A Sweeping Movement...

"What we (Showbread) wanted to want was to tell the world about Jesus: The miraculous story of a peasant, Jewish Rabbi in the ancient near-east that went around preaching that the Kingdom of God was near! The story of God himself stepping down into the world, in human flesh, and conquering death by dying himself and then being resurrected from the dead. And that somehow, in light of this beautiful, mesmerizing and mysterious story folks like you and me can be made right with God and enter into his presence now and forever.

That’s what we wanted to be our focus anyway. For the most part, we’ve given it our best. Sometimes more than others and heck, often we’ve outright failed. But after nine years of spending more months each year in a van than at home, you start to think. We can’t help but see, time and time again in our travels, a world in desperate need of God’s redemptive power. We see a people oppressed by selfishness, greed, listlessness, anxiety, depression, despair… We see a church co-opted by the American dream and a generation taught to settle for the feeble, plastic freedom offered by legislation rather than the outright soul-liberating freedom of the living God. We’ve concluded, time and time again, that the world does indeed need Jesus and that Jesus is indeed at work in the world. And slowly, as those nine-years unraveled, Jesus taught his followers in Showbread—with infinite patience—what it means to make the Gospel the sole focus of a touring rock band.

To me, that’s what Arrows Are Deadly was all about. A second wind. A breath of fresh air. The voice of God himself invigorating his kids, telling them “This is only the beginning, there is more work to be done!”

I saw a middle-aged woman weep in front of a crowd of tattooed young people because God had healed her long pain-ridden feet. I saw a young man baffled by the fact that even though he did not believe God could or would heal his neck of chronic pain, God did it anyway. A young woman in Florida bawled in front of us as she confessed that it was on that night she first believed that God truly loved her. A group of perfect strangers in New York huddled around one another, joining hands and crying out to God on behalf of a wayward family member none of us knew.

Almost a decade of traversing the countryside playing rock concerts and telling people about Jesus, but on this tour something unique was happening. We looked forward to our performances, we looked forward to fellowship and fun with our friends in the other bands, but we had an insatiable craving to see God move AFTER each show in the minutes and hours when we gathered in small circles to pray for one another. The focus, even after nine years, continues to be refined.

Every day I read theologians and scholars pour over the Bible in an endless effort to unravel it’s endless layers. On paper, theology is captivating, it stirs the heart and mind and seizes the imagination. In person, theology is devastating, it shocks a man to his very core to see with his own eyes and feel in his very bones the truth that prayer changes reality and that Jesus, God of the universe, is moving in the world today.

The current of this movement is one I simply must be swept away in."

- Josh Dies of Showbread / Taken from Arrows Are Deadly (A Review)

 

--DyingAnOriginal

When I Consider The Heavens

Something that I've been thinking about recently has been the stars.  This past summer, I spent many nights sleeping out under the stars with campers, and even on the weekends I would lay out there for hours with friends just hanging out and looking up at them.  I love the stars.  There have been few times that I've been in more awe of God than when I am looking at the stars.  Especially if you're in an open field with hardly any trees or light pollution around you and basically all you can see is the stars.  It makes me feel small.  Insignificant.  Yet at the same time loved.  The God who created the heavens and the billions upon billions of stars knows MY name and knows exactly what I'M going through.  Complete and utter awe.
If you look back at the Old Testament, especially Psalms you see David praising God a lot.  One example, and what I just read this morning as I've been going through the Psalms chapter by chapter is Psalm 8.  David opens up by saying, "O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth!  You have set your glory in the heavens."  By the way, tidbit:  When the word "lord" is in all caps in the Bible, it literally means, "Jehovah", or "Yahweh".  So what David, the king of all Israel is saying here is, "O Yahweh, my God, our king, how majestic..."  He later repeats himself in v.9 by saying that exact same verse.  But in v.3-4 is where I am focusing.  "When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is making that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?"  David is in complete awe and wonder of God by looking at the stars and seeing His handiwork.  He feels small and insignificant.  Yes, this is David we're talking about here.  David, the king of all Israel.  David, the guy who killed Goliath.  David, the guy he led armies into battle.  David, is a huge, huge figure in the Old Testament.  And great and mighty David is seeing the stars and the heavens and saying, "Wow, God, I'm humbled.  You're so awesome and you're so powerful, yet you choose to pay attention to me."
The reason that this sticks out to me so much is two words:  Light pollution.  Tonight if you were to go out and look at the stars you would see only a fraction of what David and the rest of the Old Testament figures saw.  In those times, they didn't have street lights, they didn't have porch lights or house lights or headlights or flashlights, no, it was complete and utter darkness.  The only light was possibly a campfire or the light of the moon and the stars.  So when you take that and relate it to nowadays, there is so much pollution in our world that they didn't have and they saw God so much easier than we do.  They saw STARS, we see stars.  I wish that I could go back to those days and climb to the top of a mountain on the clearest night and just look at the stars with no pollution whatsoever.  No wonder they were in awe of God. 
But how often do we have pollution in our own lives that take away from the beauty of Him?  We have these things in our lives, this temptation or distractions that try to drown out his voice much like light drowns out our visions of the stars.  I heard it said once that to get an hour of complete silence captured on video, one must take about 2,000 hours worth of footage.  I know in my personal life that is so true.  Just today as I sat down to read my Bible my phone started buzzing from a text, then my mom wanted to talk to me then my mind started wandering...
Point is, we have so many distractions and so many things that Satan uses to pry us away from Christ and drown out his still, small voice.  Just like light pollution makes it harder to see the stars, so these distractions and temptations make it harder to hear God's voice.  So I ask you, and I challenge you (and myself) what is it in your life that's clouding your vision of Christ?  What are the distractions that make it hard to hear His voice?  And how can you rid yourself of those distractions so that you can hear Him and spend time with Him?

--DyingAnOriginal

I Am The Hope, You Are The Hopeless

First off, I want to apologize.  At the beginning of this summer I had this great vision to blog each weekend about my week and some of the ways that I saw God move in the campers and in the staff and some of the awesome stories, but as it turns out, and as you can see...yeah, that didn't happen.  So my deepest regrets.  I do wish that I had had more time during the weekends to connect with each and every single one of you through my blogs and let you know how my summer was going, but alas, weekends are just about as busy as the weekdays are.  You wanna know about camp?  Talk to me.  End of story.


Moving on.

Today, I wasn't feeling very well.  I was feeling pretty achey, and I felt a fever coming on.  Not good.  After I ran my errands this morning, I took a little break after lunch and just sat and read all afternoon.  I had actually just finished up a conversation with one of my friends about wanting to read more, and so seeing the opportunity, I took it.  At first, I started out reading my summer reading assignment for college ("Freedom Writer's Diary") and after an hour or so of that, I switched over to a book that I've been going through again called, "Relationships", by Dr. Les and Leslie Parrott.  Such a good book about Godly, wholesome relationships.  If you're looking to pick one up, let it be that book.  I had been reading for about 2 and a half hours by now and my eyes were feeling pretty tired, but I still wanted to read the Bible and spend time with God.  So instead of reading the Bible, I whipped out my iPhone and quickly downloaded the latest podcast from Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley (Francis Chan's church, for those of you who know) and decided to listen to The Word instead of read it.  Not quite the same thing, but pretty close.

Today, Josh Walker was talking about Deuteronomy and the last things that Moses said to Israel before departing from them.  As he began retelling the story of Moses, much like a narrative, I began to think back over the stories that I had heard about Israel from going to a Christian elementary school.  The one that stuck out in my mind--and the speaker brought it to mind as well--was when the twelve men were sent out initially to scout out the Promised Land and they came back with huge, huge clusters of grapes (Nmb. 13:23; 26-31) as evidence that the land was what God had promised them.  God had promised them a land "flowing with milk and honey".  You would've thought that seeing the huge bounty of grapes brought back from Caanan would've sparked hope and excitement.  After finally reaching the Promised Land after such a long time of traveling you would've thought that the people would've completely ignored the grapes and just went barging in ahead, right?  I mean, let's translate this to a modern-day story.  I remember days of high school gym class when we had to run a mile.  Now personally, I hate running and I couldn't wait until that mile was over.  Nearing the end my spit and phlegm would be collecting in my throat and my mouth would be hanging wide open, panting and drawing in the air to replenish my burning lungs.  The best part was, though, after running I would always make a beeline for the water fountain, yearning to ease my cracked throat and dry mouth.  Coming back to the Israelites, you would've thought that after wandering around they would be so ready to settle down no matter where it was.  Much like I made a beeline to the fountain, they would be ready to make camp and start living, right?

Wrong.
Even after seeing that huge cluster of grapes and the bounty that the men of Israel came back with, they still didn't see the blessing of God hit them right in the face.  They had no hope.  They had no faith in Him.  Where was there trust?  Numbers goes on to say, "The men who had gone up with him said, 'We can't attack those people; they are stronger than we are.'  And they spread among the Israelites a ad report about the land where they had explored." 
As I sat there thinking of these things, my mind wandered to an ever-familiar passage from John 15:5, "I am the vine, you are the branches."  How does this relate to the story of the Israelites?
What do grapes grow on?
Vines, excatly.
The Israelites saw fear and opposition where God wanted them to see hope.  In John, Christ beautifully paints a picture of Himself as the vine and us, his Church, the body of Christ, as the branches.  The Israelites could've looked at that vine and see God's hand at work.  They could've seen the blessings that God was going to pour out on them and the plans he had for them.  Instead, they chose to see the bad.  They saw the giants and the opposition.  They saw things that would stand in their way and got afraid.  They forgot Who they had behind them and the Strength they had within them.
He was the vine of grapes that day to the Israelites beckoning them forward to take the Promised Land as He was giving it to them, yet they were too blind to see Him.
He is our hope.  He is our salvation.  He is our strength.  Yet so often, the circumstances around us, the temptations that try to bring us down, the whispered attacks and lies of the devil himself try to drown out that hope.  They try to grab our attention and take it off of Christ and to instead focus our attention on ourselves and our own weakness.  But that's the thing, when we're focusing on ourselves and the things happening around us we lose the strength we have in Christ.  As imperfect, sinful humans we are weak.  It's when we keep our eyes solely fixated on Him that we have strength to conquer the day's challenges and to rise above our environment, to resist temptation and put it to death once and for all.
So I write this as a challenge, but also encouragement.  The next time a giant comes into your view or something rises up that wants to steal your attention away from Christ, remember the Israelites.  When they lost focus on God, instead of receiving the promises and His blessings, they were sent back out to wander in the desert for 40 years.
Keep your focus on Him, because only then will you have the strength to rise above. 


--DyingAnOriginal

Camp Hebron Update Vol. 1

So it's been two weeks since I have left my normal routine of sleep, eat, work, sleep, repeat, and moved down to Halifax, PA, for the summer to work as a camp counselor at Camp Hebron.  Might I say that it has been an amazing move so far, and I'm so happy that I'm here.  I wish I could tell you all the countless stories that I have of awesome things happening during orientation week, how the staff bonded and united under the name of Christ, how I've seen God at work, or the funny stories of camp things happening.  It's been an amazing two weeks so far, so let me bring you up to speed with what's been happening...

Week 1:  Staff Orientation Week
First off, let me preface this by saying that before I got to camp, I was somewhat unsure of myself.  It had been two years since I had been a counselor, or even in leadership, responsible for kids.  Did I still have what it takes?  When my boss here initially contacted me, I didn't have some vision from heaven saying, "Go to camp, Ben!", and I felt a lot of turmoil inside.  Will God bless me if I take this position?  Camp has always been a refuge of safety and fun for me, so taking the position was a no-brainer for me, but was it what God wanted for my life?  It was with all these thoughts that I hesitantly turned off of Camp Hebron Road onto the Camp driveway.  As soon as I started driving down the driveway, though, I felt a peace flood through my veins.  This is where I'm supposed to be, and God will use me this summer.
Orientation went by in a blur of fun and frantic awesomeness.  I quickly made friends with most of the staff here and felt the staff bond pretty quickly and closely.  One highlight of the week was the campout.  Each year, as part of our training, we have a guys campout and a girls campout.  This year was definitely one of the better ones.  After gorging on hot dogs, chips, cookies, and carrots, and very manly things were discussed, we sat around and just got to know each other.  I had already become fairly good friends with one of the camp pastors, Eric, and we had had several very deep and engrossing discussions by Tuesday, so we took this opportunity to have some deep conversations. It was around midnight that people started turning in for the night, but God had different plans for Eric and I.  Our discussion had turned from discussing Scripture in Luke to just how hungry for God that I am.  To tell you the truth, after I had graduated high school last year, I entered into a spiritually dry and stagnant time in my life, and I was definitely ready for change.  It was with the power of the Holy Spirit that we left the campout and traveled through camp to one of the chapels.  We had a 2-hour prayer service from midnight until 2 in the morning, just pouring out our hearts to God and seeking Him, asking Him to fill us up.  He met us there.  When someone is hungry for Him, he does not let them go hungry.  I left that night feeling refreshed and ready for God to use me this summer.  My sole desire is for Him to fill me up, overflowing His Spirit, and letting me be a vessel unto the campers that I have this summer.
Some of the highlights of the rest of the week include the footwashing ceremony, the parties in the laundromat, and hanging out and getting to know some of the staff that I will be working closely with this summer.  The week ended, and I was soooo ready for my first batch of campers.

Week 2:  Shalom
For those of you who aren't in the know, but should be in the know, Shalom is a camp for adults with mental disabilities.  This year, our youngest camper was 20 and our oldest was 71, so that gives you a basic idea of what ages we had among the 50 campers.  I worked this camp two years ago when I was on staff last, and enjoyed it immensely.  It's definitely one of the hardest and most exhausting weeks though and patience begins to run thin at moments, but it's so rewarding at the end.  Just being able to spend time with people like this and see the childlike innocence and faith they have is unreal.
This year, I had three of the most awesome campers ever.  One was a veteran of Shalom camp, this being his 10th year.  Another had been there a few times before. The third camper was enjoying his first year.  Going into the week, I was nervous.  You don't really know what to expect most of the time, and considering that I had a camper that had never been there before, I was especially nervous of how he would do.
It's always awesome watching God work through the staff and through the campers during this camp.  Just relying solely on God's strength to get you through the week is a humbling experience alone, and I found myself time and time again going back to Scripture for the refilling and renewing that I needed.
Overall, Shalom was a great week, and I enjoyed having it once again.  It definitely creates a soft spot in your heart for people with disabilities, and after my first year doing it two years ago, I found myself drawn to people with disabilities, especially Downsyndrome.  If you haven't had a chance yet to work with people with disabilities, I'd strongly suggest you do.  It's one of those experiences that will leave you changed, and one that you'll never forget.

This upcoming week I will be in Explorers camp.  Explorers is a camp for 8-9 year olds.  You can prayer for patience, strength, and energy as I will have a cabin of 8 8-9 year old boys...yeah, 'nuff said.  Also, the cabin loop that I'm staying at is known for the presence of large wolf spiders residing in the cabin.  If you know me, you know that I'm deathly terrified of spiders, and sure enough, going into this week, I'm scared that I'll come into contact with one.  Also, pray for wisdom as I prepare devotions for this week.  Pray that I'll be able to really have faith and listen to what God wants to speak through me this week.

I miss you all.  You're all awesome.
Stay classy.

I Am The Fire, The Wind, and The Sea

It is 5 o’clock in the morning on a dreary and rainy Thursday.  Normally, I wouldn’t be up right now, much less blogging.  But a few things happened throughout the night that have given me some thoughts.  Instead of trying to go back to sleep amidst all the excitement happening outside right now, I figured that now would be as good a time as any to try to capture those and write them down.
An hour and a half ago, I was sleeping peacefully, and might I say very deeply.  If I thought long and hard about what I was dreaming about, I could probably remember, but it was of nothing significant.  Suddenly, without warning, I was groggily forced back into waking reality as my mom was calling my name.
“Ben, you should unplug your computer in this storm.”
“What?  Oh.  Computer?  What storm?”
“The one outside.”
I was obviously tired and had my mind still in deep sleep as I stood shakily out of bed and crossed the room to my desktop computer and began hastily turning things off and unplugging them from my power stip.  As I became steadily more aware of my surroundings, I noticed deep, far away grumbles of the thunder, roaming throughout the skies accompanied by the random flashes of lightning that would light up my windows.  I quickly climbed back into bed with plans of sleeping through the storm like usual, but God had some different plans.  As I closed my eyes and tried to sleep, I heard the sounds outside becoming increasingly more violent.  The thunder was louder, the lightning more frequent and constant, and the rain pouring.  Then came the wind.  With great strength the wind would buffet the house, the sounds growing more and more high pitched before dying down and starting back up again.  At first, it was just a strong wind, nothing to worry about.  Within minutes though, the wind grew to such a crashing crescendo that I opened my eyes wide.  The pitch kept getting higher as it whistled towards the windows.  Higher, and higher, and higher.  Stronger, and stronger, and stronger.  Soon, the house began to shake and the windows began to creak, yet still the wind grew.  My eyes were now open wide as I watched the light show play through my windows and listened to the wind.  I’m normally good with storms.  In fact, I enjoy storms and will sometimes sit outside to watch them as they go through, but this was one storm where I was actually scared.  Fear gripped my heart as I heard the wind slam into the house with all it’s might.  I began to imagine all the horrible possibilities of the wind breaking the windows and glass come pouring in, lacerating my skin and destroy my possessions.  Or perhaps the wind would carry a small, but heavy object through the wall downstairs, crushing my dad, and in the blink of an eye, change my life.  The wind outside still played it’s symphony of chaos, as I began to pray for safety and strength for the house, for my family, and for everyone around town as they too, assuredly, listened to the wind.  Without warning, the wind died down.  The thunder, lightning, and rain lived on, but for the most part, the wind was over. 
in my few moments of peace, I took myself back to the times of the Disciples.  Luke 8:22 tells the story of the Disciples facing one of their greatest fears, a storm at sea.  You see, some of them were fishermen and were used to being out at sea and reading the weather, turning back to shore when it began to storm.  Being a fisherman must have instilled the fear of the weather in them.  Probably one too many times, they had been caught in a storm, their boat being rocked like a cork amidst the great sea, lightning lighting up the sky and the fear on each other’s faces and thunder crashing all around them.  Storms at sea were nasty, and if anyone knew this, it was the Disciples.  In Luke, the Disciples take a trip from one side of a lake, to the other side, and while on that short trip, a storm, seemingly out of nowhere, catches them all off guard.  Now, these guys had assuredly seen their fair share of bad storms, and were used to storms of that magnitude, but there was something different about this storm.  Luke 23 says that the boat was swamped and they were in great danger.  They were even so afraid that they aroused Jesus (who was sleeping), and trying to be heard above the noise, screamed, “Master, master, we’re going to drown!”  The Bible doesn’t tell us much of what happened next.  In fact, I’ve always been impressed with the way that it handles what happened next.  Verse 24, “He got up and rebuked the wind and the raging waters; the storm subsided, and all was calm. 25 ‘Where is your faith’, he asked the Disciples.”  In my mind, I can see Jesus standing calmly in the rocking boat as He gently waves his hands bringing peace over the climactic weather.  And after the weather begins to subside, He turns around and looks at His Disciples with a, “Seriously?  I mean…really, guys?  C’mon”, look. 
As I laid in bed this morning and thought about this, the end of the story really stood out to me.  After calming the storm and questioning the Disciples on their lack of faith, they look at one another with amazement and wide eyes and say, “Who is this?  He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey Him.”  In my fear and prayer this morning, I realized that God has full control of the storms.  Not only literally, but figuratively.  With a flick of His wrist, He caused the wind to blow that hard this morning, and with a snap of His fingers, allowed it to gently and gradually subside.  Who am I to fear?  Who am I to question God?  Fear is my response to God when I don’t trust what He’s doing.  Who am I to think that my plans are better than His?  Not only does He command the physical weather, but He also commands the weather of our lives.  In good times and bad He’s there seeing us through it.  And with a flick of His wrist he could have all the pain and sorrow of this lifetime go away. 
He doesn’t. 
Let me say that again.
He doesn’t.
Where would the growth and strength come from if during every trying time, He made the problems go away?  How would we not only strengthen our faith in Him, but also the strength and wisdom in ourselves?  In the midst of the storms, in the middle of the pain, the brokenness, the hurt, the anger, the torment, the sorrow, the confusion and frustration, the times that you don’t understand what’s going on, the times that you wish things could swing in your favor for once but they don’t, the times that you look up to the sky and let your heart cry out, “God!  Where are you?” 
He’s there. 
In the middle of the storm, He’s there. 
You’re not alone.  Your God is here.
As the fear quickly subsided inside, and the peace of God took its rightful place in my heart, I began to doze back asleep, praying for safety during the duration of the storm.  It was at this point, that I heard a knock on the door.  3:56 AM.  Give me a break.
“What?”
The door opened and my Mom’s silhouette filtered into my room. 
“Did you hear the tree fall out front?”
“What tree?” 
“The tree right next to the driveway fell down.  You didn’t hear it?”
“Whattt?!”  I began to sit upright at this point.  The first thought that ran through my mind.  My car.  The tree had landed on my car and that was just one more expense that I would have to take care of as I start school in the fall.  “What about the—“
“The cars are okay.  The tree missed your car by a couple feet.  Dad called the borough office and the police and they’re going to be coming by to chop it up.  It’s lying across the whole road and blocking traffic.  One truck almost ran into it already.”   
“…What the heck?”
And right now I’m listening to the sounds of chainsaws and wood choppers out front.  Everything’s going to be okay.  Within an hour or two, the tree will be gone.  My car will be safe.  The house will be safe.  My family will be safe, and I can go into a 10-hour day at work on 2 hours of sleep.  Life is good, but God is greater. 
You’re not alone.
You’re God is here.
My God is with me.
In the middle of the storm, He’s there.
He’s here.

--DyingAnOriginal

Abstience: Why?

They asked me why I do what I do.
"Ben, why do you not have sex? Why are you still a virgin?"
For a while, the thoughts and same questions have been plaguing my own mind. Why do I do what I do? Or rather, why do I do what I don't? It's taken me a few weeks to finally formulate an answer. Well, one that I like, anyway. I never really liked giving Biblical, "Sunday School" answers. You know, the ones that you were taught to say in Sunday School when you were in elementary and middle school. The teacher would pose a question to you like, "Why is evolution unbiblical?", and after stumbling over your words and stammering, she filled your mouth with words with a straight up answer of, "Genesis 1:1 and John 1:1. You should know this by now, Ben."
I never really liked those moments. I'd rather find my answers for myself. I'm an explorer. Give me a question or something to find out for you, and I WILL find it out. Don't hand feed it to me, but let me experience it on my own. You could tell me to do something the right way, but until my way fails and I experience that failure, I won't do it the right way. I'll just do it my way, thank you. I feel like the world, as non-Christians would not fully understand my Biblical answer about why or why I don't do something.
"Ben, why do you not have sex? Why are you still a virgin?"
"Uhh…because the Bible says so and that's what God wants from me, and I want to honor Him."
"I don't believe in God…"
"Well…"
And that's where the awkward silence of raised eyebrows would come in as they look at me questioningly, waiting for a logical answer to their simple question.
But the more I thought about it, the more I realized how spiritual it is. The world may not understand my answer, and that's fine. What matters is that I possibly plant a seed or even open up questions for them. What matters is that I believe what I believe. Period. You may not understand it, and it might not make a whole lot of sense, but my beliefs are my own. It no longer becomes important for me to make sense to the world, not seem weird, and to be "safe". What becomes important is that I stand firm in my belief, explain it to the best I can, and pray for the best.
Recently, I came across a band named Prepared Like A Bride. Christian metal band. Good music. But what I can't get over, and this is partly what led me to the epiphany of why I do what I don't do, is the name. Prepared Like A Bride. Prepared Like A Bride. Prepared Like A Bride. Pure and spotless. Holy and set apart. Astonishingly beautiful and breathtaking. Oh how I long to stand at the altar some day and watch in awe, breathless, as I watch my bride-to-be take her first steps down the aisle, arm-in-arm with her father. Writing this now, I feel the grip on my heart. The tug on my emotions. The longing within. Pure and spotless. Astonishingly beautiful and breathtaking. Holy and set apart.
In Revelation 19, we are first exposed to the meeting between Christ, coming down from heaven, and the church, ascending to heaven. In the beginning of Revelation 19, a multitude begins to shout praises and affirmation to God. "He has condemned the great prostitute [Satan] who has corrupted the earth by her adulteries [sin]…Hallelujah…Praise our God all you His servants…" Pretty worshipful stuff, here. Finally, in verse 7 the analogy of the church being the bride of Christ, enters the room. Breathtaking. Commanding awe and wonder. "Let us rejoice and be glad and give Him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear." Later, an angel even invites the writer of Revelation, John, to join in on the wedding reception of this wedding between Christ and his bride, the church. The rest of Revelation 19 and for most of chapter 20 is spent talking about the defeat of Satan by Christ. The end of the world. The ultimate wrath, love, and justice of God being poured out on mankind one last time. In chapter 21, the references pick back up. First, it compares the New Jerusalem that Christ has prepared for the church as the new bride (v. 2). What really gets me here, though, is verse 9. John, still viewing this awesome story laid out before him via vision, sees an angel who says to him, "Come, I will show you the bride [the church, now in heaven], the wife of The Lamb." It is for that very sentence that I choose abstinence, that I choose purity.
Throughout the entire Bible, we see time after time that Christ commands, not only a life of purity, but that man and woman wait for each other. This is most notable in Genesis 1 where it talks about husband and wife leaving parents and joining. Becoming one. In Song of Solomon, we see an epic metaphor of a love affair between a husband and wife being compared to the undying love that Christ has for the church, and the love that we should have for Christ. In the gospels Christ reinstates time after time that to even lust is adultery. Paul follows this concept up throughout the entirety of his Pauline Epistles.
My one desire as a Christian is—or at least needs to be—to be one with Christ. To follow his commands, to keep him holy and imminent in my life, and to make his name, glory, holiness, and love known throughout the entire earth. To be so in tune with Him and connected that my ways are His ways and that His thoughts are my thoughts.
Obviously, if Christ calls me to be pure and I defy that command, that goes against everything I believe and everything I want. That becomes a sin between Christ and I and something that keeps me from becoming one with Him and bringing Him glory in and through my life. So if you ask why I remain abstinent that is the very basic reason. I want to do what Christ wants and I wish to honor Him with my life. Steering away from His holy and perfect plan of purity does not do this, and is therefore something I don't need in my life, and something that keeps me from Him.
On a deeper level, though, I want to be holy and spotless when I am presented to Christ. As the church is the pure and spotless bride of Christ, so my own marriage needs to be pure and spotless and holy before the Lord. Defiling the marriage bed before marriage and going against His plan takes away that purity and paints a stain on that white garment. God's church is pure and spotless. God's bride is pure and spotless. So my marriage needs to be pure and spotless.
On a basic note, though, it's just smarter. With all the STD's and sicknesses running rampant throughout our culture, I don't want to end up with one. I don't want any chance of endangering my wife's health and sanity by sleeping around right now. In turn, I hope and pray that she feels the same. Knowing that my wife has a STD that could potentially infect me would take away a lot from the experience of sex.
I mean, do I even look like I can afford and handle a kid right now?
I want my wedding night, and the rest of my marriage, to be meaningful. I've heard it said multiple times that sex is the glue that holds marriage and love together. Without that sex, and without that glue, it falls apart. How can that glue be strong if it doesn't mean anything? Having sex now takes away exponentially from the true meaning of sharing that experience for the first time with the one person in your entire life who you will have that experience with. The true greatness and happiness of sex diminishes each time, and before you know it, it soon becomes another mundane task. Saving it for marriage helps it to keep some of that shiny lustre. Much like I will undress my wife on our wedding night, so we will finally unwrap the gift of sex together that first night and find a shiny and mysterious gift that we need to experience together.
So with these thoughts, hopes, and prayers in my mind, I press forward. I can't say this journey has been easy, and I can't say that I haven't thought about giving in. In fact, I think about what I could gain by giving in right now fairly often. But in the end, what really matters and what really lasts are the choices that I make in the heat of the moment.
Walk with me.

--DyingAnOriginal

 

 

 

Resurrection

This thought has been on mind for years now.  I can remember it first starting when I was still a little shaver in Jr. High, and I was just being introduced to the "heavy" music scene (in particular, Christian).  Music has always been one of my passions.  I remember the first "heavy" concert that I went to was a Pillar concert back in '06 (?) in Philly.  At the time, their new CD was the cutting edge Christian hard rock, and I was all for it.  In fact, I later declared them my favorite band after I had bought their album, "Where Do We Go From Here", and had almost worn it out from playing it so many times.  It was there that I found a deeper worship.  Something that wasn't happening in churches.  See, in my experience, churches are always too afraid to offend someone.  Please the masses and find something suitable that everyone can agree with.  Discovering this in my "rebellious" years couldn't have been at a more convenient time as I quickly found out that the heavy music refuge that I was creating for myself and retreating in to was soon to be taking the place and becoming my worship.  The worship that no one else would understand because it's "loud" and "heavy".  "It has too many beats!"; "You can't understand the words!"; "The devil's music, that is!"
Really?
Seriously?
...
Really?
One of my favorite songs on aforementioned album was called, "Simply".  The chorus ("You simply love / despite all the stupid things I've done...") and the heartfelt verses would seize my heart every...single...time.  Not the, "Wow, that's really cool", seize, but the, "God...what have I done with myself?  I don't deserve this love." flat out grateful on the floor seize.  As my musical tastes developed and I steered my ears away from the CCM artists on the local radio station like Third Day, Casting Crowns, and Steven Curtis Chapman, I dived deeper and deeper into this "murky" world of heavy music to which so many people found offense in.  My tastes got heavier and heavier, and within a year or two I was listening to anything from Swedish death metal to hardcore.  And as my tastes became greater, so did the concern of my parents.  A huge stepping stone was my first official "metal" concert--Demon Hunter, Living Sacrifice, Becoming the Archetype, Zao, and August Burns Red on the cusp of popularity.  I bought a few of Demon Hunter's records because I was really into it and brought them home.  I have to admit, now that I look back on the moment, I was scared.  What would my parents think?  Say?  Do?  Sure enough, my fears were justified as they both expressed concern.  "If you can't understand what they're saying, how is it God-honoring?"  Again...
...really?
See, here's my biggest beef, and I couldn't care less who I offend with this next statement because I believe it wholeheartedly, but the church is blind and wandering on dead-end roads.  Hymns are dead.  The songs you used to sing at your Grandma's church when you visited her are gone, and if you still sing them, I'm sorry, but you're old-fashioned and not doing anything to help the current image of Christianity.  In high school, I did a report on the book, "unChristian", by Gabe Lyons.  In it, he chronicles the top stereotypes of Christians and why they are that way.  I have to admit, it wasn't a fun book to read, but the stereotypes are forever burned in my mind--old-fashioned being one of the most prominent.  Who would want to join and outdated religion?  

"If we are to reach the current unsaved population, we need to modernize.  Plain and simple."--Ben Geib

Now, I'll admit, there are some churches in America that have worship (if we are to define worship as singing and praise Sunday mornings) correct.  I can think of several off the top of my head right now, and if I was to think hard, I could think of more.  But the majority of the church population wastes itself away in the olden days.  This was where I was, caught in a place where I needed worship that I could connect with, something with meaning and passion, and facing a dead church that sang songs that I could not connect with.  In need for passion, I went heavier and heavier.  Listening to bands tearing their throats out screaming, "Great Councilor, take what's left of me!" was something that I could connect with.  "Rock of ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee", was not.

And that's where I'm at now.  Is the music offensive?  Yes.  To some.  But to tell you the straight up truth, I've seen more passion and more worship happening at hardcore concerts in the mosh pits and on the stage than I have at almost every church I've been at.  So you tell me, why do we ostracize something so strange and so foreign and dangerous if it has power and the potential to connect with a dying world and yet cling to the thing that separates us from them?  One of my friends told me a story of being in a small, seedy bar in the middle of Harrisburg watching a Celtic punk band rock out the tiny stage.  Who knows who was there that night?  In a bar, one can only guess.  As they rip through their set, they end with one, final song--a punk rendition of Amazing Grace.  As the popular ballad soars through the small, rough crowd my friend tells me with water starting to well up in his eyes, "I saw more worship there, in that little seedy bar than I have at church."  And I recall the picture that one of my friends took of a kid, gauges and all kneeling in the middle of a mosh pit and Purple Door with hands upraised to the sky simply worshiping.

So I close and I plead the church to modernize.  Obviously, screaming Oh, Sleeper and The Chariot on Sunday mornings would turn most off and away, but seriously consider the job you have and the stance with which you condemn heavy music.  I fully believe that it helped save my life, and if mine, why not others?

Rock on.
SIbrokenDE