myself as a greek talking parrot OR As the Ruin Falls

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love --a scholar's parrot may talk Greek--
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

-C S Lewis

i read this poem and a tear came to my eye..
yes, this is me.
masking my desire to love as a solely selfless desire.. and struggling to love those who "don't love" as i have "so attained" to. yes, i have lovingly deceived myself in thinking my love was selfless. i think ignorance to our selfish ambitions is bliss. and when i'm forced to see myself for what i really am... forced to see how much i am deeply in love with my "loving" self... it can be quite a sobering experience. wisdom brings pain.
ooh, but what a revelation.. and then comes what freedom! to see reality. to understand His grace again.. and conceive that i am but human in need of a love far beyond my own. a love that flattens me and uplifts me with the rest of humankind. again, we are equals, limited in love and awing at Love's existence.
He again looks at me with loving eyes, sprinkles the ground with flecks of gold and green and watches as I fall on my face amongst his demonstration of love. "God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous."

never seed a pomegranate in a white hoody and other such advices

I was seeding a pomegranate in my white hoody and managed to get the blood red juice everywhere. I guess it's not surprising that when i was a teenager my friends were going to buy me a book that told me what stained and what would wash out. I think i like to get dirty. Anyways, it made me think of my mom. For some random reason i suddenly remembered this conversation we had when i was a child. I remember re-telling her some story about the latest hollywood star and how amazing, beautiful and talented they were. My mom smiled at me from our large brown couch and said, "Stephanie the 'stars' are just people, like you and me." today i hold the same value as my mom. A value that all people are equal and stand before God the same regardless of status, prestige, wealth, education, beauty, talent, (place your favourite social value here), etc. I guess i'm just remembering what i've been raised in. Only as an adult (can i call myself that?) have i come to realize what a great value system my parents held and how they truly lived it out. i am so blessed to have been brought up with their examples.
My parents were both hippies at one point, both valued nutrition/health, the environment, equality, love and servanthood. Therefore i grew up eating what i thought disgusting healthy food, recycling EVERYTHING that could be recycled and wearing hand-me-down clothes. Of course no child admires these things when they are young. It's just annoying and uncool. My mom would drive us to school in a brown rusty station wagon that was practically falling apart, stalled at every corner and made loud noises in the cold winter. I was embarrassed. My mom thought, "Use it until it's broken." she (and my dad) had a sense of "waste not, want not." some people have nothing. We have a car to get around in, and look! it talks to us!
When i was little everyone compared what their moms made them for their lunches. I remember having sandwiches made of more seeds than bread substance, trying to transfer as much crumbling "bread" from my fingers into my mouth as possible; and an apple for dessert. I always envied the kid who got chips and sandwiches on beautiful white bread.
My mom always told us we were beautiful. That we could do anything we wanted. That we were loved no matter what happened, whether we got bad grades or not, whether we made the team or not, whether we quit piano (ahem..) or not!
My mom painted, danced, played outdoors, went on sleepovers with friends in her 40's, wrote poetry, baked, made crafts, played guitar, took care of the elderly. She was (is) amazing. But as i grow up and look back what is most amazing about my mom amidst her various talents and admirable qualities - she loved.
My dad told me a couple months ago something that brought tears to my eyes. He said that when my mother was dying and was asked what she wanted to do at the great banquet feast in heaven her reply was, "I want to serve."
That's my mom!! Her life to me is the greatest of advices!

fear of vulnerability

pride?

beautiful glimpses of love

The Enemy [God] wants to bring humans to a state of mind in which s/he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the fact, without being any more (or less) or otherwise glad at having done it than s/he would be if it had been done by another. The Enemy wants him/her, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his/her own favour that they can rejoice in their own talents as frankly and gratefully as in their neighbour's talents - or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each human, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures (even his/herself) as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long-term policy, I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self-love - a charity and gratitude for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours. For we must never forget what is the most repellent and inexplicable trait in our Enemy; He really loves the hairless bipeds He has created and always gives back to them with His right hand what He has taken away with His left.

the problem of Jesus

What i mean with this sentence is the issue, let's say necessity, of Jesus for salvation. Honestly, this last year at Prov has been a new discovery of who Jesus is, and why he is so vitally important. For what? SO many things! But that response to my own question (so many things) seems to be my problem - at least when in dialogue with others.
I'm reading Eat, Pray and Love, a book about a woman who goes on a spiritual journey and finds God - Love. AWESOME! However, at the beginning of her book she details her meaning in the word "God." One that I can surely agree with (mostly), except that it's missing one not so tiny detail. Jesus Christ - human God. To me (and it has not always been so) Jesus has become everything! All things wonderful and good. The Incarnation is our HOPE! It's Love's action. It's living, breathing, sensational, relational God. It's more than the feeling of God one gets. It changes humanity, the systems of our societies, cultures, history, etc. It changes how we live, how we love, how we understand faith and grace and perhaps most of all a world so completely contrary to our own: directly opposite - the Kingdom. For me, this is the clincher. I think that anyone and everyone is in love with love. We need it, we know it, we seek it, long for it, look for it, etc. So the fact that God is Love (as many understand and accept) and love is (supposed to be) the foundation of the Christian faith, it is easy to swallow. What I mean is, anyone would easily adopt a belief or faith in Love. Eventually we all come to know this is the answer to our human dilemma.
So what? We love! Awesome! And I truly mean that. I'm a firm believer in love - God. - Jesus. But wait - Jesus is forgotten! Love may be convincing, but then love seems to be so relative today and that's my problem. People can believe in love it seems as long as they are experiencing it as they wish..
God is/may be attractive to almost anyone now (as I'm reading lately - Go Oprah!). Why? Because most come to the conclusion that "He" is Love and also so other, ineffable - so God then can become whatever I wish. And better yet, He loves me! I find this dangerous because then God isn't God. He's whatever I deem Him through my personal experiences. God is everything and then nothing. But Jesus gives the world a clearer picture of God. The indescribable now described. Love in the flesh and even more than that (as I said earlier) the Kingdom - the Kingdom FULLY OTHER (fully from God - the fully other ONE) than our Kingdoms. That's why it grabs me and reveals to me the truth, the hope, the true life from God - the other delivered a Kingdom fully other that we can live and participate in, if we so choose. A Kingdom where the last are the first, where the oppressed are blessed, where the dead are alive, where fashion, status, money, etc. mean nothing, but conditions of the heart are everything. Where no one is elevated and no one oppressed, but all stand equal before the love of God. Where the pursuit of riches, wealth, prestige and happiness are foolishness in the fullness and happiness the Kingdom brings - through Jesus.
You see, without Jesus we just have our own thoughts and interpretations of God. We can have great euphoric experiences without having to touch anyone, or have it infiltrate the world at all. To me, that is a most insignificant power. But God Jesus not only reaches the heart in love with all sensational experience, but through him creates a bond and change and love in us for the rest of humanity and all creation. All in love! Not far off, but attainable and living and yet life so other from our normal human tendencies. So attainable otherness in love through Jesus Christ. Therefore, I have come to believe, he's not only necessary, but is the mysterious truth made known for all humanity and creation.
...some thoughts as I've pondered Him.