As The World Turns

Sometimes I wonder if I think far too much. It's not unusual for me to chew on an issue for weeks or months, especially when the matter in question leads directly to another equally important bone of contention.

I'm not the only person who believes that things happen for a purpose. And I'm also not the only one who realizes that this philosophical viewpoint can be tough to hold when terrible things befall us, or the people we love. We battle with the meaning of life when unexpected things like disasters, or illnesses, or savagery come knocking at the front door. At those times it's much easier for me to consider life a collection of random disconnected events rather than to hand them over to faith and purpose. Yes, I choose to believe in destiny, but it's good to take a vacation from it once in a while.

I was born on the other side of the world, in Indonesia, and we were hustled aboard a ship bound for The Netherlands not two months after that. Four years later we immigrated to America where I grew up in Los Angeles. Those of us who originate in far-off places can at times feel the goading of the questions of fate: "What if we had never left? How would my life be different?" I may have been spared Polio but I surely would not have met my wife and therefore not have the children that we do now.

I am grateful and blessed that life has led me down these roads. And I would not change even a small part of the details. Except for the times I feel lost in my tent, I love the road of life my feet are traveling. I choose not to live in the "What if?" I think more and more I try to live in the "What now?" What great unseen blessing can we find down this unfamiliar road? I know, easier said than done.

Young Glen, left of center, with family. Photo taken just prior to immigration to America.

Soothing the Savage Beast

When I was 11 years old my mom bought me my first guitar—a black and red beauty, wrapped in a plastic bag, and hanging by the checkout counter at Thrifty's. At 14 years old I was given the chance to lead worship for youth group and I haven't put the instrument down since. Over the past 40 years of playing, there has truly been something about the guitar that has gone beyond wood, and steel, and finger pain. It has become a communication device. And by that I mean God explains himself to me through it. I haven't decided whether this is a wonderful fringe benefit of music or the intended purpose for it all along.

Playing the guitar slackens the tension in my heart. I do not know all the dynamics of it, but it somehow has the power to break human complexity down to divine simplicity. This is a serious life-saving attribute for a person like me. When I reach the end of myself and I have no answers for any of the questions that call for timely resolutions, I look for my guitar. Some might label it a crutch. Well then, let's label oxygen a crutch as well.

Playing the guitar, for me, slows the heartbeat of life, dials down the heat, and turns down the volume. Excuse me now; I think I'll go pick up my guitar....

Some Things In Life We Recycle, Others We Must Throw Away

Earlier I let you know that I am a tent dweller. But I have yet to tell you where my tent is parked. Since we know each other a little better now, I feel safe enough to let you know that my tent is pitched in my mother-in-law's backyard. There! I said it.

It has taken me many, many months to feel comfortable enough to speak about my failures. I fell into this abyss because I was hopelessly ruled by the standards of success set down by our culture. Driven by appearances, and kept in line by false perceptions, I laid down under the weight of what I thought I should be. And then, skirting the periphery of life, staying in the shadows, I stole down the backstreets of cynicism.

Over time I found out that keeping to myself was very unhealthy. As difficult as it was, I had to find ways of opening up to others about the toughest thing I've ever had to experience. I began by writing my thoughts and feelings down which eventually became a book called Wisdom's Gait. Writing was very therapeutic and brought me to a place of greater wholeness once again. As I became engulfed in writing the book, I also found that I could more easily express my feelings and emotions to real persons—as if writing was practice for actual heartfelt relationship. And that, above anything else, proved to be the greatest healing factor. We need other people to make it in this life.

I'm well enough now to let you know that it nearly destroyed me to have to move into the tent in my mother-in-law's yard. I had never felt as betrayed by God as I did the first several months in the tent. It seemed as if God turned away from me and left me to fend for myself. I was lost and no one was organizing a search party.

We sure learn a lot about ourselves, and life around us, when we come to an impasse. All of life suddenly seems to become a huge pile of unanswered questions. Can we make the decision to believe while we feel absolutely abandoned by the object of our faith? Can we get up in the morning when a good reason to is hard to find? Can we determine what is important enough to work through and what should be thrown away?

Finding the answers to questions like these determines the outcome of tomorrow. But let's just get through today first.

Where God Lives

There are many, many, marginalized and disenfranchised people on earth. This has always been true, though it seems especially so in these times. More often than not, the people I look to for inspiration are among the broken and disparaged of society.

• I look to people who strive to make peace with their allotment long enough to stretch out their hands to help others overcome their losses.

• I look to people who have risen above their discontent, dislodging, discomfort, and disassociation to hold out a guiding candle of hope for others. 

• I look to people who have little left to lose for they are the ones no longer afraid of losing. 

• I look to people more concerned with cooperation than competition.

• I look to people who speak less yet speak volumes at the same time.

What is it that makes these people so inspiring to me? It might be that hardship can pare us down toward the beauty of honesty and simplicity of heart. But more than that, I think it's because I see the glory of the Lord in their lives. The Lord inhabits their words and their deeds at once—a combination that can change the world.

Looking For Signs

Have you ever asked God to give you a sign and what you got was...

?

The Old Thing-A-Ma-Switch

When I was in my early teens a good friend sat me down and asked what I most wanted from God. After a few moments of deep thought I responded, "I want God to give me wisdom"—imagining that I would wake up the next morning with new found insight. Of course, it didn't happen that way. 

Still, when I think back to my friend's query I sometimes half-wish I could have my response retracted. I believe my reply somehow set in motion a journey toward knowing more of the Lord's heart—a journey that would take the rest of my life. I realize now that to have a measure of wisdom concerning life means having to pay the price to get it! I now know I have to experience and endure the process which nurtures the faith seeds that will eventually sprout up to become glorious discernment. The problem with all of this is that it can take excruciatingly long years to accomplish. Alas, knowing the timely nurturing effects of manure on our plantings doesn't necessarily improve on the stink of it. It's conceivable that we may have to live with the smell of our failures in order to gain wisdom concerning them.

This morning I was imagining how neat it would be to have a wisdom "thing-a-ma-switch". A thing-a-ma-switch that I could throw whenever I needed to find enlightenment. When an issue arose that needed quick smarts I would simply flick open my options, choose the appropriate solution, and be on my way. The downside of my thing-a-ma-switch, I realize, is that I would most assuredly choose the easiest solution every time. The option, which causes me the least amount of disruption, discomfort, expense, heartbreak, embarrassment, or delay, would undoubtedly be the one I would choose.

I'm grateful that there is no real thing-a-ma-switch, for it would truly be to my demise. As much as I hate enduring the unknown, I know now there is no better way to gain access into the infinite wisdom of God than finding it down the less desirable, unmapped roads of life.

Why Wisdom's Gait?

The S.S. Zuiderkruis (Southerncross), circa late 1950s

I walk in a gimpy manner—like Chester, from Gunsmoke. My pronounced gait is the result of having contracted Polio onboard a ship during the process of relocation from our home in Indonesia to The Netherlands in 1957. The ship's name was the S.S. Zuiderkruis and it will be forever etched in my mind.

Above and beyond any other influence, Polio has been the overriding constant that has defined my past. And if I were honest I would say that it still roams the backstreets of my mind looking for an unguarded doorway into my soul. I like to think that Polio’s influence over who I am has diminished through the years. And truthfully, many of the emotional shackles of the disease have been loosed and placed safely out of the way. Still, I’m wearied at times by the hardwearing power of certain thought processes that continue to be leveled at me when my defenses are down and rainwater is coming into my tent. Decades of self-inspection and adjustments, years of failing and compensating, have all resulted in discovering some intricate and complex details of the human heart and mind.

Through it all I found that the best way to find a measure of peace about some of the unchangeable things in life is to find God's wisdom on the subject. If I cannot conquer a thing by myself then I better do my best to let God's insight and clarity bring the deliverance, restoration, and healing I desperately need. Pursuing God's wisdom, though, can take you down some dimly lit roads. And the pathway to peace may take you straight through the town of turmoil before journey's end. That's the way it seems to be set up in God's mind. Wisdom's gait is just as awkward as my own gait. They may, I suspect, be one and the same.

Fear and Faith: BFFs

I don’t offer up information about myself very easily—I never have. In fact, speaking so freely about the details of my tent life is something I never imagined I could ever do. It does not fit into my “personality profile”. When I was young I remember consciously making the decision to avoid self-disclosure. (More on that later)

When I first became a tent-dweller I hid myself away from everyone. The shame I felt over not having the ability to be “successful” in life, drove me into seclusion. I made calculated efforts to avoid all contact with family, friends, and neighbors. Fear of others confirming my own thoughts of personal failure became enough to keep myself hidden away and out of sight for months. Every moment became a challenge to overcome. Each breath became an ordeal to get through. Every thought felt as if it weighed a hundred pounds. The simple breaking of a shoestring became another hardship attempting to claim the better of me—another moment of deliberating my choices of succumbing to anger or of maintaining hopefulness. My life became a telling of minutes and hours rather than weeks, months, or years. I was ruled by Fear and I have come to know him on a deep level.

Fear tallies and rations out life. Fear collects the remnants of a shattered life together and measures them against the days that lie ahead. Fear rations what is left of money, hope, time, strength, and optimism—absolutely everything gets tallied. A simple optimistic thought had become an exorbitant luxury and therefore I refrained from showing too much optimism, fearing future lack. Like a farmer standing in a field counting the ears of corn the meager season would produce, calculating his crop against the days of the long winter ahead, I came to surveying the days to come with my close associate Fear and his scrawny cousin Futility.

Faith is the opposite of Fear. But they certainly are not unacquainted. In fact, they seem to hang around each other a lot these days—almost as if they are roommates. I cannot have a conversation with Faith without Fear jumping in trying to make a point. I like to hang around Faith much more than Fear. Faith seems calmer and less troubled by every little thing. Faith is not afraid of the future and has little concern over the “unknown”. Faith rests in the sure promises of God and in the extravagance of hopefulness. But faith can be agonizingly elusive. He'll take off without saying where he's going or where he can be reached—and that bugs me.

Is this the end, or just the beginning?

The sudden clamor of little dogs yapping startles me into awareness in the predawn. What’s all the fuss about now? I groan. All I want is just a little more sleep. I try turning over in an attempt to shut out the little irritants. But then, as if part of a finely orchestrated production, a low rumble begins on cue. It’s the unmistakable sound of a large, heavy trash container as it slowly starts rolling that shakes the last bit of drowsiness loose from my mind. Oh, it’s Friday. I realize. And that means the intrusive low rumble will soon crescendo to a bump-scrape-roll-and-boom. It’s trash pick-up day on our street and my neighbor to the right, realizing that he has forgotten to curb his trash receptacles the night before, is now attempting to accomplish the chore with minimal disruption to those still locked in blissful sleep. The trouble is that the little yapping dogs, standing guard to the left, will not allow his task to be completed without their input. As hard as he tries, my neighbor cannot go unnoticed by the little sentries and the confrontation escalates with each successive can. Inevitably, as he abandons all hope of remaining undetected, he begins to hurry his task to keep the duration of the unfolding drama as short as possible. Now, as the yapping gets more furious, the thunder of rolling trashcans gets even more desperate and rushed. I begin to feel my neighbor’s pain as I lie there in amazement. His first trip down the long asphalt driveway is followed by another, and then another—all accompanied by the incessant yapping of delusional little dogs. It’s time to get up, I decide, crawling out from under my warm blanket.  

Well, looks like I’m still here. I think to myself as I carefully peer outside. Each night as I go to sleep I pray that I would wake to find things changed. I ask God to provide a miracle that would transport me, while I slept, to a place far away from where I am. It’s cold. Five steps from here to the back door.... Can I make it without getting too wet? Just don’t trip and fall, like last time, I caution myself. After taking in a deep breath to help gather some determination, out I go. 

I am a tent-dweller. I belong to the constituency of canvas. I did not choose this tent life. It pursued me and overcame me. I used to be a house-dweller. I used to live within real walls, with real glass for windows, and a solid roof overhead. I used to have a real doorknob, rather than the plastic, dysfunctional zipper that I have now. I used to have a light-switch, a floor, and the luxury of standing up straight in the morning. I would wake up to the distant, sounds of predawn, or even better, to no sounds at all. But these days the rumble of the rolling Friday morning trash containers, little yapping dogs, and the construct of poles and canvas that I call my room, is my unwanted reality. On some days, as I brace for the chill, I struggle with the emotional pain of morning. For some reason, today I’m okay—but it’s still early.... 

The preceding excerpt is actually taken from a true story. My story. I begin this blog with this post because I don't know where else to start. Capturing my thoughts is sometimes like trying to count patrons at the bus station when they are all simultaneously scurrying in every direction. It's tricky getting my brain to slow down to a writing pace—especially my hunt-and-peck writing pace. I just needed to start and let my thoughts start flowing onto the page.

Like many stories, mine is filled with unexpected turns. Yet enduring the plot twists of life have, over time, made me into the person I am. Fifty-two years of the unanticipated have taught me a little bit about living. Not the least of which is to steer clear of second-guessing and fortunetellers. I can no longer live with such fantasies for they conflict with my newfound conviction that my life, with all of its failures, is worth something in its broken state.

Being a broken man does not make me a weak man. The cracks in my soul are now filled with much stronger stuff than what was there before. Failure brings opportunity to show strength, but not the strength of which you might be thinking.

Today I believe that this tent life is more of a beginning of things than the end of them. I will try to explain some of these thoughts through the days, weeks, and possibly months that lie ahead. I hope they help a little.

My tent, in the shadow of the ominous Station Fire of 2009.