You say
You say I am an idealist. I stand firm that I am the realist. The realist in the most realistic sense that is. You say we work with what we’ve got. Take no chances on the long shot. But I say your commonsense is apathetic nonsense. You say, “Yeah, there’s a lot of poor” yet, remain up to your chin in capitalist gore. Do you remember the old widow who gave her two pence? You say the systems corrupt; decided years ago to give up. But I won’t rest on that side of the white picket fence. You say your purpose is your wage. Anyone can escape the poverty cage. My friend, you’re wrong in the past, present, and future tense. Abandon your ways, you’re blinded by the small thinking of a worldly haze. Instead let’s proclaim “it’s time for progress and change to commence”.
"So I am a radical in the truest sense of the word: an ordinary radical who wants to get at the root of what it means to love, and to get at the root of what has made such a mess of our world."
- Shane Claiborne, Irresistible Revolution (via livinabroad)
Hosted a concert for Natalie Closner Saturday night at our house. The two lovely ladies on the left are her sisters—and two of my amazing housemates. Check it out and check out the rest of Natalie Closner’s stuff.
Change.
This stage of life is so exciting and full of adventures. I can dream new dreams every minute of everyday about all of the great things I can do with my life. Do I want to be an inner city teacher? A sociological researcher? A lawyer? The possibilities are endless. But at the end of every dream there is a small pain in my stomach—the prick of reality. Every dream comes with a price. Every dream I choose, I pass on another dream. Every place my dreams take me, they also force me to leave another place I have learned to call home. I cherish and thrive in the relationships God has blessed me with for this moment of my life, but it brings tears to my eyes to imagine my life in a place apart from the current dream I am living.
The pain I experience in the comprehension of what graduation means can be overwhelming; it is a reminder of how broken this world is, in the fact that as Christians we cannot all be in one place at one time. We have been scattered across all nations, but I look to the complete redemption of the world where community will be perfected and all will be as one.
Amidst all of these thoughts, I turn to the words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer:
“Because God has already laid the only foundation of our fellowship, because God has bound us together in one body with other Chrsitains in Jesus Christ, long before we entered into common life with them, we enter into that common life not as demanders but as thankful recipients. We thank God for what he has done for us. We thank God for giving us brethern who live by His call, by His forgiveness, and His promise. We do not complain of what God does not give us; we rather thank God for what He does give us daily.”
And I am. I am thankful for the dream I have been given that I live out everyday with the fellowship and community I have in Seattle.
