the last day in january

I'm listening to the new bright eyes ep, four winds ep, which i just got (stole) off the internet. it is pretty good. i like the song that is playing now, cartoon blues, number 5 of 6. i've also been listening to cursives "happy hollow", which i hated when i first heard it, and compared to other work by tim kasher, it is pretty lame, but it is still a good record.

oh! the meaningless things i give myself to!

um, i haven't read my bible for a few days. it just sits in my backpack not saying a word. i can be such a damn fool. i've spent more time doing useless things like taking showers than having reading words of truth that i desperately need.

i'd very much like to be in nashville right now. i think i might go on a "retreat" by myself some weekend. go to a yurt or something and just read the bible and pray and such. it think that that would be super-fly. things with mom and dad just make me sad and unable to focus. i'm having a harder time caring about things, i need to be "gearing up" and such for all my school work, but every time i find a peaceful place to sit down and get reading done, my thoughts always turn to sadness and i feel no motivation to be productive. i'm getting tired of the repetition of my life here at multnomah. i need more. i know i need G-d, yet so often, and other than a few scattered prayers, i don't turn to him. this is untrue and i know it. i do turn to G-d a lot, but right now i just don't feel real great. i'm in a small coffee shop and it is too hot and my coffee is cold, and i'm just feeling sad feelings. i hate being so emo. i never really thought of myself as emo until i came to multnomah and all my friends tell me this. i hate that term. i'm sorry, i'm not saying anything worth saying, but i just like writing out my thoughts and all.

this summer there is a small chance i might do an internship with a church in washington with their middle-school youth group. i'd like that.

i keep looking at my wrist and wishing i didn't have to rejoice, but it is a good reminder to praise G-d always. he is good. i gave him my life and i need to let go of it.

rejoice brethren! G-d is good. you are loved. everything will be alright in the end. i believe this to be truth.

church

what is church?

i met with john stumbo this week. we talked about church, and the church. i intend to study church history as much as i can. i am part of the church. the church has brought me joy, and it has also pissed me off.

what is church?

man, i don't even know...

i drink a lot of coffee these days.

i said good-bye to javier on friday. i said good-bye to bryn today. i'm tired of coming back to salem every frig'n week. i like this town, but having to live here and there is just a pain. i'm tired of shows. three shows in three night is too many shows for too few nights. jav and andrews show was my favorite.

i talked with john stumbo on friday. he is once of the most encouraging people. we talked about the church. me being negitive about things will do nothing good, and it wound help anyone let alone G-d.

i'm tired right now. it is late. i haven't seen my mom yet this weekend, and i don't think i'll see my dad, and that sucks. i don't plan on coming back for a while. i need to get a job. dan and i need to find a house. i need to find a local church and get involved, and so does andrew!

i feel pretty good about things. i'm blessed. i'm getting things out of my life that need to not be in my life, and replacing it with things that matter. that's fun.

however, it is harder for me to listen to cursive and bright eyes, two of my favorite bands, simply because it is hard for me to relate to those words any more.

my paragraphs are way too short to be considered true paragraphs.

there's mistakes I've made no rowing could outrun

i've been thinking a lot about my past mistakes lately. it isn't an easy thing to understand the weight of sin. i don't claim i can fully know this, but i feel it. you know that verse where paul talks about how everything of his life before he knew Christ he considers to be worthless, that's how i'm feeling these days. for the first time in my life i think i truely regret my sin. i used to have this feeling that i'd missed out that i'd never done this sin or that sin (tho, i'd never have called it such!), but now, i only feel this horrible feeling of remorse because of things i've done. i see the worthlessness of the flesh. because of the grace of G-d, i've changed (with surprising success, due only to, again, G-d's grace). i still don't think that is enough. i feel unworthy to say the least. changing now is too late, being good now doesn't change my past, or the things i've done or the hate that once consumed my heart, and thus, my actions. it isn't any one sin either, it is not like i regret lust, but not bitterness, it is everything not of truth!

i consider everything in my life, present and past alike, worthless if it is not of Christ.

this is changing me. i can't but feel horrible about things in my past. i also know there is grace, but my gosh, i'd rather have just stayed pure and kept from sin altogether rather than choosing wrong. it's challenging to me to understand this, it makes me want to search my life and getting anything that isn't right outta my life.

i'm finding sunday-school truths to be the greatest:
when you sin, G-d still loves you, but it makes him very sad.

some needed words of comfort from christ

so do not fear, you are more valuable than many sparrows.

good news!

bryn is getting married! i'm very happy.

a j.a.m. day!

thats a jesus and me day for all you kids!

i did spend the day mostly praying and reading the bible. it was super-fly, in a super-fly way that only G-d is.

i've got G-d running thru my brain, so intense that i can't explain.

i felt, and still feel, close to G-d. there is nothing like that. i set today aside for another purpose, but i knew i needed G-d, and i went to him. i must have told him i need him about 100 times today, and it was great. admitting you need G-d is about the best thing one can do. also, reading without ending is great. just reading. i got distracted a bunch. the lounge in my dorm is full of friends who provide (welcomed and blessed) distractions.

i also talked to a bunch of kids from back home and i'm excited to go there for the weekend.

it is funny to me about how excited i feel about things, about my day with my G-d, yet how i cannot express it almost at all. being in Christ is the best feeling i know.

we must insist your sinning STOP

jesus said this to me today:
"woe to you lucas, hypocrite! for you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. you blind lucas, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish so that the outside of it may become clean also."

so i thought about this for a while. i then understood it to mean that i need to clean the inside of the lucas and the outside of the lucas will become clean. basically, i need to cleanse my heart and the sins i commit will stop. all these suffice sins, like lust and owning too many things, are because my heart is impure. no more robbery and self-indulgence, the latter is a tough one. if i become pure in heart, these sins will stop! if i become pure in heart, i will see G-d, jesus told me so.

(see matt 23:25-26)

i woke up with these thoughts in my head

today as i woke up and heard the sound of my dad downstairs. he has a very distinct cough, so does my brother. i laid in my warm covers with my cat at the foot of the bed and listened to my dad move about the house in which i once lived, and i felt safe and comfortable. there is nothing that gives the feeling of security as knowing your dad is near, even if he has a cough. just about the time i was thinking all these things, i realized none of this is real anymore.

tastes like a yellow rubber ducky

okay, so natalie and i were driving and i was talking about how i have this habit of putting things in my mouth much like a baby does, and we decided the reason you feel like you know how everything tastes, such as a yellow rubber ducky, you can think about how that would taste yet you cannot remember having ever tasted one, is because as a lil baby (according to our great deduction), you put everything you could get your hands on in your mouth, thus, you know how most everything tastes. it is one of the first things you learn, how things taste 'cos you put lots of fun things into your mouth. i do this a lot these days and i'm not sure why, but it is fun. its interesting to put people cellphones into my mouth, because they don't like it and this entertains me for some odd reason.

i like that childrens sunday school song, "the b-i-b-l-e".

i don't think that most christians believe the bible. we sure has hell don't follow it. i think we misunderstand a lot of things for sure. there is no excuse for understanding something then not doing what it says.

(i've got no damn excuse for my actions!)

i believe in the bible. well, at least i believe it is truth. it is the most true anything can be (this may or may not mean absolute truth). i wish i could express why i feel the bible is true and that there are no mistakes in it - its message an' all. i think if you call yourself a christian and say you can't rely on the bible, you are horrible mistaken and you cannot know G-d or the life he wants for you nearly as well as you should be able to as you would with the bible serving and the guild it is meant to be. straight up.

what's new in the way of old music

the new modest mouse song - "dashboard" is amazing. i can't wait for the new record. i spent many hours today reading about music and downloading it from the internet. it was fun. i got some items i'm excited about, david dondero, who was a big influence on conor oberst. conor learned his distinct style for singing from david and it shows. i wish i could find anything from sunbrain, davids first band that was around about the time conor started bright eyes. i also got "cold war kids" which aaron told me were good. they are. "folk songs for the afterlife" is super good as well. i know far too much about omaha music. commander venus is a band with conor and tim kasher (of cursive and the good life) and thats very intersting to hear two of my favorite song writers in a band together, tho they aren't very good back then. slowdown virginia was the fore-runner to the band cursive (one of my favorites, they wrote both my almost favorite record and all time favorite song), i got their record and its pretty sweet. i like it better than early cursive stuff.

music is a meaningless pursuit.

turns out we aren't who we said we are pt. 2.

i was not entirely serious when i wrote my last blog. but i also think there are some important questions there. jesus said the path is narrow and few find it and all, so did you think this would be easy?

also: i don't think we can calm to love christ if we aren't sincerely trying to obey what he tells us we ought obey. being rebellious is not love. cheating on someone (including G-d/christ) is not love. if you have a brother who has no coat and you have two and you fail to give him one, you fail to show him the love you've been shown and you deny G-d. simply. oh shit! i fail all the time. grace. i also am losing my rebellious nature and it is being replaced with humility - slowly, but surely. i try. or at lease, i try to try. however, i can no longer live claiming the name of Jesus, and just be as sinful and as selfish as i please. i'm done with that.

turns out we aren't who we said we are.

jesus said give to all those who ask of you without expecting anything in return. christians (for the most part) do not do this. jesus also said if you love me, you will obey my commands. since christians do not obey jesus with this one command (i could use a few other examples), it becomes clear that christians do not love jesus and thus, are not christians at all. oh shit!

won't you shock and entertain us?

today i watched both kill bills in a row. i really like those movies. they make me wanna kill shit.

i am, however, a pacifist. i don't believe any christian should be violent. ever. (show me once place in the new testiment where a christian is violent (and it is okay, we all know peter got in trouble for cutting off the dudes ear)).

today i walked around the park and listened to sad music. it's getting harder for me to listen to music (music that i like for music-sake) because it is so backwards to the life i want to live. why can't people write (good) songs about living a simple life, or how awesome it is to not fuck, or why it is okay to be single, or how being nothing is just fine, and how nothing but G-d will make you feel not-empty. and i listen to mewithoutYou too much as it is.

perhaps i should stop entaking all this worldly entertainment that i love so much. i can see myself not watching movies, but no music! that'd be unreasonable. so i have to ask myself if this is something G-d is okay with, or am i trying to serve two masters. am i?

free

how free we are. us kids who've been made right in Christ have no worries. its true! so often, again and again - like a fool - and again, i feel everything that stands will go straight to hell with me right along with it. but this is just a lie. when i think i need a new pair of pants to be loved (and i've thought this before, but i never stated it in my mind that way), i'm basicly buying the lie. how free we are from those things. we are to be poor the worlds standards are made rich in the things of true worth. i don't need a suit for anything, so why should i think highly of such things? the man who gives a way all the he has and eats out of the trash is far better than the made who saves all he has so he can eat the best meats and drink the best wine. and i'd rather have nothing than even what i do have, but letting go is so very hard. do you think Christ was joking when he said if anyone wanted to save his life, he must loose it? and if you try and keep your life, you'll get nothing. so, i'm trying to lose my life. i hate that i still hold onto my life. i can't stand it that i can't stand when people do things that i can't stand. i guess that sounds unclear, but what i mean is this: sometimes people get on my nerves just because, and that is not christlike. that is lucas-like, and lucas, but himself, is no good at all. anygood i do is christ in me.

someday i'll be okay. all i want and all i want to want is this: to be like Christ. however!, i'm still in my flesh, and i'm still totally me. and for almost 20 years i was taught that i was number 1 and i was all that mattered, so i'm trying real hard to unlearn these lies. i'm free from all this, and i just need to live like the free man Christ has made me.


another thing i've been thinking about is freedom from sin. alot of folk talk about how when you become a christian you have to give up so much and you lose all your freedom, while you do have to give us "so much", heck, you have to give up everything ever, but you gain your freedom. when i'm living in sin, it isn't me being free and able to sin, its me being trapped and enslaved to sin. Jesus brings freedom from such things and allows us to be who we are meant to be. we shouldn't go on sinning because as followers of Christ, we have to reason to sin. it isn't a part of the new life we've been given.

someday i'll be better than okay. and i think that is now. to be honest, i'm dealing with something i never thought i'd have to deal with (again). its one of the hardest things a person can deal with, yet i feel peace and joy and hope. those three things are things i begged G-d to give to me and he has. G-d is faithful. it is true! even in these dark places light abounds! i feel like i'm learning and growing. i understand that i have much more to learn and i need to change even more, but i honestly believe G-d is pleased with me, and that he loves me.

love. i've been reading thru pauls letters and that guy can't seem to get past the whole "love" thing. now i can't either. paul is always saying things like "in love" and talking about how we should love eachother and how we should love G-d and how love should be everywhere. i want to have love like that. G-d have me peace/joy/hope now i want love. i want to be able to love G-d fully, and to love people the way Christ loved people. how frig'n ultra rad would that be? is there anything greater than love?!? no. no there is not.

so love G-d, and love those whom G-d created (that includes yourself).

and alway rejoice.



(this blog was made without any proof reading or spell checking - sorry!)

today i read in the bible and it said that i should think about things "above" and not earthly things. what a weird thing to tell me. i was all like "paul you crazy fool, what does this even mean?", but i didn't really say that. i wonder what this does mean tho. should i just think about heaven and not think about what is going on in my life here on earth? i don't think that is it. its like, i should be so consumed with G-d that i don't worry about things here on earth. how rad would it be to be so deeply focused on the kingdom of heaven, that i don't freak out that i have no money, or that my parents don't live together, or that my brother could go back to war. all these earthly things that i get so caught up in that i forget that this is not my home. i am not an american. i am not going to even be here for very long (and either will you). heck, some would say that i do not exist. but what really matters is that i'm focused on G-d and doing his will at all times. i wish my mind set was "how can i further the kingdom of heaven". my mindset is more like "how can i be the most confortable while doing the least work", and that is no good at all.

jesus said the two most important things we can do are to love G-d and to love others. we need to do this. i need to do this. i'm very sick of trying to fufill my own selfish desires because they will never be filled because they are wrong. i should just be filled with the spirit and love people. that would be rad.