the right of lane

Come for the coffee. Stay for the free grammar advice.

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The way of Christ

“After all is said and done, after all my peers are blamed for all the ways they never took care of me, after I have ascribed every wickedness and evil intention to everyone around me, and after I have attributed every malady and infliction of the heart to my very soul, all that is left is a shriveled up, isolated body that still is in pain with no one around to care about me. 

This is the natural end of a world of violence which eschews vulnerability and flees from pain.”

--- Taylor Zimmerman, Revoice 2020

Beautiful sentence structure aside, this one sentence captures so much of the ugliness of my own internal world. In light of this violent reality, Taylor exhorts us to embrace the pain inflicted upon us, but not out of a sense of masochism. To embrace pain is to fully acknowledge it as evil. To embrace pain is to learn from Christ. 

It is not fair but it is the way of Christ. 

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“For all the constructive attempts to make room in our churches for gay Christians, the actual path for sanctification seems almost tediously boring - a life immersed in Scripture and the practices of the Church is the only reliable bulwark against infidelity.”

-Matthew Lee Anderson, Revoice 2018

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“Hostile to the past, impatient of the present, and cheated of the future...”

- Albert Camus’s The Plague 

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He made known his ways to Moses,  his deeds to the people of Israel:  The Lord is compassionate and gracious,  slow to anger, abounding in love.  He will not always accuse,  nor will he harbor his anger forever;  he does not treat us as our sins deserve  or repay us according to our iniquities.  For as high as the heavens are above Earth,  so great is his love for those who fear God.  As far as the east is from the west,  so far has he removed our transgressions from us. 

Psalm 103: 7-12

What I love about this passage is its balance. Without listing our offenses explicitly, it reminds us that we are deserving of his anger, that our iniquities have earned his wrath. But, it does not dwell there long. This passage does not aim to condemn; it is not an exposition of our sin, but a psalm of worship; it seeks to praise God for his love, his compassion, his graces. It is when I come to terms with my own sin first that I more clearly see God’s vast love, and praise him for it. 

But on the other hand, God’s response to our sin is out of balance. God’s response is not merely an apology accepted, forgiveness offered in grim obligation.  No, so great is his love and so great is his forgiveness. And, this side of Christ’s coming, we understand God’s forgiveness more fully than even the psalmist. So great is the cost of our sin, and so great is the power of the resurrection. God’s forgiveness is not in balance with our sin, but far surpasses any forgiveness we could imagine.

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“I came no nearer to...the studious love which will make a man a botanist or an ornithologist. It was the mood of a scene that mattered to me; and in tasting that mood my skin and nose were as busy as my eyes.”

---”Surprised by Joy”, C. S. Lewis

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Home sweet home. Back for another year in the City of Springs.

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I have had a fantastic last couple weeks. I’ve gotten to catch up with old friends on the opposite side of the world. I’ve gotten to know new people and enjoy dinner in cozy apartments. I’ve gotten to experience the solemness of Christmas with both like-minded friends and with people whom I don’t share a common language. These are the kinds of experiences of which I’ve always dreamed. Experiencing life on the opposite side of the world and in a vastly different culture has been a driving factor in my life for so long. And I finally achieved it. I did it. It’s checked off on my to-do list. Good job. Kudos to you.

So why am I so lonely? I sit on the couch in my small apartment, one moment filled with restless energy, the next lethargic, like a fickle teenager.

I’ve had a fantastic last couple weeks, but I’m not experiencing them with the people I miss most, nor am I experiencing them with the people I desire most.

-Christmas, 2015

[dsxsbx]

Yosemite // Oscar Nilsson

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Beijing. November, 2015.

[yoursummerdreamz]

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Red Leaf Gorge - November, 2015.

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Language goal achieved: Asking the barista if China’s Starbucks have the Pumpkin Spice Latte. Good news: He understood my question in Chinese. Not so good news: No Pumpkin Spice Latte.

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I often think about where I went wrong

The more I do the less I know.

But, I know I have a fickle heart and a bitterness

And a wandering eye and a heaviness in my head.

But, don’t you remember?

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Climbed Mt. Tai this weekend. It was grueling, but so worth it.

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Went for a walk in downtown Jinan and stumbled upon this.