Humble Hero (Poem)

Being hopeful and full of emotions does not make a man a hero.

You have not won simply because the fog has lifted.

You are not made new when you’ve rounded the bend from a struggle you stumbled your way through.

When we feel on top of the world and our life has taken a turn; when pain is replaced with laughter; when toil is turned to rest, we can not boast as if we’ve done a thing.

Character is is not proven by a hard season ending, but by endurance in the pain. Relief is not a personal gain, but grace from the creator of the day.

Rejoice when the storm subsides, but thank the one who brought you through to the other side. Do not boast or claim that it was by your own strength or even in how you’ve changed. Without God’s strength, we each can fall back into any phase, any vice, any maze, and it’s only because of Him that we can be saved!

In humility is where we find victory. Character is where we can continue to live healthy. All else is vanity, and every other boast except in Jesus Christ, the king of kings is false security.

May I not even be honored for the art or talents I bring. May I not identify with worthless things. May my God be where I seek out peace. May my heart be totally given and my spirit ever free.

Longing for Home (Poem)

when you find someone who feels like home, you want to hold them close. you want the moments to last a little longer when you’re with them. You hope the moments will lead to more moment like the last, that the hope you found in them will not stay in the past.

If a person like that couldn’t change your path, I don’t know what could. It’s not what they say, or how, per say they act, but it is who they are. Your emotions feel so distant, yet so close at hand. You know you’re not dreaming, but at the same time, it feels like it can’t be reality.

As time goes on, you pray that what you felt won’t fade; that the other’s heart felt what you felt. That you might have felt as much like home as their company felt to you.

If there is any hope in a memory of a moment in time, if it be to find yourself at home with them or another, it is that home can be found and does not need to be forgotten. Sometimes, it is to be fought for and other times let free.

That longing for home will not end here, for it’s etched deep inside of me.

Good Intentions (Poem)

To write is something I know I can’t stop doing. When I take a break, it’s like the communication from my heart and my head gets rerouted. I don’t fully understand the neurological connection that bridges them, but the only connection I see is my pen.

I’ve been full of good intentions, full of quotations. I’ve been full of good ideas and dreams and expectations. I’d been full when in community and full when on my own.

Most recently, I’ve been alive with other people and empty on my own, but that empty feeling is starting to flow into my conversations. That emptiness has begun to seep into my friendships. The way I sometimes have nothing to say. And that’s not a bad thing, on it’s own, but I find my passion beginning to wane, my hope start to decay. Being honest is my way, but it hasn’t lead me through the pain.

To be honest is the first step and the start of good intentions, but it stays that way when that’s the only step I take; I’m walking in place. I’m facing my fears, then turning away, turning to shame, turning to pain, to my old ways.

Step two is find someone to help you through and I’ve found someone. good intentions brought me there, but business took me away. I take time for music, time for media, time to dress myself, time to work, and time to educate, but at the end of the day, end of the cycle, I still feel like I’m hardly alive. I’m pushing through, I’m telling the truth, and I know what to do. My pride will have me ignoring help, thinking I can’t look weak, especially to those I’m trying to let know that God brings life, but if I’m hiding my life, being honest, with a catchphrase on the side, making a change for a moment in time to take back the changes the moment I slide. If I’m living like that, I’m living a lie, and if no one else bought it, I bought it myself. I purchased fake comfort; see where it got me?

The part that gets me shaken up is I know I’ve lived in seasons of freedom. I know I’ve given up things I thought I needed. I know that Jesus is no less powerful when I don’t believe him, and is no less loving when I don’t receive it.

He doesn’t just want me to follow the steps, or fall in line. He hasn’t been forcing his agenda on mine so I give into his list of conditions.

His heart is for my heart to give up my pain, give up my worry, and give up my shame. His heart is for me to take up my cross, follow his lead and count the cost. His heart is for me to see that my habits, see that my hardships, anxiety and fear are much heavier then the cross we can choose to wear. The cross is no longer a mark of shame or surrounded by pain. It no longer caries the same kind of weight because of the cross that Jesus took on for me. He gave up his life to rebrand shame to forgiveness, and pain into healing, reducing it’s burden from heavy to light.

So why do I stay in this space, walking in place, one step forward and one step back, one step in faith and the next, relapse? The burden is light but it’s unfamiliar. It’s light, but it’s huge. What’s holding me back is my trust issue, because if my fears come true and it really does all fall on me, then I’m screwed. On the other hand, If he’s carrying all that weight, then I’m good. Any problem I might face I can face with him. He’s got my back and every other side an attack could come from.

when it comes to the spaces I’ve felt comfortable in, even if it’s filled with depression, I have to change my footsteps. I can’t step in the same places I have since been. I can see them from a mile away; I’ve worn a rut in and I know each mistake like I know my own skin. I know what will happen as soon as I give in. If it be lust, insecurity or depression or anything in-between, they’re all internally connected at my brain stem and never fail to pull me back if I let them take root in any place I am.

I must take the steps, and change my path; start to trust and not turn back. I’ve been honest and I’ll do it again, but only time will tell if this was all another good intention.

I’ve

Said

Before,

But

Pray

That

This

Time

Starts

The

Change.

To Someone *but not just anyone (Poem)

Oh future one, who you may be, I’m giving all I have to be the one that you would fall for. I share the things I’d rather let alone, the moments that I treasure, I post in plain view, hoping that who you may be would see southing in me; something you haven’t seen.

I find myself shooting shots to every screen, hoping that it would be a place my love hasn’t been, place that one would find my heart and treat it better then just another one. I don’t want this futile desperation, falsifying my character, overemphasizing my desires and heightening my anxiety with fear of rejection.

This is not who I am and not at all who I plan to be. My funk I’ve planted myself in will not be the place I stretch my roots in. I want to be at a place that God is all I need, with friends by my side. The family of God being unified, but in Christ, being satisfied. There’s still something about a life partner though. Something I long for, but something worth the lull, something worth fighting for.

I don’t want to settle for someone I don’t feel free with. Being tied down and walking on egg shells are thing I want to avoid like prison and bomb shells. I want to be able to be free without selling myself and advertising that I’m worth someones time. I want to be seen for me.

I want to be believed in. I want to be valued from one who’s willing to take me on; and it’s selfish in part, but I want to invest in someone and champion them for everything they are and everything they’ve done. I want to love. I want to hold hands and dance. I want to talk about the things we don’t understand. I want to stay up way too late, feeling drained, doing something mundane, but knowing who I’m doing it for is worth every second of the pain. I want to grow and be known, but more so, learn about someone from head to toe and toe to head and back again, because in each season we change and I don’t want to be ok with knowing who that someone was yesterday.

I don’t think my desires are too much of a fairy tail or a romantics dream, but if it is, I hope that someone is my dream come true.

It Will Pass (when we’re not okay)

Sometimes Jesus revives us in a moment, but sometimes, he gives us eyes to see how he’s been sustaining us through our season of struggle.

Being in a place of hopelessness, or grief, or pain is often accompanied, in one way or another, with questions or feelings helpless. I’m not saying it’s a necessary thing, or that it is a “this, then that” statement. I am saying, due to the human condition, we often revert to negative introspection, especially when dealing with more serious things, like depression or anxiety.

The past few months have been amazing in specific ways, but really challenging internally in different ways, dealing with some mild separation anxiety with my twin getting married soon, some loneliness, but mostly just feeling some connection to the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz, and even more specifically the way the Avett Brothers described him in their song “Tin Man”. One line specifically goes, “I miss that feeling of feeling.”

This past weekend I took a spontaneous road trip with my cousin. I knew I needed it. I knew I needed something to jumpstart my feeling and remind me of the joy I had known to be, not just on the outside of me, but deep within me. It’s a joy that leads to tremendous peace, and I hadn’t felt it in a long time.

Throughout the trip, through music, podcasts, conversations and practical love from strangers, something changed within me. My circumstances didn’t change in my life, but after attending Jess Ray’s album release concert for her new album, “Parallels and Meridians” God began to soften my heart to a place I could begin to feel again; something other than tired or anxious. I started to feel the love, and even the community of the church being a singular body. We had no plans on places to stay besides my car, and with that being announced from the stage so graciously by Jess, we were offered 6 or so different places to stay by total strangers. We ended up staying with the first people who offered, went to their place and crashed on their couch bed. When I woke up in the morning, I felt a pease and comfort, something I hadn’t felt in a while, as well as a sense of belonging.

fast forward a day or so, and this evening, at “theOak” (the youth group I volunteer at) I had a realization; Sometimes Jesus revives us in a moment, but sometimes, he gives us eyes to see how he’s been sustaining us through our season of struggle. As I worshipped and sang to Jesus, memories came to my heart from times I wasn’t feeling it, but God was still using and calling me toward himself.

If you’re going through a season, if you feel empty or anything other than joyful and free, remember: It will not last forever. as my pastor said this morning in typical Pastor Ted rhyme scheme, “Your pain has not come to last, it has come to pass.” It will not be everlasting. Push into Jesus. Be honest with yourself and be honest with Him; he can handle it. In a moment or in time, you will see the other side.

A Princess Far Away: A Hopeful Valentines Day (Poem)

My heart lies in the hands of a princess far from home. It was not by her choice, nor does she know, so when she breaks my heart, it is not her fault. I forced her unknowing hands, slipped my heart into her pocket.

When she breaks my heart it’s not her fault, but it doesn’t stop the breaking. She’s gentle on my heart, because she’s gracious to all, but she knows not my heart is stuffed behind her lovers, beating out of sync, but both beating for hers. She did not know that I had placed mine there years before their love would start, but it’s not her fault. She had no idea that as she was taking hold of his, and giving hers away, she pushed my heart deeper into her pocket, under all the broken parts of her, and all the dreams and forgotten thoughts.

I try to send my love in gifts. If I can’t have her, may she have her dreams, and I can only dream that she will find my heart. That he will find someone or she will find some flaw. What a selfish wish for two so struck by love, two loving hearts, with their own scars.

May they float away in peace. May separation cause them space that their hearts might dream of a different way. May their dreams be swept by different waves and may my heart return to it’s broken cage, if it be by storm or by her embrace. Would it float back home, or from the princess’ arms with a piece of hers to cherish and hold. But if they wed, if their union bonds, would my heart be freed when she takes his name. Would I find the one of whom my heart aches. I do not know what tomorrow may bring, but if it’s not my heart, would it be peace within. I know my God holds the universe and beyond. He has my heart in mind. I might not know the reason why or the person I will find, but I do know she will be worth the wait, I just hope it’s the princess from far away.

Inspiration Re-Evaluated: A Writing When Nothing feels Right

“From those times does inspiration turn from stress and anxiety, to hope and strategy.”

I have not written in a while, but it’s not strictly because of being too busy or not knowing what to write about, or taking an intentional break or any other excuse. My issue has been that my mind is a minefield of emotions, and nothing feels right.

Some may trace it to mild depression, pent up pride, writer’s block, shame etc. I think in the back of my psyche, a little bit of each of those might exist, but I trace it mainly to the answer of this one question:

What is inspiring me?

Say this for yourself, and take a moment before you continue reading.

Isn’t that a crazy thing to think about? maybe you’re not as wowed by this as me, but there are so many places I find my inspiration. Personally, I love interviews, podcasts, music, sermons, videos, and listening to others opinions and passions. These places can be so beneficial, but also, can be so toxic. I find myself so “inspired” I don’t give myself time to think. Even more scary, I sometimes don’t give myself time to pray and talk to the original inspiration and creator of life itself.

One way the “mind clutter” (if you will) has affected me is that I find myself in one moment, yet thinking of the next thing or the thing from last week. I see that I am present physically, responding to people, but not fully engaging in what they’re bringing to the table at that moment.

Another contribution that is made by the clutter is apathy toward situations or people. The apathy seems to come from an overstimulation of information mixed with busyness that causes people to become statistics, and hopelessness to brew when we see all the problems and how much time it takes to reach a solution. I’ve found this to lead to anxiety that can cause a shut down, and sudden urge to watch Impractical Jokers and eat ice cream (but maybe that’s just me). But practically, it makes confrontation a chore.

The last negative I’m going to share to air out just a little more of my dirty laundry to the world, is this overstimulation of information, especial from social media, as well as retreating to a vice, can cause some real loneliness. This might sound counterintuitive, but too much absorption most times, leaves us empty. I’ve felt this in many respects. I personally am blessed with some really good friends that won’t let me have a day without a phone call from one of them. What’s more important than having the coolest friends in the world, (something i definitely don’t have, because they’re all super weird, and way more awesome and loyal then they are hip) or being with the love of your life, (something I’m so ready for, yet definitely not rushing) or having everyone like you (something I’ve given up trying to achieve, yet something I wish was achievable without compromising one’s convictions) or having something to do or think about without fear of boredom, is sitting down with Jesus, (don’t tune out please) and talking with the one who created you the way you are for a purpose bigger than yourself. He isn’t judging you right now for who you are or what you’ve done. Right now, he’s longing for your attention in a world full of distractions. Some of us even get distracted by pastors talking about God or by talking all about the deepest parts of what we know about God during the times we need to just spend with him.

From those times does inspiration turn from stress and anxiety, to hope and strategy. God created you for relationship, and he created you for impact. When we “waist” a certain amount of time with the one that loves us fully, we are able to hear his heart for the hurting and outcasts and the people we wish didn’t have to live in misery and injustice. From there, he sends us into the world with assignments of LOVE into the world that may not love us back, but won’t be able to stop the impact.

And if you don’t know Jesus, IT’S COOL! Because he fully knows you and fully loves you no matter what your knowledge is of him. Get to know him, let him know you want to give up all the junk that hasn’t satisfied you yet and even the stull that felt satisfying in a moment, but did not sustain you, for him. Tell him you want to connect to his heart and his family. Ask him to show you his heart and to fill you with his spirit. In him is fullness of joy and freedom.

My life after giving my life to Jesus has been a battle, but when I tap into his strength, I can overcome and when I lean into him, in the easy and the hard times, he gives me peace and fills me with his love.

Won’t you are I put down our devices, and pick up our chins and look to Jesus, fall in love with the Bible, his physical word, and thank him for his faithfulness?

“What is inspiring me?”

Goodbye (Poem)

This poem is a tribute to anyone who has lost someone they loved. This year has been full of young lives lost, as well as full lives completed. Where grief resides, may there also be peace.

Goodbye. This isn’t for you, because you’re gone. It’s for me, because I’m left here with not you, but a shell of memories, beautiful and unique. There is no thing that could make this goodbye easier, there is no thing that could bring back normality. Normal will not return, but change. Once routine comes back into play and I start to come to grips with the fact that your voice will not be there to tell me good morning or that that shirt really doesn’t compliment me; That might be the time that normal is rewritten, but not the same, come sun or come rain, life has changed.

Goodbye to the things you did in secret or at least the things you thought no one had seen. To the infection of laughter in the way only you could bring. Our laughter will not cease, but it will never be the same. The jokes you told will be infused with longing, and remembering. It will no longer be just a joke or a quote, but a cherished moment in time, internally narrated in your voice.

Oh your voice, I want to remember it. Please, God. I don’t want to say goodbye to your voice. I know I will always recognize it, if technology replays it, but I don’t want to forget the way you said my name. The way it sounded when you were sick, or laughing, or when you sang; and not just on stage, but how you sang in the shower.

Goodbye is such an intimate word, and I utter it at a time, by you, it will not be heard, and if goodbye is forever, I may not bare the pain of it, but if goodbye is truly temporal, (and between us, I fully believe it is) then I can only wait until we meet again, and the hello will be sweeter than my hello has ever been.

When You Can’t Hold On (Poem)

My grip, tighter then a vice, yet it cannot hold back the drip after drip, the blood running through my fingers, down my arm and beading from my elbow. What a terrible way to go, just hoping; praying that I might stop the flow. The thoughts racing through my mind, cursing myself, knowing the consequence could have been avoided and the afflictions are rightfully mine, yet still wishing the past three minuets could have a rewind and retry; although I know myself all too well, that even if I had twelve tries, I would squander each one, just like I have this time. I’m not a just a victim, but a slave to my own vices, and this wound inside of my chest will not heal; Not because it cannot, but because addressing the scars is only an attempt to mend only the product of my mixed up and broken heart.

from one infected hand to another, this vice grip I’m holding will only stop the bleeding, while the infection seeps into every other part, and spreading even to the brain, and once it gets there, it festers. It builds up pressure like a balloon, not relenting until theres release and devastation.

By that time, the damage has been done, and I find myself again, dressing wounds with infection, reconnecting my cycle of remorse and repentance, if that word hasn’t lost its meaning yet.

I don’t know how to change what I’ve found myself in, but I know this vicious cycle isn’t it. It isn’t anxiety and fatigue, followed by temptation, selfishness and loneliness increased, to thoughts to actions. It is not that because I’ve lived and seen it and that’s not what I want to be; a fraud, a bad example, a hypocrite, or a liar; half hearted, tired, and hopeless or dictated my shame.

I know that my savior is somehow knocking on my door, and I’ve rejected his love for a counterfeit bluff. How can I come when I know what I’ve done, and even worse, weighed options, and still chose the world. All I can do is let go. All I can do is let go. Whatever that is going to mean, I’m need to let go.

Hopelessness is the Enemy of Freedom (Poem)

Far more deadly than cancer and far more crippling than fear. So much more defining then routine, yet as loyal as a friend. It will not leave when asked nicely, and does not ask to come in. It enters at your own risk with no care to who it might hit.

Hopelessness can be caught like a virus, anyone can carry it. Though the side effects aren’t visible in the light, it projects it’s terrors mostly at night, after the moon has taken its place in the sky, ushering in the mood; exposing the infection through thoughts and dreams, leading most times to actions, solidifying the notion that all hope for freedom is lost.

freedom sings from the rooftops, calling, bringing notions of peace and separation from the things that so easily entangle us. The melodies are riddled with failures and victories, tears and jubilee, longing and agony, peace and assuredly a promise of fulfillment and a crown of royalty.

This melody doesn’t sound easy, like a nursery rhyme or a song written for a kid. Freedom sounds more like Handel’s “Massiah”, intricate, full of different instraments and dynamics that ebb and flow. Most importantly, it takes precision and attention. Freedom is not sung through voices uninterested or who’s passion is gone. It is sung through lungs tired, yet willing to sing one more time, and a thousand more if means the battle will be won.

Freedom is full of truth, and is at times wonderful and sometimes grim, yet always promises joy, if not through it all, for sure by the end.

Hopelessness is a liar, and is always dim, consistent, but who wants a constant if theres nothing better, and tiredness and routine begin and becomes a trend.

I’m finding freedom as I take back hope again. It’s worth every withdrawal and longing and aching within, because it has come with joy, opportunities, and connection. Hopelessness can’t stay, because God has given me the strength, and I’ve taken hold of freedom.

What Matters

LIFE: Thoughts, Inspiration, Poetry

Category: Hope