Jimmy?

It’s almost Easter and that means one thing.
For me this is the time to partake in one deed I deem to be holy. I’m sure everyone who is Christian thinks about the resurrection of Christ, the Easter egg, the bunny, the chocolate filled eggs, and the chocolate filled eggs. Whatever we use as a symbolism in remembrance of the resurrection, the one traditional practice that probably takes place in every church is the communion. We use bread and wine/grape juice to symbolize the body and blood of Christ, and we pray and partake in consuming and praising, to remind ourselves why and how we became saved from our wages of sin that need not be paid.

I’ve been living completely distracted, completely reeling in my old habits, detached, stumbling in my personal connection with God for the past two weeks. Now, I can truly appreciate addicts who goes a month without relapse. I am gradually placing myself away from church and trying to put aside, ignore, and disregard the well being of what I hold most precious in my heart.

My heart doesn’t feel broken when I disregard my own spiritual conscience for the sake of self servitude. Like when I go drinking with some of my old buddies. It’s not very often. In fact, they’ve all moved on with their lives and my absence in whenever they kick it has been accepted, with no real grudges I may add. They’re very much confused when I do call one of them out of the blue, and ask what they’re up to. They always receive my cordialness with a dash of skepticism. They know it’ll come. They want to keep themselves ready for when the looming question arises. Just as when a sales person shoots you compliments before asking you to buy their useless crap, my invitation for them to attend church with me seems to always make them mad for some odd reason, as if I’m trying to sell them something they don’t really need. I’m sure they’re thinking, “silly rabbit, tricks(trix) are for kids”. This question is even brought up in the midst of my drunkenness, which tends to catch them off guard even more so, as in “this guy, how can he have the audacity to ask, all the while completely living like someone who doesn’t profess salvation?”. I literally become enraged and demand it, then we almost get into fist fights, and I might as well have asked them to go Eff themselves. Fail.

At the time, when I fall into certain transgressions, the bit of guilty conscience brought on by the holy spirit, is quickly dissolved by the sights and sounds of worldly amusement and the figures that God has so graciously created, amongst other things that of the opposite sex, alluring and seducing. Yet I only look and don’t bring myself to touch or even make an approach. We exchange looks, but as always, this game that has become so vain in my life, has utterly left me depressed. It never fails, it’s always a lose, lose situation. I come home, and this is when I feel heartbroken. I have regrets, I start reliving the mistakes I made in front of those around me who don’t believe in Jesus. I think about how I became a stumbling block in my friends’ potential to seek out God in their lives through my actions…..and it really feels like someone has smacked me in the heart with a sledgehammer. I can hear the voices, “you hypocrite, you fail, you might as well just say eff it and go back to how you lived in the past”. Don’t worry, I’m not delusional or losing my mind. It’s just the devil trying to bring me down and discourage me. I take reckless days off from church and the voices start.

No one sees the struggle, they only see the trouble.

I like to think all born again Christians, still have within themselves, constant temptations and constant spiritual plight that takes place. Quite frankly, I don’t necessarily like our church because of the awesome message, it’s good don’t get me wrong, but most of the brothers and sisters at our church became saved through scriptures and when they hear sermon that is biblical, how can they or myself take it any way other than good? I love our church because we all acknowledge the fact that we don’t deserve the grace of God and come forth to literally protect ourselves from OURSELVES. Pink reference here, but that line “don’t let me get me, I’m my own worst enemy” is very true. Our church is so boring and nonconforming to cultural and or worldly preferences that it trains me to oblige, in situations where I would normally say heck no to. This is why i love our church, it's unlike the mass majority of other korean churches.......and at the same time, it's also why I don't like certain things about our church.

anyways......
I keep telling myself that I shouldn’t partake in the communion this year. I remember a term that is used to describe this sort of psychological mechanism that we use to dictate our own behavior. Self prophesying. If you tell yourself you’re going to hell, then you’re going to hell. If you constantly tell yourself that you’re going to walk by faith, strolling in the narrow path, even through the temptations and failures, you end up following through on your “self prophecy”. The more I tell myself I shouldn’t do communion, the more I feel myself feeling free to dwell in my flesh, in my sin, in not being repentant. There’s always a chance at fellowship, but I’ve been telling myself I won’t go, hoping I can creep back to my former habits with former friends in my former surroundings…..freely, minus the spiritual conviction and the guilt of missing out on what I know is really beneficial to me, to my essence, my intrinsic being. The real me. I want to go lose myself in the world again. Live in a façade. The fake me.

It ain’t easy.

I even missed church this past Sunday. I’m trying to reexamine myself and my dependence on church, by not reading the bible or praying, and not going to church. Is this moronic? Heh, no need to answer that.

I haven’t prayed in a few days, even before a meal. I haven’t read the bible in weeks, even when the updates on my Facebook is full of verses from the Bible. I skip by all my favorite christian music in my ipod...

This is only a peep into the abomination I have become in recent weeks. None more to add to this.



Jimmy?

Paul Washer

if you like this, check out his "shocking youth service".

Pathway to Bliss

Ecclesiastes 1:18 (New King James Version)
“18 For in much wisdom is much grief,
And he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.”


Ignorance is Bliss.

I didn’t go to service last night. Instead, the pouring rain provided with me a valid and completely reasonable excuse to stay home and watch a movie at home, snuggled with a glass of wine I may add. (I didn’t have to add actually) I already made my attempt at expressing the depth of gratitude I have for being allowed to abide and live under the grace of God. This is something that I can never deny, but also, within the same spectrum of acknowledgment, I sense that there is still a tiny bit of sentiment deep within me that wishes to forget the truth and live ignorant once again as before.

Bliss. I think the only time I can truly say I felt or better yet, caught myself in complete and euphoric “bliss” during my life before finding Christ, was when I wasn’t myself, when my mind was altered, when I didn’t care about life, when I didn’t care about anything, didn’t think beyond the moment, it was just certain neurotransmitters in my brain responsible for the “bliss” feeling being activated by either THC or other chemicals contained in certain drugs. I think by now, everyone that knows me, knows I didn’t live a clean life before being born again. I feel no shame in being completely blunt with the transgressions of my former self. It’s when we chose to live a lie, in denial, not facing or embracing reality but rather being lost in what feels good, we find “bliss”….of recognizing a void within and filling it with a temporary escape, in my case, I never found bliss, I just found ways to make myself stupid. Then after continuing in this façade of a life, I found bliss through acceptance of Christ.

So…why do I have constant thoughts of desiring to not be so active in church? Why do I want to take a trip to Afghanistan? Let’s take a look at my current mental state.

Let’s take a look at life outside of church. My parents and brother probably thinks I’m selfish, my friends think I’m a self-righteous hypocrite, and I have no game when it comes to girls. I don’t want to chase….. It’s just me, my TV, my Ipod, my Gym and my home. I have no real social life and I’ve learned to get over this lack through spending all of my leisure time at church. Still, learning to live without a social life, going out to drink and talking about superficial things lacking any real substance are things I still have a flesh that desperately hungers for. Well I guess we all do… Last week I took my cousin to fellowship, then afterwards we went to LA and ate some chicken and had a pitcher of beer…..yea, I know, what a hypocrite. This is the reason my cousin gave me in saying he didn’t want to go to church, because he still wants to enjoy his life, like drinking and smoking. He doesn’t want to go half-ass…..I told him it’s not realistic to think you’re going to become a nun by accepting Christ. That’s not what it’s about. Whatever, we’ll see…..anyways, screw him, back to me….

I want to get away from thinking about others and live not preaching, but just keeping things to myself and enjoying life as it comes. I just want to get away from everything for a few days. Get away and suppress my spiritual needs and not think about church, church people, and WWJD. Really though, the only way I can get away from my spiritual needs is to be hit in the head with a really heavy stick, possibly a baseball bat and or be stricken with a sudden case of Alzheimer’s disease.

My only pathway to bliss is driving to Lakewood, grabbing a can of coconut juice from the Mobil in the corner and sitting alongside brothers and sisters at church worshipping or having fellowship. I have a modicum of desire in the corner edge of my heart, that still harbors the fleshly desires, hmm…its actually not a mere modicum just clinging on the edge of my heart, it’s a huge chunk just micro centimeter to the left of the center of my heart to be honest. It compels me to get away from this path and steer my car backwards, not staring straight ahead, but looking back, driving through oncoming traffic, in reverse. What the heck is wrong with me….i may have a good time losing my senses for a night or two, but it isn’t bliss, it isn’t going to make me forget, there are no methods I know of that will somehow make me become ignorant to the real needs of my soul. The only thing this does is restrict me from receiving blessings and being used by God.

I remember my first retreat when I read the verse above, thinking, “Wow, so this is where the phrase, ignorance is bliss comes from…”, yup, I feel like I want to become ignorant again.

I know from my previous endeavors out into the world, that everyone I come across, everything I see, and every freakin’ conversation I have will undoubtedly lead me back to my faith. I can physically keep myself away from church, but my spirit starts to crave the love of God and sharing this with others. This craving when not fed, becomes a disgusting revelation of who I truly am without God. Trust me, it really is disgusting. Really, really, really disgusting. I’m getting goose bumps just thinking about how much of a pathetic loser I can be, how much my shame has been covered up so graciously by God in the past 5 years.

According to Joseph Campbell in his book, “Pathways to Bliss”, all religion, culture, and other abstract belief system allows each individual to find their “bliss”, something that gives you a peace of mind or a “peace of heart” you can say. According to Campbell, it doesn’t make these religions or “myths” valid scientifically, but it serves the purpose of conceiving a link between your soul and your psychological being. in this sense, “truth” isn’t necessarily what is fact….it’s what you accept and believe. Everybody has their own “truth”.

My truth happens to give me eternal life in the bosom of God with spectacular sights and sounds unimaginable. My ill advised venture in looking for ways to forget this truth is really amazing, amazingly stupid. My bliss and the pathway that leads me there is church and fellowship. There really is no sense in forcing myself to go elsewhere. I’m going to make time for my flesh to enjoy the life God has given me. I may miss fellowships here and there, but ultimately I know the only way for me to truly be happy is church.



Again, I fail. Yet, again I win. It’s a blessing.
God Bless.


Fugg the world. Me against the World. Let’s keep up the good fight.

I’m learning to breath all over again….

Wayz of The World

from Peter Fellowship of KCBC by JIMMY


“Even though it hurts my chest, I’m spark 'til I lose my breath, living in sin since life began, coming out the water to get oxygen, please father help me breath again, at ease again.”

It’s an obvious reference to smoking weed, but also a symbolism for doing the things you don’t want to do in life. You ask God for help, to be at peace, and at the same time you're tokin' on a blunt, even though it hurts….

Wow, it’s incredible, this is how much I waste time thinking about the most stupid things in a day, instead of adding some useful knowledge or doing something productive for a moment, say, read the bible or do multiplication tables in my head, no, instead I sit here and listen to a line from a song and repeat it in my head. I think about why, we consciously pray to God knowing he can help us, and in the same realm of thought and prayer, we sidetrack into our own worldly needs without any consideration for the things that pleases God.

Do you ever pray about wanting to be raised up from some emotional sorrows or a spiritual plight that’s been going on for too long? I do, but damn, as I’m praying, the confluence of spirit and flesh in my heart clashes and more often than not, the flesh remains and triumph, and my prayer has become meaningless and just a waste of time. Head lowered, hands clenched, God needed, yet, my own fall from grace has stopped me from properly praying and maintaining a constant line of contact with God. I have sin that acts as a barrier between my spiritual thirst and the quenching of this thirst God can provide. All my sins have been forgiven and yet, my flesh remains, breeding sin and I become restricted. Although forgiven, it still harbors and expands exponentially in a span of mere minutes, sin makes sin like cockroaches make cockroaches. Visualize it. Take a mental picture. Sick, huh?

Money I guess is mandatory, but putting your spiritual life as secondary shouldn’t be the answer, it’s only going to add to your worries.

Yet, I’ve been thinking about getting a second job recently. (notice how fast I blatantly go away from the things I know should be my priorities?)

I can live in relative contentment, minus a few luxuries of the world, but no, I want to live out and go shop for house ware, go buy a new rug at like Ross or something. There’s a Walmart next to my work I sometimes go to and I sincerely consider buying bunch of crap I don’t need. It’s the ways of the world.. I can’t close my eyes and just think about the blessings of the soul. I’m restless, constantly anxious about life in this world when I have a kingdom of heaven to look forward to. I want to just scream from the top of my lungs, get wasted and go get into a fight with some random guy at a bar.

Getting away from the ways of the world is easy. The thing is, for me, when I get away, I always get caught again. It’s like the world sends out bounty hunters, or bait, in the form of friends, girls, money to recapture what had originally belonged to them. The ways of the world is the ways of your flesh is the ways of your sin is the ways of your life is the ways of your death.

Wayz of the world…..
………….

You, The Idiot, and The Other Guy

I made a similar post a couple of years ago, but thinking back now, I find it interesting how I haven’t progressed much spiritually…..anyways, still, I wonder.....
What if I absolutely refused to attend the retreat 5 years ago? What if I decided to take off with my cousin during the 2nd day, how if I never received salvation after feeling convicted, who will I be today? Would I even be alive today?

Close your eyes, picture yourself at a party. You're having fun and a fight breaks out, this bald, stocky, drunk and enraged jerk ruins the party for everyone by the ever so typical, “what are you looking at?” phrase, which inevitably lead to the initial confrontational vibe. He then continued to talk crap, even after the other guy initially passed on the confrontation. The idiot starts thinking he’s tough, which is noticed by another guy who had been scoping him out throughout the night because he happened to be a fellow “tough guy”, surrounded by 5 of his friends. The other guy rises up from the crowd of his friends and chucks a beer bottle at him, the idiot retaliates by grabbing a metal bar stool and swings it wildly, aiming recklessly and before you realize it, the metal stool he swings hits your face, you black out for a second, you open your eyes and notice your nose is bleeding profusely, you black out again, and an ambulance comes and takes you to a local hospital. You get looked at by the ER physician to find out you have a broken nose and will be needing an eye patch for the next 3 weeks from your "orbital muscles"(http://www.99main.com/~charlief/Blindness.htm) being "damaged". Damn party pooper.

On the bright side, you happened to be a Christian, and your church family is there to support you, even visiting you at home and offering prayers. As you sit in your room after all the church people leave, you start thinking about why this happened and try to recollect messages from the past to help raise up your spirits.

You sit there and think about the sermon from the past week, you think about the great fellowship you had. And it all becomes blurry, you slowly become enraged, you're overtaken by the thought of hatred. You remember the guy at the party that caused all this. You hate this guy with all your passion. Your heart actually feels physical pain because you hate this guy.

Now, picture that guy as me. I just very well may be that guy today. There's a lot of guys like that out there, guys who've yet to be awaken to the truth. Guys who outwardly display their resentment and discontentment in the world they live in because of their inward insecurities.  Before, I get caught up with blabbbing on and on, i'll just stop this here.  The point i'm trying to make is this, don't be too quick to judge those that curse you or make you feel bad. Have love for him/her, have sympathy, but most of all, pray for him/her with all your heart. This should be an impulse that comes without saying if you have accepted Christ in your heart. That guy can be used preciously by God.

Passage from last night's fellowship:
 
¹⁹ My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, ²⁰ because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. ²¹  (NIV)
 
 
....Hurry up, slow down, and chill.
God will do, wut he gots to do.
 
God Bless.
 
Jimmy
 

Galatian Thoughts

“ 19 Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery,[c] fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, 21 envy, murders,[d] drunkenness, revelries, and the like "(Galatians 5)

Take a pick, they all have been applicable to me .  Anyways....

I sometimes with all good intents and purposes, try to lend a hand, an ear, my heart to those who may not be proactive at our church. Then I hear their gripes about why it’s hard to maintain their spiritual lives, why our church is difficult to approach about certain issues, and I catch myself straying with them. I start becoming emotionally affected and become angry and resentful towards the church along with them.

“1 Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer[a] is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself.” (Galatians 6, NLT version)

Notice it says, “you who are godly”, and I for one, have never ever been perceived to be Godly….I should more than anything just humbly pray instead of trying to help someone out of my own will. Allow God to guide me in bearing fruit.

For the sake of bearing one another’s burdens, don’t let their weakness in turn become your weakness.

 ¹ Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free,^[a] and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. (Galatians 5)

"It ain’t Ezaay.. bein' me, will I see the Penitentiaryyyyyy or will I stay free"  =/


One Love.

Jimmy

Dig me out from under what is covering
...a better part of me.

Hate it or Love it

Life and me, it’s a love hate relationship. Sometimes you feel like you’re on top of the world, sometimes you don’t.

John 12 “25 He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.”

Waaay back in 2006, I got saved…..I hated the world(all vanity), I always felt like it was all BS. (by product of being ignorant and uneducated) Then it was revealed to me that I had a choice of being miserable in my flesh or be grateful and blessed from deep inside my heart, in a much different world. When I was gradually falling deeper and deeper into living life without any real hopes or goals, I knew I wanted to find something or someone to save me. Heck, I always thought it was going to be a girl that changed my life….but no it was a man....….errr…son of man….err….Jesus.

When you’re in high school, you have dreams of becoming something great in the world. My cousin always wanted to become a publisher of a magazine, kind of like that 70 year old guy who loves rabbits……actually exactly like that guy.

If you ask me, I always wanted to die. Not trying to be melodramatic, but ever since like my sophomore year in high school, I literally always dreamed of dying. Not pitifully, like from a disease of some sort or in a freak accident. I always pictured myself going out gloriously like in a shootout with cops or dying in a war earning the “Medal of Honor” or diving in front of a bullet for a physically handicapped child genius who loves manatees who happened to be in the crossfire of an armed robbery at a liquor store, or at the least getting hit by a wealthy drunk driver where my family can receive some financial compensation after the grieving. Point being, I hated living. The temporary joy I got out of partying and or other alternate methods to escape reality was becoming a burden on me, not to mention the health detriments. Reality sucked. Life sucked. It was literally Fudt the world, Me against the World.

“Why I’m I dying to live, if I’m just living to die?” You have to hate your life in this world and be ready to bear the cross for the glory of God, who saved you from living a meaningless life in the world.

I no longer hate life, but the dream of dying for a purpose remains. I realized how silly it is to die in a midst of violent mayhem for self glory and a lasting legacy of “manliness”. Really, really silly, I mean whatever sense of pride felt and whatever lasting legacy left in the world would be completely offset and surpassed in worth by the eternal burning in hell I would have been subjected to after this supposed glorious death. Or God could’ve just given me testicular cancer like that guy from Fight Club, who due to some male hormonal deficiency or something, grew breasts, but no. God gave me life…with purpose. I love life. I have a purpose to die for….rather live for.

Hate it or love it, we only have one life to live in this world. Where are you headed and was it worth it? I know even in my own spiritual failures, I have been given a promise that can never be taken away, and for that reason I love life.

God bless.

Jimmy

Cry Now Smile Later

Here’s a cautionary tale about the debauchery that can be the life we live

Edited

I spent the past weekend seeing a close friend of mine and talking to him about certain things that has been an anvil chained to his ankle in keeping him stuck, drowning in his own misery. Well, I think more than misery, it’s his own self conceived notion of having dug for himself a hole so deep it’s not possible to climb back out without a rope in the form of winning the damn lottery. The false hope, and living for this fallacy is entirely why his life is in its current state of descension to begin with.....Pretty meaningless if you ask me now, the thought of living strictly for material wishes, but on second thought, considering where my mindset used to be, I feel where his hopeless sentiments come from. However, blaming your upbringing or the finances of the parents for your current state of being unproductive is a practice that's coincedentally, unproductive in itself. 

When you dig yourself into a hole, I think it’s just human nature to stare at the shovel and blame the tools that became available for you to dig, not opting to stare, at your own two wicked hands and even more, looking at yourself in the mirror, pointing the index finger on the sinful nature of your own heart in appeasing your own selfishness and for lacking the discipline to live beyond the present. You dig, not thinking about the deeper you dig the harder it will be for you to jump or climb out, but because you want to dig, you just dig not giving a damn. You can’t blame the gun, if you’re the one that pulled the trigger.

This is why God’s concept of free will becomes so hotly debated I think.....
Why does he give us the choice to begin with? Why did he place the apple there if he didn’t want us eating it? Anyways, before I start to digress anymore, my personal 2 cents on this is if you want someone to love you truly, you need to give that person a choice, otherwise that love becomes subjective.

Towards the end of the night, he was willing to concede the fact that he has a tendency to in fact, constantly shoot himself in the foot. He’s sorry, yet, he never seems to be able to escape from this habit of self destruction. (we all do, but there’s a difference)

It’s not easy to wait out your struggles of wanting to do whatever the hell you want, eating whatever the hell you want, smoking whatever the hell you want, and screwing whoever the hell you want. It’s a smile now, cry later mindset that I use to be a victim of as well. “F it”, used to be the theme behind my impulses.

I used to screw myself over with my “F it” attitude constantly, I still do.

Case in point, last Saturday night, after playing basketball so hard that my legs would tremble walking up my stairs, I went to choir practice. I was going to go home early, take my magic pills and wake up refreshed to do “ma thang” at church the following day. I get a phone call from one of “da homies” that you just have to come through for and I just say F it. I knew in the back of my mind, I don’t want to either drive 20 miles to go pick his ass up nor go place myself in an environment where I’m almost guaranteed to lose my self control via under the influence of the juice in the green bottle, but here I am sitting, back in Ktown watching over my shoulders, feeling shamed in being at a place where I can lose my cool in a split second or run into one of the young people I used to give fellowship to or even an old enemy from my past. But as the saying in Proverbs go, a dog will return to his own vomit….(by the way, I saw someone affiliated with my church at this place, I don’t think he recognized me, but damn….)

Proverbs 26:11 (New King James Version)
11 As a dog returns to his own vomit,
So a fool repeats his folly.

As I sat there and listened to his own misconceived philosophy on life, it was quite annoying to see those around me still living believing in life as dictated by one world, and not seeing the possibilities of what I testify to him, of a different world, a world where you hope in things not seen but felt. He actually called me a freak for continuously using the term, “worldly sense”, and that if I believe this notion of black and white without a gray area in between, then I am literally, in fact, a freak.

There’s nothing outrageous about what I told him, maybe a bit philosophical but really, it’s simply what’s stated in the bible. There’s a black and there is a white. It’s not about whether you fall indulgent to your natural inclinations to be self centered in all your ways and thoughts. It’s about where your heart is as I seem to always point out in all of my posts. The deeds you will yourself to do or not do isn’t what places you in the white or the black, if it was, there still wouldn’t be a gray, we would all be in the black. (okay, maybe Mother Teresa, Ghandi and that guy who burnt himself alive in Vietnam….)

My friend still thinks he’s not all that bad, that he has a good heart, that because he wouldn’t hit a girl he should be generally considered a decent human being. But this is what I mean when I say debauchery, it’s not true, the very standard he’s measuring himself against is in itself not decent. As a Christian, we have the words of God that we can measure ourselves against and it becomes quite obvious where we stand. Only by the blood of Christ we are called righteous, but aside of having accepted this in our hearts, we fail, we're in fact, NOT good, i don't have to beat up a girl to realize I'm a selfish, prideful, lustful, violent person by nature. Don’t front. We all lie, we all think and do for the most part, as we please and to say that you don’t is a debauchery within the context of being a christian, which is what he proclaims himself to be.
I just want to remind myself that I have a choice. I can smile now and cry later in torment and in eternity, or I can cry now and smile later in heavenly bliss…..forever.

I hope I don't sound like a condescending prick on my posts.....I love my friend, we know everything about each other pretty much, but i hope he finds God in his life.
God Bless.
 
Brother Jimmy
 
again, hope...is not in me....it's in YOU.  In You. it's in you.
 

Agape Love

John 13:34-35 (New King James Version)


34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

verse of the day from Biblegateway.com

Agape Love  


Brother Jimmy

Body of My Soul

It’s a very surreal feeling, laying in your own pool of blood unable to move. I won’t call it an out of body experience, but not being able to feel one whole half of your body makes you realize, you are not who you are in the flesh.

7 But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.


It’s talking about the Holy Spirit, this “treasure” inside our earthen vessels. I didn’t always have this treasure inside, I only had me, early 20s low life, stupid and mad at the world. I was an idiot who had hatred, resentment, and zero resolve to better myself.

….Absent minded of the bigger picture and always staring at the world through the narrow perceptions of others, of what I saw on TV, the streets, or what I saw through my own failures and self denials derived from insecurities. I was a mess on the inside, which becomes quite palpable to those around you because your lifestyle tends to manifests itself in your appearance. Our earthen vessel, if you will.

My earthen vessel. Since age 12, my body from the inside out had been filled with cigarettes, liquor and pot, among other things, and now here I was laying, blood spewing from a place where I didn’t feel….anything. Literally, the only thing I felt as I lay on the concrete was my shoulders and head, I couldn’t feel my lower body at all. Once I figured out what had happened, I remember thinking as the paramedics started to cut my clothes off with a scissor, “WTH, why do they have to cut my pants and shirt? damn I just bought these last week”. I’m lying on the ground, unable to move, not knowing whether I still had my package and my legs due to the loss of senses in my lower body as a result of having my nerves severed with a knife, and the first concern I have is losing my clothes. The thing is, when you live your life not thinking about the future and just living in the present, you don’t think about things like finishing school, having a family, and or how are you going to go back to work or whether or not you’re still going to be able to reproduce…..you think about….your clothes, how people perceive you at the given moment, all superficial crap. I mean, I could’ve been lying on my death bed at that moment as the crowd was gathered around me, and I’m thinking to myself, I can’t look scared or worried.

Allowing myself to be renewed from the inside, by accepting the gift of God, and attaining this hope has been an inexpressible joy, but joy seems to always be accompanied by chronic pains of struggling with the flesh.

8 We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed—

My mind is in a constant flux of lust, envy, and pride. Yet, I realize it’s when I am pushed on by temptations and talked crapped on by those who hate on me for one reason or another, this is when I realize, it doesn’t matter…..
It doesn’t matter because I choose to take the good with the bad, the blessing with the chastisement, it’s the world I live in. It’s about God being glorified and exalted.

I remember thinking when I regained consciousness after being transported to the hospital from being stabbed in the back in 3 different places, having my spinal cord missed by less than an inch. I thought I was going to go take vengeance, I didn’t give a damn what hood they were with, who the friends were….the only thing on my mind was I made new enemies. I started asking around, heard some things, and I was filled with even more resentment in my heart. In retrospect, I was a complete idiot and I got exactly what I deserved. People by nature are really wicked when you really consider the behavior. We never see ourselves, we only see others. I was 22. I went to a party in Riverside. I got drunk. One of my friends got into a fight. I got into a fight. It became this huge brawl and before I knew what happened, I was laying in my own pool of blood.

Back to the future…..fast forward 6 years, and I’m 28. As I take another glimpse into my past, remembering who I was on the inside or rather what I carried in my heart before accepting Christ, I can’t help but chuckle with gratitude. I point back to this incident in particular because I had built up such a high degree of hatred and anger inside me through this incident for various reasons, one reason being my subsequent discharge from the service, but I think I had to have gone through this to truly be broken before the scriptures when I went to my first retreat with our church.

I still have not regained all the sensitivity in my lower body. Apparently, severed nerves are still a bit of a conundrum in the medical field. I still have spasms from time to time in my left leg, sometimes it’s agonizing, but unlike the person I was 6 years ago, I don’t allow the body of my soul, to despair or curse as this passage shows…..it’s merely an earthen vessel. So once again, F the World and F the body. It’s about the Treasure we have inside.

God Bless.

PS

On a side and gloomy note:

I’ve been at the receiving end of some blatant slander and lies. It’s one thing to make up stories to cover up your own shame, but what’s up with the added personal attacks. If the people actually eat up the bogus crap spewing from the mouth, the only thing you’re doing is stumbling them with your lies. Let’s not place blame on others for your own spiritual failures.

I like hotdogs, but I’m starting to really hate BRATS!  how the mind can be twisted....instinct of self preservation? I don't know, just stop trying to make me look bad, it's not working as you may hope.


Brother Jimmy

...I know what i've been, but here in your arms I know what i am.......
when i don't measure up to much in this life, i know i'm a treasure in the arms of Christ.