Did Not Our Hearts Burn Within Us?

"And the Lord opened the mouth of the ass..." (Numbers 22:28a) // "For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you." (2 Corinthians 5:13)

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Pin tammy the skim scammy.

[bonesache]

“I have been writing this essay about Blake’s trial for more than a year now. I have been taking notes for it for five years. Over the course of those years I have asked myself, many times, why I’m doing this. A careful account of the trial for the sedition of the poet and printer William Blake, in the year 1804, on a fitfully wet day in January, in a wooden room by the sea—Why? Because this essay is my way of befriending and comprehending Billy Blake, whom I greatly admire in absentia. Why do I admire Blake so? Because he told the truth, because he shoved an insolent leering soldier down the road and stuffed him through a doorway, because he saw angels and saints and talked openly about his visions. Because he published his work himself. Because he was a tender and difficult and solicitous friend. Because, when he knew he was going to die, he lay in his bed singing softly. Because he wasn’t satisfied with extant mythology and so built a vast, grand impenetrable one of his own. Because he single-handedly rescued the ampersand from oblivion. Because, even though he claimed much of his work was dictated whole to him by angels and prophets, he edited heavily. Because he and his wife used to sit naked in their garden and recite passages from Paradise Lost. Because, when he was asked to recite his poems at parties, he got up and removed his coat and sang his lyrics aloud while dancing around the room, which is why he was subsequently not invited to parties anymore. Because he taught his wife, a grocer’s daughter, to read. Because he took great care to leave no debt at his death. Because in the ringing fury of his lines, there is also great mercy. Because, even when he was sick unto death, he engraved a little business card for his old friend George Cumberland. Because he could not stop painting and died with his pencil in his hand. Because he bought a new pencil two days before he died. Because the very last thing he drew was his wife’s face. It is this last detail that catches my heart.”

— Brian Doyle, “Billy Blake’s Trial”

[wafflewarrior111]

So... I found this and now it keeps coming to mind. You hear about "life-changing writing advice" all the time and usually its really not—but honestly this is it man.

I'm going to try it.

[missroserose]

I love the lawyer metaphor, because whenever I see “John knew that...” in prose writing I immediately think “how?  How does he know it?”  Interrogate your witnesses.  Cross-examine them.  Make them explain their reasoning.  It pays dividends.

[heck-in-a-handbasket]

All of this, but also feels/felt. My editor has forbidden me from using those and it’s forced me to stretch my skills.

[ineedthesons]

This is your "show not tell" advice explained!

[mareebird]

THIS

[kendrixtermina]

hm. im REALLY against any variation of “this rule is true in any context” because it defeats the point of creativity, but this is good advice for a) beefing up your descriptions and b) communicating emotional tension (eg, the MC has not admitted or processes this feeling but you want to show them having it)

That said, sometimes you would want to just state the character’s opinion. (& maybe contrast it with their actions, the situation) or use a shorthand when it’s like an introductory side detail. 

[porcupine-girl]

What I like about it though is that it’s NOT stated as a “don’t ever do this in any context” rule - it’s not a rule, it’s a challenge. Don’t ever do this for the next six months and see how it changes your writing. Not never do it again, just try it and then you can go back to using them but you’ll probably do it way more sparingly because you’ve built up other tools to use instead of those words.

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Heavy

Heavy music with screaming vocals is like poetry. Some poems are enjoyable even if you don’t understand the overall meaning. The sounds of the words together, alone, is beautiful. 

Screaming vocals can be like that. It is communicating - along with the music it backdrops - something intense; an intense emotion - not always anger.

Love these guys:

Demon Hunter

Cheers!

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post.

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Fourfy

For fee

For free

The pirates are right

To emphasize

The RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

The Mental Minotaur

A bear hug is nothing.

Minotaur hugs are death.

My mistake was in calling him,

Mini-Saurus Rex

-Marcus S.

BTW: Read Richard Hugo’s book about how to write poetry.

It’s great. Not that it made me a great poet. *Laughing all around*

But the book is funny too. 

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post.

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Under a tulip poplar With weeping leaves Rainy dusk time Is like a mourning widow It’s a window Into a broken heart Peace ...

My best friend, Shannon Aaron Stephens just started a blog. Finally! I love this guy. You will too.

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Would you ride your wheel or run?

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Ásgeir – Living Water

[Chorus] / Living water, healing spirit / Life flows from these soothing rivers / When you're plagued and feeling thirsty / When life stings and shows no mercy / Here you'll always

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Healer

I have a friend who

As a child learned

His name means, “healer”

Become a doctor?

No. But he can heal motorcycles

My friend tends to get sad

More than almost anyone

I’d like to cheer him

Once he told me about

Some Japanese art

Always with a flaw

We are like that

Flawed yet beautiful

My friend is like that

His perseverance

To find the silver lining

And keep his gaze to the horizon

For the coming of

The Healer

Makes him an equal

With Job

For, there is another

Named “Healer”

This Healer is

A friend of us both

He is making us

Less flawed, more beautiful

Motorcycle healer, though

Has medicine for

More than he supposes

Neighbor, daughters, wife

Brothers, parents, 

Friends

His presence brings

Some hope, some healing

-Mark Studdock

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

God is Heavy

Glory is: reputation, fame, abundance, honor, brightness, beauty, heaviness, density. Humans are not very dense (https://science.howstuffworks.com/atoms-in-person.htm). Nor is anything in the universe, really (https://science.howstuffworks.com/dictionary/astronomy-terms/question221.htm). God is different. God is glorious. God's density is complete. There is nothing in Him that can be filled - He is full (Job 41:10; Isaiah 6:3; Exodus 3:24). He is dense with God-ness.

-Mark

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Hebrews 11:1-3

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 For by it the people of old received their commendation. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

Hebrews 11:1-3

God made into being “everything that was made” (John 1:3): matter, energy, space, time…

He saw a nothing; He had an idea of something and made it. It wasn’t, then it was – by His power.

We are created in His image. Of course, we don’t have the true creative power He has. And our faith in Him doesn’t create anything of our own power. He creates us, our faith, and the result of our faith.

But it is interesting that even the formation of nature has the pattern of faith in God – trusting for a future reality – hoping for something that isn’t yet.

Is this that God had faith in Himself for a creation and got the reward for His faith (by His own doing, of course)?

That may not be the way to think of it.

 Looking forward to something that isn’t yet is all of our existence as humans moving through time. We always “hope for” the next breath.

Nearly every thought we have deals with the past or future. And those stuck in the past (whether celebrating past triumphs for too long or clinging to past hurts for too long) we often view as unhealthy.

The future is it. That is all we really have, and we don’t have it yet. Yet. We hope to have it.

The prevalence of this truth to our whole existence is, in my view, a clue that having faith in God is not so foreign to us or belonging to a previous age of history; but is very foundational to who/what we are. It is necessary.

-Mark Studdock

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

Sabbatical

I will not post again until June, 2020, I think. God bless you.

-Mark

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

I have a friend who is a Christian and has been Protestant his whole life. He has been examining the origins of Protestantism and how that influenced the founding of the United States, but really just considering the practical and theological outcomes following the Reformation. His trouble is the trajectory toward extreme individualism in the Church. There are now a wide array of interpretive methods, but each using its own (whether wittingly or no) kind of appeal to tradition (at least in part) to understand the Bible. This has lead him to court the idea that if we must inevitably use some tradition to help us interpret the Bible, why not trust the oldest formally recognized tradition - the Roman Catholic Church?

Considering this, I had a thought: If the trajectory or outcome of a Christian tradition is  the primary measure of its validity, look again to the Reformation context. Luther’s 95 theses were written primarily to confront the practice of selling Indulgences. That’s where Rome had ended up: selling promises of heaven to the highest bidder. She is at least as bad as Protestantism.

Then I remembered we know that “The ends don’t justify the means.” Perhaps the ends don’t nullify the means either. I think this is a fallacy. It is a fallacy to say: “Whatever it takes to get the desired outcome.” It is also a fallacy to say: “Even if this began in true virtue, the resultant adherents are doing wrong - throw out the whole thing.”

Isn’t this the fallacy made by those who don’t hold to any established religious worldview? They claim: “Religion in any form is bad for the world. Look what comes of it.”

I would contend that atheism, agnosticism, indifference are bad for the world too. But not because of what results from holding these beliefs or worldviews.

I’m not contending ideas have no consequences, they certainly do. I’m not contending the consequences aren’t one measure of the validity of the idea, they are.

My broader point, though, is that what corrupts a religion isn’t that it is a religion. What corrupts a religion is people.

What went wrong with Roman Catholicism is the same as what went wrong with Protestantism is the same thing that created apathy toward or hatred toward or extreme skepticism toward God. That is: the human heart. The heart of every human is broken, radically so.

I believe if we could strip down every worldview to their simplest form (a form that accurately represents them, while still retaining their distinctions), Christianity would shine out as the most beautiful.

It is this worldview alone, notably, that provides a solution to the inherent problem that corrupts every worldview. Only Jesus claims to have a solution for the depth of sickness in the human heart. He embodied that cure and grants that healing freely.

humbly submitted, Mark Studdock

[tlatotem]

Mythbusters ended too soon. I feel like The Cask Of Amontillado is exactly the myth they would have tested.

Like, figuring out how long it takes the mortar to dry. Finding the maximum amount of time before knocking down a recently built brick wall. Establishing the best place on a recently bricked wall to topple it and escape.

And then, doing all of that while drunk.

Mythbusters, you left us too soon.

[rabbit-exe]

actually, they made that episode – I have a copy of it in my basement, wanna see?

[tlatotem]

Would I?!

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

You’ve got it all wrong about getting it all wrong

When I started to enjoy playing electric bass, at some point I heard Jaco Pastorius’ self-titled album, and thought: “Ah ha ha! Yes! Here it is. This is bass music. In my dreams, this is the album I would have recorded.”

After being a Christian for many years, I read Donald Miller’s book “Blue Like Jazz”, and thought: “Ah ha ha! Don Miller has written my biography!” After reading this book, I had a realization that liberated me irreparably: Jesus Christ isn’t a religion, He is a person. Jesus is God, too. He doesn’t want our stoic or fearful service, He wants our hearts to come alive. Jesus didn’t bleed and suffer and die for us so that we can follow some rules. He died and came to life again so that we can be alive... with Him! I realized: ‘It is for freedom that Christ set us free.’

A couple books recently have lifted the weight of ‘The Law’, so to speak, from my shoulders in a lesser way. I’m beginning to feel free to call what I write “poetry”.

Just like the auditory ivory tower has bound so many rules on what might properly be called “Jazz” and have therefore undermined the spirit of that style which is the wild, liberated, anthem of “joy will rise in the heart no matter how dark the man’s cell”. That is how I think of Jazz. It is so energetic and hopeful; even in the slowest, darkest song. That something so restrained could have such beauty is a testament to what it is. At its best (my favorite, I mean :) ) Jazz has a beauty and power and speed and energy and an element of the indescribable that makes you realize there is more to life than what can be seen or described and even more than can be felt. You’re thinking I’m describing Jazz myself and falling into the same error. I hope not. I confess everything must have boundaries else it is everything else. The idea that if something is everything, it is nothing; has been noted before by others. This I admit. But what I hate is the weighty shackles and measuring rods and arbitrary rules that ignore a beautiful thing because it isn’t “in”. We are fools who engage in this judgement. To be uniform necessarily precludes being beautiful! If every woman had precisely the same face, there would be no beautiful women. And I know that a beautiful woman does actually exist, I will have you know! I am sure of this because she is my wife. My wife is beautiful.

So too, the literary ivory tower has piled high the (ironically) books which describe what is and what isn’t poetry. *Sigh* Again, I admit, we must have some definitions. But please, my friends, loosen your belts! Is this not enough: “A poem is: an arrangement of words written for the sake of beauty.”?

So, I shall write. I will seek to arrange words in order to engage in beauty-making.

Jesus came to fulfill The Law. The Law taught us much. Even with its own kind of beauty, though, it could never be as beautiful as Jesus. Our Hero has come at last. Oh we languished so long under the realization that “WE CAN’T DO THIS WITHOUT YOU!!!” Then: You came! Oh God, our God. You yourself came to us. You took our form and became a humble and unsuspecting savior. You rocked the universe to its foundation by... dying. We never saw it coming! We were bound for eternal death from our evil deeds and you took our place! Oh, sweet redeemer! You paid our debts! As slaves that could never earn our freedom, you bought us out of slavery with... your blood! My God! My God! Why have you remembered me? It is too wonderful for me to comprehend. Lord. Amen.

Just like this, The grace of The Son of God - God Himself has rescued us and invited us into the life of freedom (out from under slavery to rules [and slavery to death]). Then we begin to write laws about how to live out from under The Law.

We have done it to the Most Glorious and we do it to some of His gifts as well.

Lord, set us free! True freedom, we mean. Are there right and wrong still? Yes, we know. Make our hearts to desire the right and pursue it. Help us know where is the limit that the rules and rule-making must stop. God, may we always desire that ourselves and others grow in love toward you! May all we do be driven by love! Amen.

Lord, please help us seek, and make, beautiful things for your glory and the good of all around us. In Jesus’ name, amen.

-mark

[didnotourheartsburnwithinus]

The Janitor

A man died. This man utterly depended on Jesus Christ. Now dead, in heaven as an initiate into eternity (how long is that process?) he met many interesting people. One day he happened upon a street sweeper. Yes, literally, a man pushing a broom down the streets of gold. "What is this?" said the man. The sweeper heard him and responded, "What's what?" "You're sweeping." "Yes, I'm sweeping the streets." "But why? I mean, there isn't dirt here. Is there? And who would sweep in heaven? Why sweeping?" "You are very confused." "Um, well, yes. Indeed. Apparently. Yes." "As to your first question, 'Why?', it's because everyone has a job. This is mine." "Oh. I guess I don't know mine yet." "I would say not. You've only just arrived. It takes a while to learn how to do your job." "Well, you must know what my job will be?" "No. It's just that it takes a while to learn any of them, I mean." "Certainly it doesn’t take long to learn sweeping?" "You think not? Well, in fact I've only just begun to learn what it means to sweep a street." "Hmm," said the initiate thoughtfully. After a pause, the sweeper began again. "Now, you asked three other questions. The next was about if dirt is what's being swept by me. No, it isn't dirt. You're right that there is nothing dirty in the least here. But there are kinds of by-products. Not 'waste' exactly, but leftovers nonetheless. Everyone traveling through leaves behind some light." "I'm sorry, what? Light? How is that? You can't sweep up light, can you?" "Oh not everyone, but I'm learning how. Like I said, I've only just begun to get it. I've been at it a while. At least a long time in the sense of what we called "time" in the prologue." "Prologue?" "Oh, yes. That is the shorthand for your life in your broken body. Everything before your death." "Ah. Thank you." "Indeed. Now the next thing you asked was who would sweep in heaven. My name is David. I think there may be a few other sweepers. What is your name?" "I'm Lou Edison. It's a pleasure. David what?" "Oh, in those days it was only 'David'. Perhaps David Jessison or something like that, by your method, son of Ed. The pleasure is mine." "Ah, I see. Wait! What?! You mean THE David?! KING David?! You are King David?" "Yes, I am David." "Oh. Uh. But. Sir, you are so highly regarded and "after His own heart" even. Why have you been sweeping?" "Yes, that was your last question. But you answered it yourself." "I'm sorry?" "I was highly regarded, knew Him well in the prologue, was a king." "And so..." "The first shall be last; the last shall be first." "Oh. You mean?" "What do you mean?" "This is some sort of punishment for having received some of your reward during your life, or something?" "No. That is not it. You probably know Him better than that, if you'll think a moment." "Right. There is no punishment. All punishment has been taken." "Good." "Then some slighted degree of reward?" "That confuses it. Let me tell you this: 'the first shall be last; the last shall be first' is still true in the chapters, here." "I don't think I'm following." "This is an unspeakable reward to sweep light." "But, no one knows you. You are just a janitor. How can it be a reward?" "My friend, you have again answered your own question. Only you don't have all the details. He knows me, and I know Him. That is a reward indeed. This is my job, and I was made to do it. I love this sweeping, this road, the occasional friend stopping. I love this light, His light. I love Him. He is always here. And He also stops by." "I don't understand yet. But if I've learned anything from our conversation, I suppose I will get it eventually." "You've got that part already! Good word, my friend. Enjoy your walk." "Thank you."

By: Mark Studdock, aspiring janitor