Choices.

So I have been around some people the past few days who are all about choices.  Our choices can empower us.

Really?  You mean we can be who we choose to be?  I disagreed with that for years.  Now, I think our choices are paramount.

Years of the sovereignty of God not correctly processed led to some really incorrect ideas floating around my noggin.  And there's Joseph and all that happened to him.  I've been told dualism; I'm not sure about dualism.

I've been reading and thinking through some metaphysics lately.  Perhaps we have misunderstood the reality of God?  Perhaps the dualism of man's responsibility and God's sovereignty is only apparent because we have not grasped the reality of the Father.

I look back at the choices I have made in the past two years and wonder...

Did God intend good out of my thoughtlessness and carelessness?  Yeah, good has come.  But there's still this struggle.

With choices, is it about spending hours in prayer hoping God will change something, or is it making the choice to actively change things?  Is it both?  Neither?

If I say choices, then I get the credit.  If I say God, then perhaps the same nothing will continue to exist that has been floating around for quite some time.  If I say both, then I may have some logically inconsistent premises.  If I say neither, then I'm really screwed.

However, to say my choices are the key is just stupid or at least incomplete.  It may be my choices that turn the point, but experience has shown me I can't make the right choices.  Something has to flip.  A busted hammer can't mend itself.  And though I want to make right choices, I don't.  Is this where God comes in?

Twelve step programs say we need a higher power.  A man could choose a lamppost as his higher power.  It's always there.  It always serves its purpose.  I wonder if any studies have been done on the sobriety of men who chose the lamppost as their higher power.

So God causes the flip.  I ask Him and He does it.  I don't ask and He doesn't do it.  So does that mean the deciding factor is my asking?  Guess so.  Well that doesn't seem right because I get credit.  But the man with a pain who decides to go to the doctor doesn't get credit for the remedy the doctor applies.  What was it that caused him to go to the doctor or me to ask God?  We get into an infinite regress and someone wises up and just says God.  I don't buy it, at least not in that packaging.  Something doesn't quite connect here.  Out grasp of reality is likely a little shaky.

I don't have answers.  I have questions.  But I'm seeking the answers.

This isn't some crisis of faith.  This isn't questioning the existence of God.  This is a question of how well do we understand the reality of God and the reality of our existence.  Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.  He is the way to live as social creatures.  He is our spiritual life.  But have we really applied ourselves to an understanding of what it means that He is the truth?

I only expect one reader to have any clue where I'm coming from.  For the rest of you, I hope that you can, like me, ponder whether we've believed things that are contradictory without thinking you're sinning and without doubting God's existence and Christ His Son.

Wrenches.

There’s a satisfaction in turning a wrench or a screwdriver or ratchet that just isn’t found anywhere else.  It seems that whether the task is simple or complex, I derive a singular and unique pleasure from working with simple tools.

I bought a motorcycle a few weeks ago and just now I was spending a few moments adjusting the right side of the handle bars.  The next project is to sort out an oil leak.  The previous owner had a shop fix an oil leak; I’m inclined to believe they may have taken money for services NOT rendered.  That’s the way it goes sometimes.

This morning we enjoyed a sermon on mature masculinity.  Many points were made, among which was the fact that our masculinity is measured within the context of our interactions with and concerning females.  How do I treat them, talk about them, and think about them?  It was much needed for many of us, for myself particularly.  It gave me much to think about in addition to the countless other topics that I consider each day.

This bike doesn’t make me more manly.  Like so many other things, it just is.  The guns I own do not make me more manly, they just are.

I’ve not written anything recently and perhaps I’m a tad rusty.  Or at least many of my thoughts over these recent months are not as ordered and fully articulated as I would like them to be for sharing with others.  I hope to tidy up a bit and see if I can get some thoughts out.

I enjoy turning wrenches, running my saw, or wielding my axes and hammers.

I hope to get my hands dirty and mind tidied a bit.  You’ll know if either happen any time soon.