faithful are the wounds of a friend

Today was a bit rough.
There is a brother that I work with that came up in Shreveport, La. who is a black man. Two cultural differences that I am trying to deal with and I keep coming up on the wrong side of things.
Twice his name has come up in duscussions of sexual harrasment, and yet I really don't believe that he's guilty in either case- One isn't really even worthy of mentioning and we collectively (road supervisor team) made the decision that it was most likely a misunderstanding, and to some degree, a scatter-gun vendetta kind of a deal.
Today he was talking to a white girl that is dating a black man, and makes it no secret. He was chatting with her this morning and some statements were made that could be easily misunderstood if they were taken out of context (that's how I heard them- out of context) and then they were reported by someone that was not involved in the conversation to someone that tends to believe the worst of people. All around it is a somewhat volatile box of tinder.
I spoke to him as much to protect him as to communicate the official word on the subject, but I came away feeling so wrong. I believe in justice and I believe that I am as responsible for it as anyone else, and I'm thinking that a man feels accused of an act that just isn't in him... twice... and I'm not sure that he knows that he's important to me and the company.
I have to study to understand this harrassment business. Particularly since the person who spoke out has made me uncomfortable with things that she has said in the past.
When the "victim" was asked about it, she said that she could handle whatever was happening- isn't this something outside of the definition of harrassment? Isn't harrassment something that is defined on a case by case basis by the "victim" of unwanted attention?
I feel as though I have done a dis-service to my boss as hurting my friend who I believe is without guilt in this instance.
I don't know if I'll come back to this subject or not, but I have purged a minute amount of my angst here so far.
We'll see what tomorrow brings.

I got into a discussion on theooze last night about grace and how hard it is to receive or understand. I don't know whether I brought them up or Catie did, but the position of the Jews came into it- Ah, it was whether or not the church is getting better with age.
My view is that the church suffers the same kind of effect that the rest of creation seems to- the further from creation, the further the fall.
She brought up the Hebrew being the chosen people, and it seems to me that God said "Hey Abe, I like you and I'm going to do something here for you," but over time He regretted His decision a little and told them that He chose them because they were just enough to identify, but not enough to bew taken seriously and therefore He could show His intentions t'ward man through them.
The Jews are chosen to provide a deliverer, a saviour, the Christ, but they have chosen to be really quite passive about it, other than when they adamantly deny that it is Jesus.
And the church today shudders at change. God doesn't change, but our angle of observation does and we need to realize that it is happening, rather than denying that we can see Him from another side.
Which leads us to the question of the engagement of the flesh these kinds of matters. We have to stop being afraid of it. The flesh will not just lay quietly down to die, and so we must expect it to roll about, and make a ruckus- it's dying, after all. Or at the very least swelling up so that you can see the need to treat the infection.
These are certainly interesting times we live in. And I hope that I'm at least 65% right about my stuff, here. The other 35%... I can't identify it or it would change.Let me know if you have a thought.

I can feel this welling up slowly. It's suddenly like I was born for this.
Thinking last night about this upcoming engagement I remembered laying on the floor at the Fireland Belfast meetings in 1998, godsmacked over something Greg Austin prophesied over me about a knight or being knighted (I don't remember much, but that comes back to me so far) and as I lay there I remember acting out opening my heart and exposing it to the warfare in the room and praying that it would get inside of me. The cadence, the structure, the unforced unity.

It was that night that this seed was planted in me.

I had never been a drummer, never really had a desire beyond the bored drumming of my fingers on occasion. Now I can't believe the standards I have for how it's supposed to work. (God deliver me from that please) but I am getting jazzed.

The following is a work in progress. Not all of it is represented here but I am open to constructive suggestions made by anyone who should happen to find and read this post.

It begins with the principles sitting around an abba drum... Or the leader sitting and beating it and as the principles are ready to join they come in and begin to play in unison. This will continue through an invitation to the Holy Spirit to lead, to invoke a spirit of unity and to free those in attendance to pray and dance.
The abba is continuing throughout this period.
Then the principles, again at the leading of the spirit, will move to there own kits or hand-drums and begin to play in submission to the abba for a time and then all will fall silent for a moment.
The silence will be broken by a principle hearing a spirit led beat whether in exultation and hallel or a call to arms. From this point on it's for the people to play what they feel in their heart. Dancers dance, flaggers flag, intercessors crunch...
I must find a signal for when something specific needs to be done in a unison

Cacophony is out, I think. Unity for the city is a major battle in this endeavor- dynamics, tempo, rhythm are going to be the greatest weapons in our hands during this event.

There is much that I have yet to consider, but these bits need, I believe, to be held on to.

Well, so warfare...
I am of the opinion that there are so many things that we as a body are conflicted about, at what point do we begin to die to ourselves, to those truths that we wrap our minds around to the extent that there is a barrier built that prohibits any new ideas from getting through.
I watched it with the renewal movement. We have a new truth and so you must bow to our new revelation, as though it is a new form of a God that we so all agree never changes.
We relish in our new revelation, rubbing the noses of those who don't, won't or perhaps can't see it our way in the delight of our specialness and abandon any thought of pondering how the truths interact.
This is true with the pomo as well. The new generation is having an awful time of dealing with the previous generations need for definition, and ridicule ensues because it is a hard wired part of human nature. I see them reaching back and reachig forward with goals and hopes, but they are as guilty of abandoning the parts that worked as any other philosophy in the past when it was birthed.
My experiences are mainly in urban America, but the pervasive life seems to be hopelessly entangled in an "after me you come first" mentality.
I am cut off on a near daily basis by vehicles driven by youngsters, and yesterday the glaring example was a car with a "BODY PIERCING SAVED MY LIFE" sticker in the window and a fish on the bumper.
I guess that it's discipleship that is missing. The IRC seems to be preaching a message without a soul. There is flesh and spirit, but I don't see it with any depth.
Perhaps it's our motives that are wrong. It's not supposed to be about going to heaven. It's about knowing God in such a way that He can pick you out in a crowd.
I'm thinking about making a t-shirt that says "JESUS DIED TO GET YOUR ATTENTION"
And why not... I haven't been flogged since the first Harry Potter movie came out.

I should manage to be a little more cohesive in my thought process this evening, although I didn't get home until about 0330 this morning.
"Why," you ask? Well, that is the topic that I am addressing.
Trevor came down to the greater Seattle area for a conference, and he is the usual catalyst for the action to follow. Spiritual Warfare Dancing at a club in Seattle.
We, in fact, engage in warfare in a fetish club in dark neighborhood in Seattle and last night we tore it up, well, some things, not the club.
It started out with the three of us sitting outside praying about assignments for our time inside. There were three chairs on the sidewalk in front and we were approached twice once by a girl who was laughing about our various hairstyles and once by a guy who thought that we were perhaps the authorities from within (we had already paid the cover, so in some sense we paid for some legal use of the place and therefore carried some authority in that sense)and wanted to know about getting in to see someone, a room mate or something.
Trevor was to do some warfare over the Black Sea and Hungary, Dave was to battle three leviathans and I was to do some recon work for future trips and establish some new levels in my life.
We went in and I was engaged immediately. One of the things that I fight is the fear of man or intimidation. I came in wearing clothing that would be acceptable in the club, black pants and shirt, and as soon as I got under the black light I was covered in lint. It hadn't been there before (I'm sure that it was but I hadn't thought things through yet) and felt like I stuck out like some kind of wack job (which in all fairness I am within the club context) with white strands and etc all over me... But I was out during the first song that we were there for.
Dancing was wild. I'm not as sore this morning as I though I would be, but I haven't dome anything all day and I'm no less sore than I was. And I noticed that I dance in a largely celtic manner with my hands still while my feet move, another thing that has been a source of intimidation. W00T I'm not so weird after all.
During the time I think that I saw a need to get back to Shaftsbury Square in Belfast, and I need the boys that I met when I was over to go with, I think.
I tink d'ere up to it!
Anyhoo, ballywhoo, I'm sittin' on the rest for now. It may come up again later, and it may not, but watch the black sea and keep an eye on hungary. Somehting's gonna happen in those regions. ;^)

I was talking with Steve tonight about meetings in Hoquiam/Aberdeen. He needs a worship service and would like to have one from the area, or at least as close as Oly. I am kind of at a loss.
He said that there are pastors in teh area that are afraid of renewal, preaching against it in the area, against the Healing Rooms that have been established there.
What is our world about today if it's not about unity. I wonder if "the great deception" may not be to fear the flesh. The flesh is the vehicle that puts you in position to do Gods work, it is ammoral at worst. The flesh is not what will lead you into hell, it's rebellion. It's rejecting God and the road to His doorstep, the cross of The Christ, not whether you hold your mouth right when you open your hymnal.

I recently heard from soneone that their folks don't like a particular ministry because they don't reach them. It's a commercial radio station, they are going to attract the people who are going to spend the money, not the "I must hear a hymn", and "We tip 10% when we go out because it honors God... unless of course we don't like the waiter."

When did americans begin to think that we are so smart that the rest of the world needs to do what we do or we should go and tell them what's right. Those same people that think that a little girl (22 or so) is a hero for standing in front of a bulldozer in a foreign country to protest a war, and it is a war, and gets killed by the armyhas any right to do as she did.
I'm all for passion and feeling as though you are doing something good, but when you begin to believe that you as an individual can stop a war in a land where you have asked permission to visit by standing in front of a weapon- by any means other than pleaing with God, you have gone over the edge of sanity and believe a madness that will surely overtake the world as John prophesied, as Jesus prophesied, where we will be willing to look to a man for the big answers and he will deliver and then we will again see hitlerian dictatorship rise with the same results, only no man will be able to point and say that he had anything to do with the destruction, but all will stand in awe of a God that meant what He said... We cannot save ourselves from the horrors to come. We cannot save ourselves from destruction wrought by our own will and emotions. Only Jesus has eared the right to sit on a throne over the world. Only Jesus can introduce us to the Father that we left in the garden. Only Jesus. We cannot know the Father without knowing the Son. And we choose any another way.
We know that we don't know the right way. We know that man screwed up faith. Created religion out of it and we don't like that. Humanism is as afraid of the spirit as the church is afraid of the flesh. interesting dichotomy, eh?

I am so looking forward to this movie even if Dissney is doing it. As well, this is a test post trying out the pic thingy.

Weel, I think that I'm going to try to be better about this. I was at a meeting a couple of weeks ago and I'm going to say two things here one is just for me to remember (you are not selfish, Todd) and the other becomes a reason for becoming more regular about writing here.
The other is that God said that He is going to give me revelation like John Crowder. Deena said tha she asked God why their wasn't a guy like him around here and apparently God told him that I am that guy. Now there's a blow to the low self-esteem ego that I've been currying all these years (which in and of itself is revelation of a sort)