Posts Tagged ‘God’

IF…

// September 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // My Thoughts

If you struggle with sin,
if you are selfish,
if you are an alcoholic,
if you are addicted to drugs,
if you are addicted to pornography,
if you don’t spend enough time with your wife and kids,
If you are a jerk
If your dad was/is a jerk,
If you were/are abused,
If you were/are neglected,
if you constantly need the approval of others,
if you are habitually whiney,
if you nag your husband,
if your spouse is cheating,
if your child hates you,
if you hate anybody,
if you just did it again and you feel horrible about it,
if you don’t know why you do the things you do,
if you feel hopeless,
if you feel insane,
if you feel like jumping,
if you already jumped,
if you just left and are never going back,
if they broke your heart,
if they broke your spirit,
if you are broke,
if you are bent,
if you are angry,
if you are afraid,
if you don’t care anymore,
if you care but are afraid to show it,
if you are confused,
if all you want is to be touched,
if it all fell apart today,
if they did it again and you just can’t forgive,
if you don’t want to go on,
if you don’t feel anything anymore,
if none of this fits you, or if all of it fits you

Please know that God truly does love you more than anything else in this world.  He isn’t concerned about how well you keep it together, or if you did the right thing.
he is not interested in how often you go to church, or if you said your prayers yesterday.

He just wants you to know he loves you… he really doesn’t need you to do anything…he has everything he needs,  he just wants to love you…  just focus on loving him back with all your heart.   stop focusing on trying to please others or doing the right thing, or being right, or even keeping it all together… let it all fall apart!    all those other things,  they are just distractions,  just love him back… and let me know how much it changes your life…

Seriously let me know…  at  jasonthebaldguy@gmail.com

Tags: Art, dad, doing the right thing, drugs, God, Kids, Love, porn, pornography, sin, spirit, spouse

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God is a Republican?

// September 3rd, 2009 // 4 Comments » // My Thoughts

Over the past 2000 some odd years Christians have always been an eccentric group but I have to admit, I think we got dumber once we got to America.  It seems the longer we stay in America the dumber we get!  God is not a Republican People!    This may offend you or make you think differently about me but I have some news for you.  God is Pro Choice.  He is the original Pro Choice supporter.  He decided to allow you to make ANY choice!  you can choose to kill, or heal, or love, or hate, or steal or deal, or make or break, you can fly or flunk or vote or hope but the choice is yours and yours alone! (sounds a little Dr Seuss eh?) My point is … that the freedom to do good or bad is unquestionably given to us by God, our countries leaders knew that. But somewhere somebody decided that it was our jobs as Christians to be the moral police for the USA… NOT OUR JOB!   Do you honestly think that God intended to create the world, give everyone the freedom to choose right or wrong and then let YOU decide what they could and couldn’t do so that your religious panties would not get bunched up?  Why do  you think that Jesus ALWAYS rebuked the pharasees?  They were religious zealots that sought to control the population with laws that were never intended by God.  Look I love all these great christian leaders that keep telling you that we need to prevent same sex marriage, abortion, etc.. etc… but the fact is that they are incredibly short sighted.  It has been  proven over and over you cannot legislate morality!  The world will do what they want, and we as Christians should be there to pick up the pieces for them.  Look at prohibition,  abortion, homosexuality, same sex marriage,   every time those issues are subjected to intense scrutiny and outrage by well meaning “christian” activists, it only serves to alienate that group of people from Christians even further.   I would bet $1000 dollars that you take a few fishermen and start protesting their fishing as evil and ungodly and those previously harmless fishermen will become pitchfork bearing villagers bent on eradicating every christian in sight.

So before you get up on your conservative high horse and begin railing on me for being a liberal, or a democrat, or a heretic or whatever, hear me out.

I think that everyone should have the right to do what they like… just like God Created us. This works fine… the world takes care of these things naturally… they don’t want to bother with religion. i.e.  you kill someone you will probably end up dead or in jail-pretty much happens all over the world. The thing is you get religion involved with making laws… and you end up with “King James” you know… the guy that created a Church State and killed people for not attending the State Churches?  This is the same Guy we ran away from to America and decided that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”  It wasn’t the state that was the problem in the first place… it was religion all along.

Religious zealots killed Jesus
Religious zealots started the bloody crusades
Religious zealots persecuted protestants
Religious zealots have alienated homosexuals
Religious zealots are unreasonable
Religious zealots are unmerciful
Religious zealots are intolerant of anything except what they believe
Religious zealots bomb abortion clinics

So when you get all excited and worked up and angry about how all of these groups are attacking your morals and fundamental beleifs remember… we fired the first shots in this war… and God never authorized the war.

Tags: activists, Art, choice, christian, christians, conservative, Dr Seuss, exercise, Fun, God, jesus, Love, pharasees, Religion, the past

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Waiver of Parental Rights

// August 31st, 2009 // 6 Comments » // My Confessions, My Life

I am thinking tonight about Abraham, walking up the hill to sacrifice his firstborn son, his only heir. These days God doesn’t just stop by for a visit and start up the conversation “I need you to make a sacrifice for me”, there are no stone altars, or rams caught in the thicket in the nick of time. There are lawyers and loafers, children and adults, men, and women, all in some way seeking their own interests. These days the issues are clouded and principals are less important. Being right, or winning, or out maneuvering your opponent is more important. These days if you do something wrong, just be sure you file the paperwork right and everything will be easy like butter. What you don’t say is more important than what you do say, and how you don’t say it is even more important! It is not doing the right thing but looking like you are doing the right thing while you are cashing out on someone else’s misfortune.

As I looked at the “waiver of parental rights” affidavit that old feeling came over me… the cold clammy fingers of fear and dread gripped over my heart squeezing it until my throat felt like I was swallowing a baseball. “It has come to this…” I breathed. There are really no words to express the feeling of being asked to sign a piece of paper that legally divorces you from your own child. The reality is that there are no words for these types of things at all… How horrible of a parent do you have to be for such a document to be necessary? Where is the rope that you grab to keep you from falling further down the nightmarish rabbit hole, where big is little and up is down? Perspective is all a matter of reality suddenly… the reality is that you have to make a choice… you have to think about “that which you would never willingly conceive of in your mind”… I am a man of reason, so how do you list your priorities and mark them off until you reach a reasonable decision? How… How do you even think about trying to choose?

The phone rings…he says it is what he wants, I will still be his dad… just not on paper.
I look at the paper… everyone says… fight! and win! God is for you! but the many years of seemingly good choices are dulled by a foggy perception…It is like looking back on a mine field where I stepped on every single mine and somehow survived. How can any choice be a good choice once you make the choice to walk through a minefield? I put my hand up to the past and turn away… “no” I cannot go there… others claim to remember it better than I do… and different… so different that I doubt myself… I wonder how my heart can be so sincere and yet so faulty… as faulty as my memory? The phone rings… he has questions… why I made choices… why I didn’t make others… I honestly don’t know… The questions are perfect and concise…. the type that don’t need answers… just delivery.

I sit… I sign. I sign the “waiver of parental rights” I go see a notary and look for the judgement on his face as he notarizes the “waiver of parental rights” I go to the post office and the postal worker drags the “waiver of parental rights” out of my resistant hand with a quizzical look. As the envelope leaves my hand my mind hears the deafening chorus of the abandoned as they scream at me of the fear of the unknown. I smile at the postal worker like a victim with a gun in his back as I swipe my card to pay the postage for the “waiver of parental rights”

The phone rings… people say… “you did the right thing” some of them are the same people that said “fight and win!” I think about all the times I have ignored the council of “Job’s Friends” thinking to have done the right thing, only to be found here apparently winning their approval… I value it little.. I value it less than little. I close my eyes to imagine a simpler time when life was catching toads and building forts.

(This post is a very real and honest post that describes the events surrounding the day that I actually did sign a “waiver of parental rights” for my first born son Collin James Carroll. My Ex-wife continues to actively read this blog and pass along my confessions that are meant for your encouragement as information that causes him to question my character and loyalty to him. My reasons for this post are not for the sake of drama, or sympathy, or counsel. I am simply hoping that through this post that you gain an insight and understanding possibly an empathy for those that are facing similar issues in life.)

Tags: Art, blog, choice, choices, dad, doing the right thing, dread, fear, friends, God, perception, perspective, sacrifice, sin, the past

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Chaos? or a greater magnitude of Order to an order of magnitude Greater?

// July 28th, 2009 // 4 Comments » // My Thoughts

is chaos just a greater magnitude of order?

Don’t expect this to make sense.. but if it does then maybe you are as weird and eccentric as I am!

There are several theories or laws that we use to describe our observations of the physical world… one of these is the theory of entropy, in summary the theory of entropy states that all systems tend to decay into disarray.  A second theory Chaos theory explores this process of decay and disarray and together these theories form a very convincing case that eventually everything will unravel and the universe will fall apart.  I was happy agreeing with these ideas since they seemed to explain many things that I have witnessed and read about as a physics buff.  Today though… as I was driving home from work… I was just thinking… nothing really and suddenly out of nowhere came this thought.. “the things you see as chaotic seem that way because of  your perspective… Chaos is simply Order at a greater magnitude than you can perceive.”   Well I pretty much spent the rest of the evening thinking about what this means.  here are a few thinking points

  • The wisdom of man is foolishness to God
  • the spinning top that slowly succumbs to gravity, and friction is joining and fully contributing to a bigger, spinning top… Earth!
  • The silly things that I stress out about are actually things that are working together to reveal Gods Plans for my life!
  • a marble rolling toward an ant will seem like a catastrophe to him… to you it is hardly worth noticing. Ironically the path of the marble has everything to do with a system of rules such as inertia, gravity, friction, energy and more; a system that universally governs almost every event on the face of the earth at once. From the micro to the macro the same laws are obeyed. Catastrophe is only relevant to an observer within the realm of their observation.

Anyways!  so that’s what I thought about tonight.   any comments?

Tags: Art, God, Mac, perspective, physics, sin, stress, wisdom

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The Trouble with Trouble

// July 3rd, 2009 // 1 Comment » // My Thoughts

whatever trouble you are experiencing right now no matter how bad it is… it is just a distraction that is keeping your attention away from the one truly good thing in your life… Jesus… and if you think he is not in your life… look away from your troubles for a second and you will see him there waiting for you.

The trouble with trouble is that as soon as things do not go our way we assume that the situation has turned into trouble and we want nothing to do with it. The truth is that while bad things may happen to “good” people bad things do not happen to “God’s” people! you are welcome to disagree but hear me out… “bad” is a matter of perspective. “evil” is a matter of fact! scripture says “all things work together for the good of those that love and serve God” scripture also says

Jer 29:10-14 (NIV) This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”

he doesn’t say “you know the plans I have for you” he says “I know the plans I have for you”  From God’s perspective the 70 years of captivity in babylon were a “good” thing for his people even though they may have perceived it as “bad”   so you see “bad” is a matter of perspective.

so wherever you are, whatever trouble you are in…whatever pain you suffer… whatever struggles you deal with… they are all for your good,  so look away from  your troubles and look to your savior… “Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”

I am not saying that trouble will not overtake us ever… but we can look at it from God’s perspective, and welcome it as an opportunity to grow and discover what the plans for our future are like!

Tags: Art, God, jesus, Love, pain, perspective, trouble with trouble, truth

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Do you think you will escape?

// June 19th, 2009 // 4 Comments » // My God, My Thoughts

The Pharisees were harsh and judgmental of anything that did not fit their ideology of righteousness. Yet Jesus Continually rebuked them and warned them that they would be judged accordingly.  Isn’t is strange that so many Christians still insist on acting more like Pharisees and less like the Jesus that we claim to follow?

Someone very wise once said that  cynicism, skepticism, and criticism are the opposites of  faith, hope and love.

Harsh, Angry, Judgmental behavior is often more of an indicator of fear and lack of truth than anything else…If you are familiar with discerning truth you probably already know,  Truth can stand up to challenging… without anger, without resentment, without fear.

It seems that I do not go very long these days without hearing fresh news of Christians who forget the Jesus that they follow and begin acting like the very brood of vipers that Jesus rebuked.  Some would seem to believe that a position of leadership entitles them to such behavior, I would beg to differ and I beleive that I can safely say that regardless of your status as a leader, if you deal with your own brothers and sisters in Christ harshly, critizising, accusing,  causing them pain, then you are a fool and you do not understand the message of the Gospel at all!

I say this very seriously and with great love in my heart for every person that reads this.

If you deal with others in a harsh, critical, judgmental manner,  do you think that you will escape the judgment of God?   Do not deceive yourself, such things bring shame on the church and the people of God.

My life is filled with people who have been hurt by religion and Christians in particular, and it fully angers me that these hurting people were never the ones that sat in their pews doing nothing, they were once passionate, and christlike, and hungry to serve.  But some egotist made it their business to shut down the work of God.  Again I tell you …. do you expect to escape his wrath?

Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. 1 Corinthians 10:12

PEOPLE!   Give grace!  love each other,  be gentle with each other…  LEADERS!  Be kind, be compassionate, be merciful and nurturing!

If you insist on acting like a brood of vipers get out of the Church business!!! Wall Street needs you!!!DSC_9863_127
photo credit: nsaplayer

Tags: anger, Art, beleive, brother, christian, christians, cynicism, egotist, Faith, faith hope, fear, God, jesus, judgment, Love, pain, pews, pharisees, Religion, resentment, righteousness, shame, sin, skepticism, truth, wrath

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