Disciples

It's no secret.
I've battled depression.
I still battle depression.
I make it days, months, years without a thought of deep sadness or self-harm and then...
boom.

There it is.

Sitting on my shoulders.

Twisting and contorting its body until I'm looking directly into its face.

Some things set it off more than others.
There's a trigger man.
I've been able to identify some of them.
And sometimes there are new ones.

This season is a new one.

I hope it ends soon.

I'm frustrated with my church.
Maybe even the Church.

I'm frustrated that we can have pastors stand on stages and berate the congregation for having "drive" or "vigor" and for following the "traditional norms" of the business world.

How we can look down on that "look out for number one" attitude.
The disposition of me first.

And yet.

We still have things like unpaid internships.
We pull the rug out on staff in a new church plant.
We hire the least amount of people to be on staff.

But we've got to have Global Freedom.
We've got to make that movie.
We've got to have the best Easter program.

But we can't look out for number one.
So we neglect ourselves.
Our lifeblood.
The people looking to become better disciples.
We teach them that hard work and dedication to the cross
will only come out of their paycheck.

We silently encourage them to work horrible overnight jobs so that they can be at the office ready to plan the next big event for the students

and they can barely pay rent.

We welcome them into the offices and team just to not communicate events to them.
Causing them to feel more left out and ignored than they had before they came.

But if they look out for themselves, it's of Satan.
It's sin.

If they leave one church for a paying job at another
we consider it making misty plans for tomorrow.
Plans that shouldn't be made because we don't know if tomorrow will come.
The church calls it working outside of God's plan.
I call it finding a way to eat.

My dedication to the cross might kill me.
But not like Jesus.
This isn't Christ-like.
It will be slow.
And it will be under the nose of the Church.
I am one of the least.
And the worst thing is,
there are others worse off than me.

Zambia's Song

These children are beautiful, but they're dying by the dozen.

Pick up a box of eggs on your way out, but make sure to drop them on our doorstep.

How we make such a fuss of worthless objects that we worship like our God.

but young daughter, its not your fault that you were born without the means.

I mean life gave you lemons, but you lack the water needed to make that succulent lemonade.

We watch you walk miles but the television plays it as dull

so we change the channel hoping for something like an earthquake or another dead soldier

and let the importance and gravity of the situation roll off like water on a freshly waxed car.

But "carry on my wayward son/there'll be peace when you are done/lay your weary head to rest/don't you cry no more"

because by the time you get this message I'll be way too late

and the sack cloth and ashes will be prepared for morning.

Once the mourning starts your mothers eyes won't be dry for months on end

and the rest of the world sits like Jobs friends but for years instead of days

until your sister gets a microphone and stands on the stage and preaches a word that breaks our hearts

and the cycle starts over again!

Let the timer count down. We can take wages. Will the trend last days or years?

"Oh, I'll put a 50 down that it lasts at least 267 hours, 42 minutes, and 6 seconds!"

They tell me that the poor don't even try to stay afloat in this world

What they don't know is that something like a flood flashed before their eyes and they've got so much water in their lungs

They're just trying not to die, and they don't seem to care about anything other than how to get by

yet with all of their sickness and disease because of their situation they won't be hired

and because they aren't hired they get sick with disease

and because of their disease they bring about so much dis-ease

I just wish they didn't lie when they said loving people would be this easy

Our cameras are so focused on ourselves while we study the backs of our hands

the backs of our knee caps and the weenus is getting neglected.

I hope when you hear this you feel the guilt that balances out the shame and hurt that our people feel.

There are so many cracks in this globe we're just spitting to make some mud to make it flush and hold itself on its own

For Those Too Lazy To Take Down Their Christmas Lights

Hung like Christmas lights in mid-July
I’ve got my tongue caught up in a bear trap
I’m losing sight of everything that I’ve wanted to write.
She placed a hand on mine and I wished the world away
My eyes were opened and I couldn’t see
oh the Heavens know the things I wish to say when I sit to type.
These fingers stretch out like branches of barren trees
The fruit is rotten and falling while worms nibble at the roots.
Vines stretch forth and choke the earth around the trunk.
This burden is so easy and the yolk is yellowed
I want my soul to be poured out like water not held inside this bucket whilst I make a ruckus and shake a little bit of my thoughts out over the sides
I think I’ve run out of things to say that are of importance
so I will stand here and yell nonsense at the top of my lungs just to silence the crowd and feel like I’m in control of the ocean
No! Screw the ocean, man! I want to be in charge of the rotation of the earth
so If I move left fast enough I can bring everything back to perfection
I’m not even a perfectionist but I love the harmonies you sing to their swan song
and I want to be the melody but my voice only sings in the key of C and E is a distant dream to a vagabond like me
Sojourners and refugees make a home on a piece of cardboard to soak up your tears
I’M SO SICK OF THIS SHOW
Who are the Kardashians anyway?
Bring the justice and righteousness like a flood
make it flash and we will have a celebration as the whole world dies off again
Again? When was the first time?
I’m sorry your Sunday school doesn’t tell you that God killed EVERYONE when Noah sailed off high and dry.
Let’s argue this out, and you can call it a debate.
I’m still searching for something solid to write on. To place my hopes on.
I’ve lost my eyes in the light.
My name is Eli.
I’m strung out on thoughts like Christmas lights in mid-July.
Just leave me up and eventually I’ll find my season again.

Family Life.

Let's gather up the mirrors.

We can melt them down,

and pour metallic surfaces into the mold of a woman.

We can call it a relationship.

And it will be the only way mutuality will ever be reached.

YLFC

I had the opportunity to spit at Yorba Linda Friends high school service, and this is my piece. Enjoy.

I'm just a big city kid carrying small dreams like pebbles,
speaking softly and walking with a stick hoping to hit Mark McGuire home runs without the steroids
but somewhere in God’s Great Big Book it says that the weak will shame the strong
and that Bible Scholar Bullies like myself will be left wandering a desert of humility
wondering what dreams are made of
and whether or not we were wrong.
Yet it doesn't take much to have the faith of a mustard seed,
it’s maintaining that faith that takes the shade of vibrant honesty.
But the Lord has a way of dragging out the maimed and unexpected
and delivering them to a seat of power.
Isaac was an old man with a barren wife,
Moses had a speech impediment,
Jesus was a good Jewish boy,
and Rahab was a whore.
But you don't see God at the sidelines screaming,
"You aren't good enough to play on my team, little boy! You haven't fixed up your life so that its perfect"
But instead he tells us to sing
"all of you is more than enough for all of me for and every thirst and every need. You satisfy me with you love, and all I have in you is more than enough."
And the spirit of a loving God reminds us that we are his portion,
and that the things which we consider as being not good enough simply mean that we have ignored what He sees as the right stuff to participate in an active empire.
so I challenge you today to see the field of dreams and the bloodline of biblical proportions
To see the significance that your story could be leaving
and when you're done doing all of that, then see yourself differently.
"For it is one thing to be admired, another to be a guiding star that saves the anguished."

Schubert

I never knew you but I knew you. Like a son knows a father or a man knows his best friend though its been ages since they've seen each other. I watched as you walked through the dark and struggled with the weight of mutation bursting forth from inside you. A community carried you and now we find ourselves mad at God for removing sweet flowers from our weeds. We will call you rose and by every other circumstance you smell sweeter than any fabrication of truth that we make claim to know to heal our burdens. But all that we know has been uprooted and our world of dirt and decay seems to be drifting away somewhere ethereal. This is not the way that anything was supposed to be and yet here we are. I hope to whatever god you worship that this is all some sick dream of some perverts fantasy that likes to twist the knives in our backs until the hilts are like the heads of owls. Welcome to paradise. But God knows how much you've made us move and I'm so thankful I had a chance to hear you speak and I have made a destination to live and love like you and we've all made the same destination and we prayed every day that you'd be here to see us through and some trickery has been done. The rug is pulled out from under us by a faulty magician but there is magic yet in the air because you live in the hearts you've left behind and for that reason you will never die. And it's so obvious that you've left an impression in our hearts, Mr. Neil Armstrong, because this community has wept for you and prayed for you. We long to burn with you and carry the weight. But they were wrong when they said the good die young. They die when they are aged, like a fine wine, when they share enough of themselves to be a constant and you get so caught up in constantly being by them that when you subtract the constant, you're left with the variable--that's the change. So we roll with the hurricane and pick up the hurts we carried with you and move on to other things that your strength allows us to make it through. And when we forget the things we wish not to, we stop and remember you. Joel, "may angels lead you in, hear you me, my friend. On sleepless roads the sleepless go, may angels lead you in."

The Story

Tell your story. Write out the purpose for the pain. The reasons for the heartbreak and injustice, the deaths and depression, the love and the hope that you have experienced. Write it out and share it. Sing it from every rooftop you mange to climb. Dance it out in the streets. Shake it like breaded chicken until there is no more life in its veins. Stand within it in the subway tunnels and cry it out in a huddle of your closest loved ones. Suck the marrow from its bones because we are all going to die some day and right now we only have one chance at being legendary at being hopeful at revolutionizing this world but we also have one chance at being mediocre. At complacency.  This life can be everything you have ever wanted so write your story among the clouds and people will stop and stare while you do.