People think I'm crazy.

Nutty. One donut short of a dozen. One bullet short of a full clip. One patty short of a Big Mac. One geese short of a flock. One (blank) ad nauseam

Since I've decided to go to Japan for a year, most of my friends and family have not seemed too keen on the idea. In truth, I wonder if partly I'm to blame for most people's adverse reactions. Despite the Communications/Journalism diploma from the UW that now gathers dust in my room, I think I've failed to really convey my reasons for leaving for a year. I think part of it is the fact that these reasons I have relate very closely to spiritual and personal issues, things that are difficult to articulate into words. After all, when I talk about my own (painful) spiritual journey of self, it's difficult for me to be clear and concise. It's not arrogance, but most people lack a point of reference to understand me - I think only people who share the same experiences can honestly sympathize.

People are right when they say that I have good reasons not to go. After all, the dependable, routine-loving Garrett has a great girlfriend, has a crew of close friends in Seattle, goes to a church he loves, lives rent-free at home, and now is steadily employed. What is he thinking? Those are plenty of good and rational reasons... good reasons at least from a human point of view.

Throughout this whole process of deciding of whether or not to go to Japan, I've tried my best to not give much consideration to a world's view of my situation. Sure, it's only a year, but a year like this past one has been sufficiently hard enough to reinforce a principle that is central to the Christian faith (and hence central to my own): the way God works in the lives of those who follow Him will often defy human sensibilities, logic, or rationality. And don't expect otherwise.

It's not to say that God always works in an unconventional way. However, I think I'm one of those people that has often been caught up in the perspective that God ONLY works in a conventional way. And there's no quicker route to being wrong than placing limits on God.

You read the Bible and you see that God loves to surprise people. He's never a one-trick horse kind of deity when He's out to change somebody's life or help them to grow.

Jacob was on his way to recouncil with his brother Esau when God challenged him to a night-time wrestling match - Jacob wrestled him to a standstill, was blessed, and recieved the name "Israel" as a consequence.

Moses was pushing up like 40 years old, watching his father-in-law's flock when he saw a burning bush and God called out to him. Moses has a long conversation with God, even argues and makes excuses to God, but in the end... God gives him a mission and a purpose. Moses is to bring the Jewish people out of Egyptian slavery and lead them to their own homeland.

Even God Himself, as Jesus, began his mission as a prophet, a preacher, and a miracle worker through unusual means. He didn't go to seminary, he didn't attend college or medical school... instead, Jesus goes out into the DESERT for forty days and fasts! Seems odd to us.

Now I'm not saying I'm a Jacob or a Moses... and I'm definitely not a Jesus, not by any comparison. I merely mention them because their lives are a testament to the unusual way that God often changes and shapes peoples' lives toward something greater and more purposeful. Above anything else, I desire that... having reach this latest plateau, this melancholy malaise that intensifies in and out, has made me want to live, not just exist. And a real, meaningful life can only come from Creator of life himself. Humanity is hardwired to that fact.

Having experienced the life I have had, even up to this point - there's been many times I've felt alone, abandoned, betrayed, and constantly tested... I've chosen to try and edge out a hope that things would turn out for the better, even when they haven't always have.

When friends have had the blessing of a Paul-like mentor, or a vibrant church, or being called to seminary, or missions work, or full-time ministry, I used to envy them. It's only in the past couple of years that I've realized the envy was not so much that I wanted to be in their circumstances so much as I wanted that same spiritual richness I saw in their lives to be in mine. Afterall, if God can bless their lives so greatly, why can't He bless mine?

There have been days this past year where I couldn't bear to even get out of bed, because I felt so depressed, so utterly helpless to effect anything positive in my life. Even today I doubt myself... this blog bears testament to every bad day and the ugliness it brings out of me. I look in the mirror sometimes and I don't percieve a 24 year old man, I see a 10 year old boy... the reflection in his eyes, the look of his eyes gazing into a sky whose sun has been crushed and whose light has been put out. It's as if all the misfortune, all my dark feelings continue to flow from that wound I recieved that day 14 long years ago and no matter how much I try to walk away from it, I still am covered in its shadow. The echo of that one disappointment and gaping hole it left is always ringing in my ears.

Every day, there's a fork in the road - one is a broad path of indulgence, willful ignorance, and utter surrender to selfish pursuit of this empty world; the other is a narrow trail of self-denial, love of truth, and a faith in the eternal. I want to choose the latter, but staying here in Seattle at this time will continue to tempt me to fall into the former.

I'm the sort of person who after traveling, appreciates more of what I have been given. When I returned from Brasil three years ago, after spending a month in the Brasilian countryside, serving and teaching English in a tiny 100-member church, I came to love my own church here in Seattle more than I thought possible. Perhaps this time when I get back, God will teach me to love myself and those around me more than I thought possible.

People who follow Christ often change radically, but more often than not it is a process of time spent - time spent growing in understanding of God, time spent in prayer, time spent reading Scripture, time spent in the company of strong believers.

Metaphorically speaking: The lives of people are often like hard pieces of rock, scarred and beaten, our weaknesses and failings the rough and jagged edges that make us prone to hurting whoever we touch. But choosing to follow God is like being tossed into the river, a constantly moving current. As we live life, as we remain in sincere pursuit of God, as we lay in that river - those jagged edges are smoothed out, until we are shaped and molded into something no longer as rough. But only over time and only if we have courage enough to stay the course, to remain in that river - as fast, and incomprehensible it maybe to us, the current of God's design is shaping us, changing us until who we are is no longer who we once were.

I want to grow. I want to change for the better.

So after all this long rambling... for all the people who are still going to ask me why I'm going away for a year... don't mind me, don't worry.

I'm just jumping into the river to lose some rough edges, that's all.
posted by G at 2:43 AM   |

in?scrip?tion (n-skrip-shun)n.
1. The act or an instance of inscribing.
2. Something, such as the wording on a coin, medal, monument, or seal, that is inscribed.
3. A short, signed message in a book or on a photograph given as a gift.
4. The usually informal dedication of an artistic work.
5. Jeremiah 31:33