another Sunday (08/01/2010)

This morning I woke up, dragged myself to the shower, got dressed, took my medications (8 capsules & pills), hugged my nine-year-old (little one sound asleep), left home half-awake, bought a toasted raisin bagel with cream cheese with a large coffee and took the Q32 for a 45-minute bus ride to church. It was another Sunday morning that I'd go to church to hear the Word of God and a good sermon that could feed my soul while hoping for that solace and shelter from and within God.

Today being Communion Sunday, we shared the feast of Christ (the sacrament of The Lord's Supper) -- a piece of stale bread of delicious life and droplets of grape juice from the cup of sweet salvation -- and hence felt a little closer to God. Faith can be so illogical that it can makes us doubt it.

Nonetheless it was merely another Sunday in church as I greeted my friends -- especially Charlene who starting today is now part of the staff at FAPC (master degree in divinity, but not yet called to be a pastor). As much as I come to church every Sunday, I once again feel empty inside -- lack of faith.

After service, I didn't go to coffee hour although I could've used some coffee to fully wake up. I just took the Q32 back to where I live.

Am I lying to myself? Do I have a real faith that I can hold onto (http://project05952381.blogspot.com/2010/07/my-lack-of-faith-my-mental-disease.html)? At least, it's clearly now a roller coaster going up and down in that human mystery called faith.

Maybe the question should be how much faith I've got today or any given day. In such case, I felt empty inside this morning, but little satisfied after church.

At the end of the day, faith's simply a mental state, but does my momentary (day to day, hour to hour, minute to minute) state bring me closer to God?

my lack of faith & my mental disease

Can it be that the problem with my lack of faith is really my defective brain? Maybe I think so much that I believe too little. Maybe I'm too stupid to have this illogical faith. Then again perhaps I'm too smart to believe in God enough.

In all, it's the constant battle between my brain and my soul, the demons in my head killing the angel that I might have been as a child (if ever), in other words the clash between good and evil in me. This just drives me crazy having two opposites in me killing each other every day. Sometimes there seems to be a truce and feel at peace, but this is rare.

Sometimes people ask if there's a Heaven or if there's a God. I've lived and felt the horror of hell in my flesh and mind. Hence I'm sure there's a God -- the Lord, His Word and His Kingdom. Nonetheless knowing that there's a God in Heaven doesn't mean I've got enough faith.

Maybe I know too much for my own good. Of course, I might just too little that I'm blinded. How could I even think about leading (http://project05952381.blogspot.com/2010/07/devotionals-pt-3-rock-roll-ministry.html)? I might just be to stupid to think so.

what not to do, touch, see, listen, taste, smell, feel, have sex with, etc

I still have issues trying to understand what are proper or correct things to do as a Christian -- well aside from anything that breaks the Law of Moses of course.

Some would say that horror movies are not godly correct. The same has been said about music (for example, rock & roll), art (nudes, how sick), food (pork, non Kosher/Halal filth), clothes (miniskirts, oh such horror), flesh (sex, how dirty) and probably every single thing in the cosmos (including aliens in other worlds).

Considering all this, most of the universe if not all is from the devil and will trigger our eternal damnation. That means that we're surrounded by devil music, devil art, devil food, devil clothes (Halloween costumes most likely included), devil flesh (devil in the flesh) and a devil universe/reality. This assumption is absurd as you can read especially in Genesis 1:4, 1:10, 1:12, 1:18 and 1:21.

"1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw it was good.
11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.
14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."
-- Genesis 1:1-28 (KJV)

God made everything across the whole cosmos and then proclaimed it GOOD. We make things good or bad, pure or filthy. It's all in our minds and souls. Hence trying to be completely honest to ourselves and leaving our selfish prejudice aside, what's godly correct and what's not? Maybe the best answer came from a minister who told me to avoid anything that takes us away from the Light.

I guess this means that watching a gory movie with zombies and other monsters is fine as long as it doesn't affect my faith. After all that movie's merely a piece of fiction to take our minds off our problems for an hour or two (four hours in the case of Lord of the Rings) and make us laugh.