Stewarding Marriage

The other night while tucking myself into bed I did as I usually do - I snuggled. No, I wasn't able to snuggle with someone, instead I snuggled with something. I snuggled up close to a book. Yeah, I read at night. That night I was feeling particularly lonely. I was particularly in need of some company. You know what I mean. The whole I want to be with her right now and just hold her close. Well, yeah, since that wasn't going to happen I went to bed with a book. Perhaps it wasn't my wisest move but due to that lonely frame of mind I went to bed with a book on marriage. Actually a book on sex. No, actually it was a book on God. Wait, how about all three things combined! Yeah, I went to bed with Sex and the Supremacy of Christ. That night I was reading a chapter written by Ben Patterson and at one point he said,

Marriage and sexuality is a stewardship. I must give my wife back better than I received her. And I must give the world we shared back to God better than we received it. Marriage is yet another arena in which to live out your vocation to serve Christ. Dietrich Bonhoeffer once spoke to a love struck couple in a marriage homily: "In your love you see only the heaven of your own happiness, but in marriage you are placed at a post of responsibility towards the world and mankind." We do nothing in this life unto ourselves alone. Even a happy marriage (or great sex) is not only for the happiness of the husbands, wives, and children; it is for the God's glory.

This shocked me. I was dumbfounded, and that doesn't happen often! It wasn't the concept of marriage or sex being for God's glory. No, it was the concept of it being for His use. Rather, for His service. To be, as Bonhoeffer put it, "at a post." It is a heavy responsibility. Sure, I assume (yes, I take it for granted and I know it's wrong) that we'll serve together and tithe together and go to church together and all the rest of that good stuff. But now I need to understand that we will also be a sort of beacon in our society. Wow! That's a pretty tough call. It's not just about us. It's not even just about us and God. It's also about others. This get's, I won't lie, just a little complicated.

A God Who Answers

It is 6:45 in the morning now. I am sitting in front of closed cafeteria doors. Usually breakfast opens at 7:15 and since I knew this I'd taken my Bible hoping to have some "alone" time with God before breakfast. Not today. No, today breakfast opened later. It opened at 8:15. Thankfully I still had my Bible. But what I want to share now is not something I've read while sitting and waiting for breakfast. It is not even something I read while eating my bagel with cream cheese. No, this is something I read while walking towards breakfast. Yeah, I know (believe, me I know) that walking and reading can be dangerous. Once I was knocked down by a parked truck I didn't see because I had my head so buried in the book I was reading. But today I repeated the experience. Not the accident, I mean the combination of reading and walking. I read Psalm 38. I was going to read in Jeremiah but when I opened my Bible it opened to Psalm 38 and so I decided to read it. Wow!

The first four verses speak of how badly sin can wreck a person's life. It made me think of my own "sin tolerance" levels. A friend of mine and I sometimes speak of this and refer to it as such, as "sin tolerance" levels. You know, the whole story of how much sin our bodies or minds can cope with in a movie or a book or a song or any other sort of activity. Sometimes I get careless. In these first four verses it spoke of God's wrath on sin. God firing His missiles against the agent of sin. We are the agents of sin. It's not "the devil made me do it." Rather, it is "I chose to do this." But then it also spoke of the psalmists shame over his sin. It spoke of his grief over his sin and the burden that it was for him. In fact, it was such a burden that his entire body was wracked in pain, even his bones were restless because of sin. Sin doesn't always bother me as much as it should. Instead I flirt with seeing just how far I can go in "tolerating" it. That's wrong. That's dead wrong.

Then, sort of to cheer me up, but not so much either, I read verse 9. In verse 9 the psalmist says that God knows all his desires. Just to know that God knows is a relief. He knows everything. So is it really all that much of a relief? It's kind of a mixed bag for me. I like it that He knows the good (or good desires) in me, but I don't like it that He knows of all the rest. You know, the bad(or bad desires) in me. Actually the rest of me, the bad stuff, that's the majority of me.

But my climax came with verse 15. That is when I stopped walking. I just stopped dead in my tracks. My heart felt as if it'd stopped too. Something else started up though. A feeling of gratitude. You know, the kind that starts in the pit of your stomach and blossoms in your heart and shines out your eyes. Yeah, my eyes were shining - they were welling with tears. What a great verse! The verse promises a God who answers.

Yes, I might be a sinner. Yes, I might not hate my sin as much as I should. Yes, it might not even bother me all that much sometimes. Yes, I might overlook the fact that God knows about my desires and even my breath. Yes, I might try to fend for myself and not care that I am hurting Him. But God still answers.

Not only does He know (vs. 9) but He also answers (vs. 15). Often we talk of not getting the answers we want and the rest of all that jazz. It's silly. We don't deserve any answer at all. We're fortunate just to have Him even condescend to speak with us. So you know what, who cares? God knows and even though He knows (or is it because He knows?) He still chooses to answer us. That's enough for me. Who cares about what answers I might want? All I care about is getting an answer from Him.

But then I froze. The early part of that same verse says that God responds or answers because he (the psalmist) had waited on Him. That means it is a conditional answering service. But then I thought about it some more. Yes, it is conditional, but it doesn't say what condition the waiting has to be in. Job waited a little impatiently and God answered him. Or as Peter Kreeft said, "Job's faith is not sunny and serene, but it is faith. It is not without doubts. (Indeed, his doubts came from his faith. When faith is full, it is open and can include doubts; when it is weak, it cannot tolerate doubts.)" Or we could use the example of Jonah. Yes, Jonah also waited on God. Not with the same kind of doubt as Job, but still with doubt. The difference is Jonah's doubt was an angry doubt, it was an impatient doubt. Yet Jonah also waited on God and he also received an answer. So I suppose the condition of the waiting doesn't matter as long as the condition of waiting is met. God will answer.

A Snuffed Out Candle

It is 6 o'clock in the morning and I'm awake. Yes, I realize this isn't terribly early, but, you have to understand, in my book, this is terribly early. Terribly. I meant to sleep. In fact I meant to sleep since 5 o'clock and hadn't been able to. I went to bed some minutes past midnight and had a restless night of sleep. Then I woke up (at 5) and my mind was on scary movies. No, I've not recently seen any scary movies but they've been on my mind. Let me explain.

A friend and I were just talking about how Sixth Sense though a classic suspense (even somewhat scary) film is not really all that classic. Don't get me wrong it is. I suppose I mean to say that although it is a great movie it's not so great. Still don't make too much sense, do I? Okay, so this movie, Sixth Sense, is in the cinematographic hall of fame for having one of the most twisted endings in movie lore. True. But if you've seen it once you're done with it. At the most you might watch it again just to catch all the subtleties and quirky twists before the final twist. But after a second viewing (which is a bit of a stretch) the movie is done. For that reason it's not even worth buying.

You see, the problem with scary movies (and many suspense ones) is that once seen the thrill is gone. That's not the case with every movie. No, in fact, most movies are thrilling with every viewing. Sometimes the thrill even augments after repeated viewings. Such is the case for comedies, dramas, musicals, and other genres. The reason for this is, I believe, that scary movies are intended to supply the unexpected. Once they are watched the unexpected then becomes expected. After watching the movie once you know when to expect every haunting, every blood sucking, every snap of the neck, every silver bullet shot, every full moon, every evil laugh. All of it. There is no more thrill.

Could this be a problem with everything supernatural? Yes, it affects us with the creepy side of the supernatural realm. By that I mean the daemons, the ghosts, the spectres, the vampires, and what-have-you, but there is another side to the coin as well. Yes, there is a nice side. Supernatural still, but nice. That is the side of the angels, not of the daemons. For example, the parting of the Red Sea, as in the Bible. The first time that story is told us we are fascinated. It is so...so....so unexpected. Wow. It's like a miracle. No, wait, it is a miracle! But then we hear the story again. Maybe we heard it the first time in family devotions. That was great. Then we heard it again in Sunday School. That was great too. This time it came illustrated. True, it was just an old flannelgraph board or some silly slide show of flash cards, but it was still pictured for us. Then we read it for ourselves. Okay. That was kind of cool too. Then we heard it in a sermon. That's when we first felt adult and responsible and enjoyed the story still. But then we read it again. No, actually we didn't. We skimmed it. That's when we dozed during the next sermon on the same story or text. Yeah, you've heard it once, you've heard it a million times.

Unfortunately then I think this is a problem that affects all supernatural events, both the scary and the sacred. Once the thrill of the unexpected has been delivered it soon becomes expected and that equals boredom. Yes, even of the virgin birth or of the resurrection or of other divine occasions. Einstein calls us "a dead, snuffed-out candle." He said, "The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. He who knows it not, can no longer wonder, no longer feel amazement, is as a good as a dead, snuffed-out candle." We can no longer let "this little light of mine shine." It has died. It has been snuffed out. How am I suppose to share the awesomeness of redemption - the greatest miracle ever - if I myself have lost the awe of it?

Tourniquet on Regret

Cormac McCarthy authored the book No Country for Old Men which was later adapted into film by the Coen brothers. The film though highly controversial and, at times, disturbing does share a poignant glimpse into the life of the protagonist. The protagonist is portrayed by Tommy Lee Jones and towards the end of the film there is a scene between him and his father. That scene is, I think, the climatic scene in the entire story for, at least, the protagonist. It is certainly the scene that has proven itself to be revolutionary for the character. In a way it was the drop that filled his bucket, or the straw that broke his camels back. The scene is, as I said, shared between he and his father. It is a poignant scene, though not by any accounts should it be categorized as a tender scene.

Our hero, the protagonist, asks his wheelchair ridden father what he would have done if the perpetrator that caused him to live the rest of his life in a wheelchair were still alive and free. (He'd died in prison.) To this the father quietly replies, "Nothing. There'd be no point to it." At this the son remarks his surprise and the father explains, "Well, all the time you spend trying to get back what's been took from you more is going out the door. After a while you just got to try and get a tourniquet on it."

These are the words of the wise. Grey hairs do not come alone. This man lived long enough to discover that regret should not be the priority of life. To much time is spent wasted on the infamous "what might have been" question. We forget it seems that John Greenleaf Whittier spoke of these as the saddest words, and he might well have been correct in his assumption. "For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these, 'It might have been'." Or to go more contemporary (and Country as well) it was Tim McGraw who sang something similar in his song Red Ragtop. He sang, "Well, you do what you do, and you pay for your sins, and there's no such thing as what might have been, that's a waste of time, drive you out of your mind."

This all takes me back to one of the best films ever made. Yes, you guessed it, Good Will Hunting. As with every film it does have it's flaws and by no stretch of the imagination am I, as I've repeatedly noted, endorsing all the content of any of the content I use in my blog postings. So, yes, although this film may have flaws one of them is not Robin Williams. His nomination and award of the Oscar was well deserved. Near the films halfway mark there is a particularly powerful scene in which he speaks of regret. The scene is powerful because the acting is powerful. The scene is powerful because the dialogue is powerful. The scene is powerful because even the cinematography is powerful. Yet what makes the scene most powerful is the tension of it, and that is due to the fact that the message it has to convey is so powerful. It can truly only be appreciated if it is seen but I will pass on a little of what is said during that scene. The words come from Robin Williams who plays widowed psychologist. During said scene he says, "That's why I'm not talking about a girl I met in a bar twenty years ago and how I always regretted not going over and talking to her. I don't regret the eighteen years I was married to Nancy, and I don't regret the six years I had to give up counseling when she got sick, and I don't regret the last years when she got really sick. And I sure as hell don't regret missing a damned game." Okay, now let me explain. Williams had a choice. He had a choice between cashing in on the ticket he had for some famous baseball game that went down the History hall of fame. Or he had a choice of cashing in on a a girl who made his life the happiest it could be and went down in the Life hall of fame. The point is, he had a choice. Regret is, I believe, a matter of choice. It might have been, is always a matter of choice, because what might have been might also not have been. He, Robin Williams, might have chosen the game over the girl. He might have chosen bitterness over the long haul and final death of his wife due to cancer. But he didn't. He didn't chose to regret. Like in the first film we addressed Williams put a tourniquet on regret. Will I do the same thing or will I live on (it's not even living) with regrets?

Musically Challenged

I love music. I really do, I am a big fan of music. I am also very diverse in my musical tastes. Well, no, that's not really true. I am diverse in my experience of music. In many cases (or genres) I'd even say I am a bit knowledgeable. I'll give everything a chance but my tastes are so far pretty well established. Yet I do leave a door open for more to squeak through on the wings of tolerance and curiosity. But I have to confess that right now I am a little peeved with music. Yes, peeved. Perhaps even outraged!

My most recent post had to do with feelings and the human expression of them (An Expression of Love). At one point I spoke of the poets and their particular genius in crafting the most beautiful expression of feeling. This made me think of the Coleridge illustration and I began to browse through The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis. In this small but powerful book he uses this illustration. In the book Lewis tells us that we have become "men without chests." This is an all too true tragedy. Yet there is another tragedy. We have also become "men without brains."

We can no longer feel (chests) or think (brains) on our own. Music dominates much of our life. To be totally honest I feel robbed. This is, I realize, a rant due to my own outrage and that in but a matter of minutes I'll be placidly back in my routine of musical intoxication. But right now the veil is off. The gauntlet has been thrown. The drugs have worn off. Now I see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Ha! That's the problem. I see the light at the end of the tunnel but I cannot express it without the words of a song. My outrage should not be, I'm well aware, aimed solely at music. Poetry and the other literary bastions are also responsible. At the same time I do not lay as much blame at their feet because this is, after all, the age of the cyborg. We are people wired to music. Literature though powerful still has taken a back seat in our current age.

As with the previous post, it is difficult to express our feelings. Yet I think that it is due to the fact that we are no longer in touch with them. We have dulled them by handing them over on a silver platter as it were to the gods and daemons of music. Ah, you see that's the rub, music is both a god and a daemon. It is a good and a bad thing. The fine line of discernment is hard to draw. It was Chesterton who said, "Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere." Music is an art form in which drawing that proverbial line is incredibly difficult, at times nearly impossible. Yet there is a fine line and it must be walked. The problem is that music is intoxicating and while "under" it's influence one can barely see the line, let alone walk it straight.

Lewis also spoke of the danger of living in amousia. He referred to this in his autobiography, Surprised by Joy. Music was herself once a muse. Yet she has, I'm afraid, drowned us. Pope spoke on the danger of drinking from the Pierian streams. Well, I'm afraid we've now fallen into them and drowned. We are no longer capable of addressing our own feelings. We cannot, as Coleridge, see the waterfall and exclaim "Sublime!" No, now we seek our thrills not from Nature but from music and other media agents. It's pathetic.

An Expression of Love

Someone recently wrote to me on the theme of feelings. Feelings in the emotional, not tactile sense. She wrote of inadequacy in the expression of feelings for another. She said that she felt not only inadequate, but went so far as to say that it was impossible. At the time I agreed with her. Now, well, now, I'm not so sure. Part of me agrees with her yet there is another part that disagrees, or rather wants to disagree.

Part of the reason I want to disagree is due to poetry. In the crafting of poetry - true, beautiful poetry - there are feelings expressed in ways that succeed in simply, to put it poetically, blowing me away! The height of emotion conveyed in, for example, a sonnet makes me wonder if the poet wasn't on some special wavelength with the ancient Muses.

Another reason for my wish to disagree is because I think that maybe all we do is driven by feelings. These are thoughts that have been on my mind only of late. Due mostly because of my friend's recent letter. She wrote, for example, of feeling "inadequate." Well, isn't this too a feeling?

I mean, everything we do is run on feeling. We do this because we enjoy it. We don't do that because we don't enjoy it. Enjoyment is the feeling that triggers most of our responses in life. Yet there are, I admit, actions we commit without a feeling of enjoyment. In fact, we often have to do things we don't enjoy. These are, if I may argue the point, done on a sense of duty. A feeling of enjoyment and a feeling of responsibility can both guide our actions.

Nevertheless it is difficult to express some of our feelings. Love is, I believe, the one feeling we often find most difficult to express. As Christians we like to tackle the idea of love as a feeling and once in our clutches we flog it to death until it becomes nothing but a matter of the will. Christians have transformed love into a matter of commitment and robbed it of the original God-intended thrill. Either extreme is, of course, dangerous.

Love is often spoken of as "chemistry" between two people. That is a very good description. Love, like chemistry, is something no one really understands. Some people, smart people, can have a real good grasp on understanding some of the issues of chemistry (or love), but no one, I believe, ever really understands it at all. There is also a big difference between love and chemistry. People enjoy love, not many people enjoy chemistry (and I can't quite blame them either).

Could this be then why love is so often associated, at least in the secular realm, with feelings? Feelings do not require explanation. Perhaps, as my friend suggested, it is impossible to express them as well. I've said this before, but I strongly believe it, and will just throw it on the table once again. Love is something that cannot be defined. God is love and neither God nor love can be defined. Yet both can be described. God is described, for example, by His attributes. So with love. Love is described by it's virtues or qualities. Many of these are found in the classic I Corinthians 13 passage. There it speaks of patience, selflessness, graciousness and many other virtues which sum up not a definition but rather a description of love. Thomas Watson said, "Love is the queen of the graces; it outshines all the others, as the sun the lesser planets."

Perhaps then love is indeed something that cannot be expressed. Yet Lewis put it well when he said, "One loves though one hardly knows how. " Though we may not know how to love, or even how to express our love, we still do. We take comfort in knowing this.

A Quiet Love

He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing. Zephaniah 3:17

This text has always intrigued me. I am not fully sure of the meaning behind it all, but here are a few thoughts on the matter. According to erudite scholars such as Matthew Henry, the Lord's rejoicing over us with gladness is similar to the exultant rejoicing of a groom over his bride. Absolute ecstasy.

The second part of the verse is not about His quieting us. No, instead it has to do with Him. He will be quiet. Some take this to mean that He will not reproach us for our faults. It's true. He forgave them and He forgot them. They will not be brought back from their dead-sea burial. One teacher told me that if God buried our sins in the deepest sea that there was no longer any need for us to go fishing there. Interesting thought.

But I like to think of Christ as He stood silent before the slanderous accusations that were slapped across His face by Roman and Jewish authorities. Like a Lamb He remained silent, even while being led to the slaughter. In His whispers He expresses His delight. In His shouts He calls for our attention. But in His silence He shows us His love. Jesus delivered many great discourses. The Beatitudes on the Sermon of the Mount or the Last Supper could count as two of the very greatest discourses of all time. Yet the most sublime discourse He ever delivered was His silence prior to our salvation.

God is referred to in many ways. They speak of Him crying. They speak of Him thundering. They speak of Him whispering. They speak of Him glowing or shining. Lewis writes "[John] Donne points out that we are never told He laughed; it is difficult in reading the Gospels not to believe, and to tremble in believing, that He smiled." Yet here, in the third part of the verse, we see Him singing. What an amazing thought.

I won't even pretend to write anything about God singing. But just think about it. He was quiet for us, all because He loved us. There will also come a day when He will sing for us. Perhaps while the prodigal was away there was silence in the home, but on his return there was a fiesta, a real party. They had, I'm sure, singing and dancing too! On our conversion the Bible tells us that the angels start jammin' in Heaven. They have a real celebration. God sings, and I think He might even give us each our own serenade.

Besetting Sins

I'm not sure this is a very good idea, but bear with me. Have you ever thanked God for besetting sins?

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. - Hebrews 12:1

When it speaks of sins that ensnare or beset us it is reminiscent of Genesis 4 when God warned Cain that sin was crouching at his door, ready to pounce. We all have these kinds of sin. We all struggle with all kinds of sin. In fact, I'd say we all struggle with all sins to one degree or another. But there are particular sins which seem to beset us more forcefully than others. This, so it turns out, might actually be a good thing.

Lewis wrote, "If you are a nice person - if Virtue comes easily to you - beware! Much is expected from those to whom much is given. If you mistake for your own merits what are really God's gifts to you through naure, and if you are contented with simply being nice, you are still a rebel: and all those gifts will only make your fall more terrible, your corruption more complicated, your bad example more disastrous. The Devil was an archangel once; his natural gifts were as far above yours as yours are above those of a chimpanzee.

But if you are a poor creature - poisoned by a wretched upbringing in some house full of vulgar jealousies and senseless quarrels - saddled, by no choice of your own, with some loathsome sexual perversion - nagged day in and day out by an inferiority complext that makes you snap at your best friends - do not despair. He knows all about it. You are one of the poor whom He blessed. He knows what a wretched machine you are trying to drive. Keep on. Do what you can. One day (perhaps in another world, but perhaps far sooner than that) He will fling it on the scrap-heap and give you a new one. And then you may astonish us all - not least yourself: for you have learned your driving in a hard school."

Switch the analogy of driving that Lewis made for the one made by the author of Hebrews (who was not, I believe, Saint Paul), the one about the race. Interestingly enough Lewis writes about himself in the second paragraph. His upbringing was filled with jealousies and quarrels. He was indeed saddled with a sexual perversion and often felt an inferiority complex around others. Yet look now at how he ran. Look at the legacy he left behind. Paul, though probably not the author of Hebrews, also ran an incredible race even with a thorn in his flesh.

Here is the wonderful news about our sin, I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against Him. Until He pleads my case and executes justice for me. He will bring me forth to the light; I will see His righteousness (Micah 7:9). I'm glad, in a way, to have these sins. They help me become more Christ-like. I am even more glad to have Him as my Advocate. He pleads my case, and does so successfully because He pleads with His own righteousness. If I were to plead my own case all I'd have to show would be filthy rags! I'd be doomed to failure even before beginning. Our sins, even those besetting ones, have all been forgiven because of His righteousness.

His righteousness puts my sin in proper perspective. It also puts His grace in proper perspective. It doesn't matter what your besetting sin might be. John Piper wrote a post titled, Missions and Masturbation and at one point wrote in it, "Periodic failure in this area [masturbation] no more disqualifies you from ministry than periodic failures of impatience (which is also a sin)." The sin doesn't matter, the grace does. The grace of God covers it all. Praise God for His grace!

The Worship Centre

During one of our Chapel services the invited speaker offered a three day series on Beauty, particular the Beauty of God. His messages struck deep and were probably the best that semester. The speaker, Steve DeWitt, encouraged us to glorify God in all things. The Bible tells us to worship God even through our meals. C. S. Lewis suggests that we are to worship God in work and play. DeWitt spoke of worshipping God in all things, including sex. He called this "the worship centre" and spoke of the bed as the marriage altar.

C. S. Lewis, while discussing sex in the afterlife in his book Miracles commented, "The letter and spirit of Scripture, and of all Christianity, forbid us to suppose that life in the New Creation will be a sexual life; and this reduces our imagination to the withering alternatives either of bodies which are hardly recognisable as human bodies at all or else of a perpetual fast. As regards the fast, I think our present outlook might be like that of a small boy who, on being told that the sexual act was the highest bodily pleasure, should immediately ask whether you ate chocolates at the same time. On receiving the answer 'No,' he might regard the absence of chocolates as the chief characteristic of sexuality. In vain would you tell him that the reason why lovers in their carnal raptures don't bother about chocolates is that they have something better to think of. The boy knows chocolate: he does not know the positive thing which excludes it. We are in the same position. We know the sexual life; we do not know, except in glimpses, the other thing which, in Heaven, will leave no room for it. Hence where fulness awaits us we anticipate fasting. In denying the sexual life, as we now understand it, makes any part of the final beatitude, it is not of course necessary to suppose that the distinction of sexes will disappear. What is no longer needed for biological purposes may be expected to survive for splendour. Sexuality is the instrument both of virginity and conjugal virtue; neither men nor women will be asked to throw away the weapon they have used victoriously. It is the beaten and the fugitives who throw away their swords. The conquerors sheathe theirs and retain them."

Augustine and Aquinas both believed that our identities as male and female are kept intact. According to the account of Lazarus and the Rich Man their identities were not changed into mystical spirits, but rather were kept fully recognizable.

Really, the only negating factor to the belief of sexuality in heaven is found in the passage of Matthew 22 where Christ addresses the inquisitive Pharisees on the matter of a woman with multiple husbands. Jesus replies that they would neither give nor be given in marriage.

But now I ask, what is the purpose of eating? You would probably reply, "To satisfy hunger." You're right. But what of Heaven? In Heaven there will be banquets and feasts of exquisite proportions and yet we will never be hungry. So what is the purpose of sexuality? You will probably respond by saying that it is for procreation and recreation. Lewis suggests that though the biological purposes (procreation) be anulled the recreational (splendour) might survive.

Prior to the Fall the Garden was a place of shameless nudity, and, probably, sexuality as well. I doubt that God, being the Creator of this gift (sex), would abolish it with our entrance into Heaven. Just as He does not abolish our physicality or identity, so I doubt He would abolish our sexuality. Or as a friend of mine once put it, "What will the bedrooms of our Heavenly mansions be for? Not just sleeping, I hope." Even so it doesn't really matter all that much because with or without chocolates (sex) Heaven will be a wonderful place. In the end I suppose it doesn't matter so much where I end up as who I end up with. I just want to be with Jesus.

An Autobiography

Somehow I gathered enough of my own conceit together to think that I could draft my own biography. It was a rather simple draft, just a basic outline and some notations. My autobiography was going to be titled The Truth and would consist of four chapters. I would begin with a prologue to explain a few things, a prologue titled Time.The first chapter was going to be titled Testimony for my earliest memory pertains to my salvation at age three. The second chapter would deal with some of the scars in my life and would be titled Trauma. The third chapter would be titled Tragedy. The fourth and final chapter would be titled Triumph. Notice how the entire piece alliterated. What a fool!

Now, in retrospect, for I drafted this when I was in my late teens, I see how much of a fool I was. My story should begin as it began for Shakespeare's Macbeth. It should be - and it is - "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." Certainly my tale is told by an idiot, but it does, I believe, signify something. It signifies quite a bit, in fact. But everything of significance in it is due to Him. Not to me. It is now His story. I'll let Him draft out the pages, polish them up, and then sign it off in the end.