sometimes you just need to yell at God during a thunderstorm

Prayer is really weird.

Best I can tell, if God doesn't exist I am going to have spent thousands of years of my life talking to:

• my hands
• the inside of my eyelids
• car windshields
• hot coffee/tea
• walls
• my bible

...and tonight a thunderstorm. 

If God is real though, I will have spent such a small portion of my life talking to and listening to the only one who matters. 

Either way (talking to inanimate objects or the author of everything ever) it seems dumb how sanitized my prayers are. If I am usually praying to a windshield, I doubt that the windshield cares much about my diction or whether or not I use some salty language. I cannot fathom that my coffee cup cares if my laments make sense, or if they are petty. 

I also cannot really see how God would care either. 

Don't get me wrong, I am quite sure that God cares that I pray and the content of my prayers. I am just not sure that God is easily offended or turned off by the content of the prayers. If God really is the author, he is in the heads of his characters. I am already known. "Thou's", "oughts" aren't going to fool him. Neither are worthless and meaningless platitudes like, "but I know you care". I am sure he does, but when I am uttering that line, I rarely believe he does. Who wants a God who is so easily buttered up? 

This week, my small group is supposed to be working on prayer. I doubted that I would find this week so difficult. In my head it seems easy to be honest and even vulgar with one who knows my inner vulgarity. Yet when I close my eyes (or bow my head, or whatever) I find myself often incapable of actual honesty. All the formality and hypocrisy that so appalled me in my early Christian days takes over in me. Rather than honesty, I become tongue-tied. 

But, when faced with a thunderstorm tonight, it seemed easier. Something about the violence of the scene before me made it easier to pray the violent, angry prayers in my own heart. They came out of me like vomit. All of my internal anger found external expression. Somehow, I was able to believe that the God of the lightning I could see and the thunder I could hear would appreciate those prayers. I worry that if I am unfiltered that I am going to hurt people and break relationships. For once, I wasn't worried about breaking relationship with God. 

Maybe part of prayer is to daily affirm that God can handle our crap. That he is not unaffected by us. He hears the cry of his people, even if the rest of the world wouldn't find those cries to be very important. 

I am not feeling thankful for as much as I ought today. Gratefulness is not my strongest virtue. But today I am thankful for this; I am thankful for the God who hears. 

writing stuff

For as long as I can remember, I have thought of myself as a decent writer, who could become a good writer if I tried. Of course, I have never really tried.

There is power in this way of thinking. I could be good at something, if I tried to be good at something. If you don't try, you don't have to fail. If you never fail, you always could have succeeded. It is a vicious cycle, but one that I unfortunately know too well.

When I was a freshman in college, I watched the movie, then devoured the book High Fidelity. The book centers around a thirtysomething man who owns a record shop. He is a sharp musical critic, who analyzes everything in his life through his harsh critical lens. He is also profoundly unhappy. This book was actually essential in my journey towards following Jesus. It helped me see that most of what was keeping me from Jesus was my harsh criticism of other people, people who were trying, but often failing at living virtuously. Like in High Fidelity, I had to come to the point of recognizing that those who tried, failed and kept trying were significantly ahead of me; the critic who shielded himself in self perceived untapped potential.

Back to writing. Here are the excuses I make not to write:

• "I don't have time". False. I have time. I work out. I watch sports. I play Words with Friends. I have time. I don't make time. But that is an entirely different issue. 
• "I have nothing to say." Listen, everyone gets blocked. Our ideas get blocked, ambition gets blocked, even bowels get blocked. The reality is though that creativity spurs creativity. I used to be able to run 7-10 miles. I now can run 2. However, if I ran 2 miles everyday this week, I could probably run 3 next week, and so on. 
• "The world doesn't need another Christian no-it-all book/blog/tumblr/etc". Here is where it really is. 

I think of writing externally, not internally. Before I sit down to write, I think about the audience first. I try to imagine what no one else has said. I (rightly) conclude that everything has already been said.

But here is the rub, I think that I still need to say it. I have thought about writing or being a writer since I was 10 years old. That is 22 years! My writing dream can order a drink. By comparison, I have known my wife for 12 years. I graduated from college 10 years ago. I have followed Jesus for 14 years. My thought of being a writer is older than all but one of my friendships.

I don't think it would be healthy to allow another 20 years to pass or critiquing others or wondering if I could actually do that thing.

So I will try to be here more. I will try to extract more thoughts from my head and see if I can get any better at the process. If you enjoy it, let me know. If you see things I can improve on,  also let me know, but nicely. I'm in a vulnerable state with all of this. If there is a dream delayed for you and you want to give it a shot, let me know...it's fun to embark on the journey together!