The important thing is to receive this moment's experience with both hands. Don't waste it. "Where you are, be all there," Jim once wrote. "Live to the hilt every situation you believe to be the will of God."

Elisabeth Elliot writes this about dealing with loneliness (edit: more specifically how she and Jim dealt with geographic separation before they got married. Passion and Purity: amazing story). I wish I had read this during summer in Korea.

Happy two thousand twelve, reader. Wherever we are this year, let's be all there.

sloppy pop

don't you love rediscovering your favorite parts from the shows you watched as a kid, and introducing them to the next generation of phonics-learners. between the lions was such a good show!

knowing and being known

It is a false form of honesty that suggests that nothing should remain hidden and that everything should be said, expressed and communicated. This honesty can be very harmful, and if it does not harm, it at least makes the relationship flat, superficial, empty and often boring. When we try to shake off our loneliness by creating a milieu without limiting boundaries, we may become entangled in a stagnating closeness. It is our vocation to prevent the harmful exposure of our inner sanctuary, not only for our own protection but also as a service to our fellow human beings without whom we want to enter in a creative communion. Just as words lose their power when they are not born out of silence, so openness loses its meaning when there is no ability to be closed...

Certainly in a period of history in which we have become so acutely aware of our alienation in its different manifestations, it has become difficult to unmask the illusion that the final solution for our experience of loneliness is to be found in human togetherness.

A lot of times I really don't get Henry Nouwen (THE introvert of Christian literature introverts?), but I am really thankful for this shred of wisdom.

Sometimes, like it has been this week, I want so much to know and be fully known in my relationships that it makes me sad and quite distracted.
Henry Nouwen reminds me that in any relationship in life (marriage included) I will never be fully known by any person other than God. And I realize that's okay. In fact, it is a good good thing.

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.

Let's know and be known by one another in a way that is healthy for all of us and brings Him the greatest honor. Let's depend on Him for wisdom to know how and how much and when...
And where that human togetherness falls short, may we be satisfied in knowing that He knows us fully, perfectly, exhaustively, completely. He comprehends every single thought, emotion, meditation, struggle, wordless prayer. And His love - full, perfect, exhaustive, complete - meets every need so long as we trust and obey.

Bridge to Terabithia and God

"Do you believe people go to hell, really go to hell, I mean?"
"You ain't worrying about Leslie Burke?"
It did seem peculiar, but still - "Well, May Belle said...."
"May Belle? May Belle ain't God."
"Yeah, but how do you know what God does?"
"Lord, boy, don't be a fool. God ain't gonna send any little girls to hell."

I recently reread Bridge to Terabithia and watched the film adaptation, since I'm using the book to tutor a fifth grade boy in English. I don't recall this part at all.
This book disturbs me - the entire plot, but especially this part. It also kinda disturbs me that it never occurred to me to pray about which books I assign to the kids I tutor. I wonder whether I am doing a good job of presenting these kinds of topics to kids that pray everyday for sick relatives and see their grandpa do his quiet time in the study every morning.

Anyways, I found a little essay for tomorrow's lesson about the book's history of censorship. Hopefully discussing it will be fruitful for us in more ways than just increasing his Lexile / TAKS scores.

today's Utmost

"When you find yourself face to face with a person who is spiritually lost, remind yourself of Jesus Christ on the cross. If that person can get to God in any other way, then the Cross of Christ is unnecessary. If you think you are helping lost people with your sympathy and understanding, you are a traitor to Jesus Christ."

"For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified."
1 Corinthians 2:2


Let's not confuse mercy with sympathy. The gift of mercy too points to the cross as the only truth and the only hope.