Through My Eyes: A Journal

By Liz Root

Contact Liz by emailing her at liz@vagrantcafe.com

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6/28/2002
i'm not sure what to say today, but i figure i better say something. um...starting tomorrow and for the next week i will be out of town and w/o a computer. just so you kids know. i'll be in chicago, and then at cornerstone festival. maybe i'll see some of you there.


- liz r. - 6/28/2002

6/24/2002
i've received quite a few responses to my post two days ago. i think i might expand on it a little, mostly b/c it's stuff i'm thinking about lately. i don't really care one way or another if i get any email about it...but there's just all this stuff inside of me about this, and this is my only forum to get it out right now. so here goes.

from my observations, however limited they might be, there seems to be a growing trend among Christians my age. It seems that in response to all the traditionalism and legalism out there, we've chosen our reaction by swinging in the complete opposite direction. i don't necessarily believe this is the answer. Yes, it was for freedom that Christ set us free. But if we are truly free, it seems that we wouldn't have to defend it or prove it anymore. We might have to fight for our freedom, but once it comes, we need to walk in confidence and peace. This isn't what I'm seeing these days. We're so busy defending our "rights" to do whatever we please. We've taken this freedom farther (further?) than it was ever meant to go. "Everything is permissable, but not everything is beneficial."

it seems as though we're afraid of absolutes. i'm not saying that everything is black and white. i know there's a lot of grey in the world. but mostly, we don't want to admit that the things we're doing are sin. i hope you know that i'm talking about something else than just what most of our churches have portrayed as sins, such as fornication, drunkeness, addiction, etc. the Vine's dictionary defines sin as "the rejection of the law, or will, or God and the substitution of the will of self." i don't know about you, but most often, i chose my will over God's. i think most of us know this is what we're doing...but we don't feel like dealing with it, so we form new theology and new doctrine to try to make whatever it is we're doing okay.

please, please, please realize i'm not talking about specific things here. you might think i'm thinking about so-and-so who's sleeping with her boyfriend, or so-and-so who drinks too much, or so-and-so who watches pretty wretched movies, all of them Christians. I'm not. Because people will make their choices, and there's no power in me to influence them otherwise. What i'm saying is that we've come to be constantly on the defense. Constantly protecting those things important to us. Constantly worried that if for one moment we allow ourselves to experience God as He truly is instead of the figment of our imagination we've made him to be, that he'll strip us of everything.

God doesn't take anything. He might ask us to give stuff to him, but he will not take it. It seems to be a more often experience with me lately that I realize that I don't really have anything. That none of this stuff i own really matters. owning it isn't bad. it's not a sin to have money and buy things we enjoy. but i realize my overwhelming need for Jesus. that i truly can't do anything without him. this might make you uncomfortable, but oh well. i know it seems plenty of us are getting along just fine without him. but are we? are we really? are you fulfilling your life's desire? are you even on the path to getting there? if we stopped to look at where we've ended up, we might begin to realize how things could have been different if we'd given up, and began to take up our crosses and die daily.

we've been exhorted to "make Jesus a bigger part of our lives." this is completely crazy. shouldn't he BE our lives? but we don't want him to be. we're so deathly afraid of who we'll become if we really did die to ourselves and chose to walk in His will. we don't like to lose control, even though it's becoming more and more obvious none of has it in the first place. "Delight yourselves in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart." Psalm 37:4. I don't think this means what we think it means. You see, none of really knows what we want. we think we do, but we don't. we want what the world tells us we should want. it's only when i begin to lay myself aside for a moment to just worship God and praise Him that I begin to know who I am and what I want. We don't really believe that Jesus knows us. He doesn't wait for us to worship him so that he can give us what we want. We worship Him and then he begins to place those wants and desires in us. The closer I get to Jesus, the more he opens the world and it's possiblitities up to me. I've never had more dreams and goals in my life than I do now. This doesn't mean i've "arrived" or anything. This is only the very beginning of the journey. in fact, i'm still packing. but you see what i'm getting at.

anyway...i've rambled on and on. so i set out a challenge. look at your life. see all the stuff you've built up around you. all the things that are so terribly important to you. all the theology and doctrines you defend. put them in the light of Jesus and watch your house of cards tumble to the ground. and i'm telling you, that's when the true freedom comes.


- liz r. - 6/24/2002

6/23/2002
ok. yesterday i was slightly more specific than usual. today i will be slightly more vague. there is a situation that i just wish would end. the situation is stupid. the situation will not be fixed by insecurity or immaturity. it will not be fixed by projection. it will not be fixed by accusation. sometimes i just think people need to learn how to freakin' laugh. it's okay for us to realize that we might not know everything there is to know about someone else. it's okay to deal with the fact that some people might not think the same way we do about things. it's okay for me to admit that just because i don't understand someone's behavior, that it doesn't make them some kind of bad person. i don't know why so and so seemingly ignores me one day and pays attention to me the next, but until i've established some kind of relationship with that person, i have to leave it at that. anyway...the situation is frustrating, but so it goes.

in other news: it's raining. have i mentioned that i love rain? oh, except for when i have to drive in it. but other than that, i absolutely love it. nothing more on the topic...just wanted to mention the rain.

i just read an email full of stupid church marquis signs. they actually make me angry. i hate them. for instance: "it's hard to stumble when you're down on your knees." they just make me nauseated. i'm not lying. angry and nauseated. especially because today in church my pastor spoke about the fact that more than anything, Jesus hates religion. that the new testament was never meant to be a second law. do these people who put up these witty sayings really think that God is smiling down on them, congratulating them on such meaningful, convicting, brief messages of truth? my friend is going to let me borrow this book called "bumber sticker theology" or something like that. i'm really looking forward to reading it. it's about how we're so quick to put deep truths into cute little biting slogans. good grief.

please read www.opuszine.com and read the blog on the front page. and read 6/21's entry. b/c it's really good.


- liz r. - 6/23/2002