesn't mean that we should condemn them; that means exactly the opposite. That means we should love them profusely. God looks down on a nonbeliever and sees a creation of His, dirtied and soiled as it is in sin, and loves it anyway. That's what we're supposed to see. We didn't earn the gift of grace that we have by works; how can we judge others by their works? The beauty of Christianity is God's abounding, free, amazing gift of grace. If we don't show grace and mercy as God's children and forgive the sins in others that WE OURSELVES ARE GUILTY OF, why would anybody want to believe in our Father? So that's a brief outline of accountability/non-Christian relations in my mind. Comment me if I've misspoken something or I need to be called on something. It is, after all, really late and my mind may be skipping important details.

    But Christians discussing accountability with other Christians can be a mess too. You'd think that we would have this worked out, but we are human too, after all. We'll never get it perfect until Christ Himself perfects us on the last day. Until then though, we have to find a way to cope. Basically, every Christian has his/her sins that they battle with. We cannot as believers just assume that because we're forgiven, sin is ok. Paul actually addresses that in Romans 6. We have to fight that sin nature in us through the power of Christ.
A great tool we have to fight these sins is accountability with other Christians. I know living with the roommate that I do is a great help to me. I know that he's not going to be shacked up with somebody when I get back to the room and he knows that I won't be drunk/high when he comes back. We also know that if either of those situations happened, we'd call the other person on it. At the same time we should be accountable though, we have to speak the truth in love. We're called to speak words that strengthen and edify. We can't condemn, because in Christ, there is no condemnation. We have to be careful that in keeping our accountability, we don't levy condemnation on our brothers and sisters, because one Christian is just as guilty of breaking God's law as the next, and we all have the same forgiveness. And that forgiveness is not through our works, so we can't judge others by their works. That's just not our job.

I really wish I could write more, because as this semester goes on, this topic is getting nearer and dearer to my heart. Maybe I will turn on my smooth jazz tomorrow (or today) and write some more.