Jesus did not finish all the urgent tasks in Palestine or all the things He would have liked to do, but He did finish the work which God gave Him to do. The only alternative to frustration is to be sure that we are doing what God wants. Nothing substitutes for knowing that this day, this hour, in this place, we are doing the will of the Father. Then and only then can we think of all the other unfinished tasks with equanimity and leave them with God.
there is nothing in dreaming that is so impossible
except that we lack the courage to follow their airy calling
destiny works the easier when we leave all doors open
Sweet dreams are made of this
Who am I to disagree?
Travel the world and the seven seas
Everybody’s looking for something
– Eurythmics
Perhaps the problem in morality is desire, after all. Sometimes I think we are sent to combat the storm armed only with an umbrella. It is seemingly quite fit that the sin of lust is seen only as fitting of the second circle of Hell, according to Dante, only just worse than not having been baptized, almost forgivable. Also, the punishment of being blown about as if in violent tempest, seems fitting. But as I was saying, if nothing that desired were in us, we could be so easily the model citizen, we all. But we do desire, there is something older than man within that drives us. Sometimes to good ends, but much more often, to cause us to take a shortcut on our principles, to obtain what it is we want in the most immediate of fashion. This is the storm vs. the umbrella.
So what are we to do? Seemingly, the best we can hope for is not for us to face it head on, but to have that which is larger take it on. Buddha held that desire was the root of all suffering. That once we eliminate such subversive drive, we would be free from this wicked world. In my thinking, this is what is meant by being selfless — and in the highest of senses, we might think that this is to have replaced our own will with the will of God. Selfless: without self. And perhaps then, in this manner, we are actually going past the goal of Buddha, and tapping into the infinite, when we desire not of ourselves, but of love itself. For I think there is more in this life than pain, and wish not to detach myself from it in totality. The problem of desire I surrender it, my best to win over it.
A function of prayer may be that God lets us ask for things and not just give them to us, so that we might become better, wiser people. Even better, that we ask things for other people. Perhaps it is only secondary whether or not our prayers are answered, especially in the way that we mean for them to be. Or as George Meredith said, “Who rises from prayer a better man, his prayer is answered.†After all, God already knows what we need and what we want: it is we who are clueless about the whole affair. In seeking God, then, we find out our own true selves. Not that we should not care about the things we pray for, because that is a part of it too, I think. To quote Ani DiFranco, “God’s work isn’t done by God.†Amen to that. Indeed.
O eternal God, who from all eternity dost behold and love thy own glories and perfections infinite, and hast created me to do the work of God after the manner of men, and to serve thee in this generation and according to my capacities; give me thy grace, that I may be a curious and prudent spender of my time, so as I may best prevent or resist all temptation, and be profitable to the Christian commonwealth, and by discharging all my duty may glorify thy name. Take from me all slothfulness, and give me a diligent and an active spirit, and wisdom to choose my employment; that I may do works proportionable to my person, and to the dignity of a Christian, and may fill up all the spaces of my time with actions of religion and charity; that, when the devil assaults me he may not find me idle, and my dearest Lord at his sudden coming may find me busy in lawful, necessary, and pious actions; improving my talent entrusted to me by thee, my Lord; that I may enter into the joy of my Lord, to partake of his eternal felicities, even for thy mercy’s sake, and for my dearest Saviour’s sake. Amen.
time is easily forgotten, impossible to ignore
strange, to us, how death is unavoidable
we dream of a world untouched by pain
strangely, the meaning comes to us in the hurt
we believe we belong not to this world
the secret is known to us, to walk in light
and time is blinked away in the eye of eternity
Examinations are formidable even to the best prepared, for the greatest fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer.
– Charles Caleb Colton
I respect faith, but doubt is what gets you an education.
– Wilson Mizner
Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.
– Brendan Gill
Patience has its limits. Take it too far, and it’s cowardice.
– George Jackson
Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something.
– Plato
The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true.
– James Branch Cabell
If you are going through hell, keep going.
– Winston Churchill
And I am flawed
But I am cleaning up so well
I am seeing in me now the things you swore you saw yourself
– Dashboard Confessional
[Book.]
Then, slowly, focus. But it is night, and I can make the shape of buildings: a skyline across the starry sky. It is a familiar scene, and I realize that I am looking out my apartment window, out into the city. Considerable time must have passed, though I am relatively certain that it is not the next day yet. Where have I been? What have I done, but walk? The light is not even on, and it is merely moonlight streaming in that has any glow. I go to the lamp, and see that it has tipped over; I prop it up and turn the switch. Along the shelves across my walls, my various figurines have been toppled by the shaking this morning, some having fallen completely off, and are on the floor. Even the piles of my clothes seem to have shifted. Everything changes.
in the mystery of difference is the form of things
such are the most fundamental particles of information
which comprises the quality, and the causation of all
I cannot pray in the name of Jesus to have my own will; the name of Jesus is not a signature of no importance, but the decisive factor. The fact that the name of Jesus comes at the beginning does not make it a prayer in the name of Jesus; but this means to pray in such a manner that I dare name Jesus in it, that is to say, dare to think of Him, think His holy will together with whatever I am praying for.
Night falls, and suddenly I awake, as if from a thousand years slumber.
Night falls, and the rhythm that has been low emerges from the ground.
Night falls, and I can imagine infinity with a single look upward.
Night falls, and I am singular, separate from the crowds under the light.
Night falls, and all the questions seem unanswerable and distant.
Night falls, and it is as if it has been night all along, that day was a dream.
Night falls, and the final hope is still with us, to when death itself will die.
[Book.]
I am a question mark, looking for a question. As I walk, all the world before me now becomes as the gray of oblivion, all my sensation becomes numb like sleep; I walk on and on, keeping without falter the onward progression of this self, and I now am unable to discern anything of what I come upon nor remember what I pass by. The day does not care, and hours tick on, I am sure. What planes of existence I may have crossed escapes me, the mystery not only being that the null takes over, but how I keep going on when this slice of the universal experience happens for everyone else in the world, and not for me. For I have become a living ghost, and time has no meaning when in this sleep that does not dream. When traveling in the underworld that was before there was a heaven and a hell.
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