celestial kiss

This is a quick sketch I did on 09/26/07 while I was watching one of my favorite films: Howl’s Moving Castle. This is in my journal that I have for my Introduction to Art Therapy class where I am being taught how to facilitate Art Therapy sessions. I sketched this very quickly in pencil and then just used regular Crayola crayons to color it in (which I did very hurriedly). But this is my favorite scene in the film for me and I identify with the girl Sophie, who must be feeling in this scene such a sense of protection and fulfillment. It’s my favorite moment in the movie.

Unfortunately, the photo washes out the color of the original and makes it look "dirty".

friendship

My friend, Heather, came over on Friday and decided to climb up on the balcony while we were hanging out and take my picture. You'll have to forgive the goofy smiles on my face, I can't help being like that when I'm around Heather.

So I had to take her picture as well...

The beautiful and brilliant photographer, my good friend, Heather.

true love

I believe that a basis for a good relationship is a love for God and a desire for God that is greater than the love and desire you have for the other person. This will free you from the sin of making the other person an idol and therefore being ruled and controlled by them.

Obviously, we would agree that if we set up a relationship with someone in which their role was to meet all of our needs, and we were going to be cruel to them and punish them if they didn’t meet those needs, we are setting up a very wrong (self-centered) and in fact abusive relationship. We are also allowing ourselves to be dependent on them and ruled by them. When we allow our wants and needs to rule us in any relationship they become severe masters. Our wants and needs are no longer normal human desires but lusts.

As Dan Allender says in his brilliant book, Bold Love:

Lust may be sexual, but it may also be directed toward a person or object in a nonsexual manner. [He said earlier that “Lust is the fallen desire for union gone mad.”] Lust may be directed toward a person, object, position or state. Many lust after being happy (state); others lust after reputation (position), antiques (objects), or people. In any case, destructive lust involves the heart of a thief whose passion is to be satisfied, not the heart of a lover whose desire is to give.

The current “disease” labeled “codependency” provides an excellent paradigm of nonsexual lust. The person who lives for approval and involvement with another is often willing to sacrifice life and limb to “possess” the heart of another. The energy behind possessive love is lust—that is, the desire to find a host who will provide a vital energy that appears to be missing in the codependent.

The codependent is usually aware of an emptiness, an ennui, a boredom, a soullessness that seems strangely relieved in the presence of the beloved. The fullness experienced in a smile from the beloved is often enough warmth to endure the literal or figurative blows of rage that icily strip the codependent of any remaining shreds of dignity. It is not unusual for codependents to bind themselves to the stark task of trying to draw blood out of a stone. The frustration of emptiness seems to lead to even greater sacrifice and commitment to serve the object of their desire. In turn, the object of their desire usually intensifies his rage to disentangle the threads of sticky, absorptive enmeshment.

This process looks like a dance of death, where codependents ask their partners to provide intimacy, while subtly inviting an avalanche of hatred to be unleashed. The person who is the object of the codependent’s needy lust often feels alternately prized and then violated in the heat of absorptive passion. The whirlwind of desire and destruction sabotages the self and intensifies self-protective despair.

When satisfaction is not forthcoming (of course, it never is fully), lust will inevitably turn darker and meaner. A private fantasy of sexual gratification with an attractive object of desire will likely not suffice over time. A more intense, more consuming desire to be captured or conquer will take over. It may not be enough to be merely wanted by an attractive man or woman; the “wanting” will likely descend into darker control and subjugation. Soon the fury of emptiness will be conjoined with the desire for absorption, and perversion will be born.

Lust almost always becomes perverse. Perversion is the wedding of lust and rage. The soul is never satisfied with the taste of pleasure; it demands to be satiated. When unrequited hunger mingles with the fury of wanting someone to pay for the pain of emptiness we are forced to experience, a tumultuous interplay of violence and passion is fused that simultaneously seeks to use and destroy.”

Obviously, this is very destructive and doesn’t work. It may even be motivated by a good desire to change oneself by being connected to a person with an “opposite” quality. But this desire becomes consuming/is a consuming lust, and we have made the mistake that the other person can change us. The way we change is to realize that we are wrong and take responsibility to change in that area. However, we can appreciate other people’s support. Another thing we do with desires in this case is to believe that they are needs, when they are merely wants, which would be “pluses” if they were fulfilled.

A lot of people try to solve the above problem by being “nice” about asking for their demands/needs to be met and by being aware of the other person’s requirements/needs and trying to fulfill them. They try to “even it out” and believe that they have become a lot more easygoing and unselfish by doing so. But is that true??

Isn’t it a toned down version of the same thing? Sugar-coating selfishness doesn’t do anything! This will not remove the feeling of emptiness and listlessness that accompanies selfishness. And how does a person feel who worries that they might no longer fulfill the demands of the relationship? Can’t they be instantly terminated and removed? It’s frightening! They are so easily the object of the other’s scary and scornful manipulation.

Bob Dylan sang: “You’re gonna have to serve somebody. It may be the devil, or it may be the Lord, but you’re still gonna have to serve somebody.”

There is a third way. This way allows you to be free of manipulating and being manipulated and being afraid of the other person. Instead of trying to meet the needs of the other person, it allows you to be truthful to them for their good. That is truly loving.

The Bible gives us two choices for desires that rule us: holy passions or lusts. What rules us? A desire for God and His love or what we want? It’s not wrong to want good things, but are we wanting them more than God? If we are, they are lusts. But when we want God’s desires and love more than our wants, we convert all of our motivations into holy passions both for the other and for our own lives. As Edward Welch says in his book When People are Big and God is Small: “We need to need people less and love people more”. This is the only time when we can truly love unselfishly.

Now there is another group of people (myself included) who have the opposite kind of problem. They are really giving in their relationships, so much so, that they can easily be taken advantage of and often neglect themselves while giving to others. These people should learn not be naïve! They should strive to be strong in their relationships (both in regards to respecting themselves and confronting others) always out of a motivation to love/and of love.

The famous prayer of St. Francis of Assisi sums up what I have been trying to say so well:

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved, as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.

change

God made me an Artist. I’m still not sure what kind of medium will be mine, but I know my soul is one of an Artist. Whether it will be writing/composing a novel, poem, song, writing and directing a film, I know that this is what I’m called to do. As Eric Liddell would say: “When I [compose], I feel His [God's] pleasure”. Usually unable to say what’s really on my heart, I find I express myself eloquently via some artistic medium. I also reflect accurately what’s going on in the world and in people, and enjoy entertaining them. This may be the only time where my “true self” is more fully seen, and where I can discuss how I perceive the world. I want to bring joy to others, but I also know that in order for them to be truly happy, they need to change.

I enjoy entertaining people and bringing them pleasure that way, but especially for those close to me, I want them to enjoy the deepest of all happinesses. As the old hymn says:

Fading is the worldling’s pleasure,
All his boasted pomp and show;
Solid joys and lasting treasure
None but Zion’s children know.

This is probably why I’ve also had a lifetime interest in Biblical Counseling. I’ve been reading through this “Resources for Changing Lives” series written by psychologists/counselors/pastors coming out of Westminster Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania. I just started reading: Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands: People in Need of Change Helping People in Need of Change by Paul David Tripp. I feel that many people do want help from God to change the worst problems of their lives: finding what kind of career they should have, living peacefully, enjoying a successful marriage, overcoming their cruel tendencies, but are somehow unable to do so in coming to God. I believe that this is because they are unaware of the biggest problem of all, their sin. And as much as they think they’re dealing with that, they’re not.

As Tripp says in his first chapter:

“As sinners, we have a natural bent to turn away from the Creator to serve the creation. We turn away from hope in a Person to hope in systems, ideas, people, or possessions. Real Hope stares us in the face, but we do not see Him. Instead, we dig into the mound of human ideas to extract a tiny shard of insight. We tell ourselves that we have finally found the key, the thing that will make a difference. We act on the insight and embrace the delusion of lasting personal change. But before long, disappointment returns. The change was temporary and cosmetic, failing to penetrate the heart of the problem. So, we go back to the mound again, determined this time to dig in the right place. Eureka! We find another shard of insight, seemingly more profound than before. We take it home, study it, and put it into practice. But we always end up in the same place.”

Sin is the biggest problem we have in our lives. It prevents us from coming to God for help with our problems. We need to rely on Christ to rescue us from ourselves.

Later he says:

“…Independence, self-sufficiency, and self-absorption lead us to think of ourselves first and to climb over the fences between ourselves and our desires. We want control and hate being controlled. We want to make up the rules and change them whenever it suits us. Essentially we want to be God, ruling our worlds according to our own will. No matter what else we are rebelling against, our rebellion is ultimately directed at God. We refuse to recognize his authority, robbing him of his glory and usurping his right to rule.

Sin also produces foolishness in us. Foolishness believes that there is no perspective, insight, theory, or ‘truth’ more reliable than our own. It buys into the lie that we know better. It causes us to distort reality and live in worlds of our own making. It is as if we look at life through a carnival mirror, convinced that we see clearly.”

And one more thing. Even when we try to do the right thing with the best of intentions, we miss the mark of God's perfection. We cannot perform it perfectly. In the end, it’s useless to put our hope in insights, and we can’t do anything to save ourselves. That’s why we have to trust in Jesus and what He did for us on the cross. We trust in His finished work, His rescue from our sins.

Only the Holy Spirit can help us trust in Jesus because He enables us to see our need for His saving work. He becomes our hope, not a system. He conquered sin on our behalf! And through His redemptive power, He has changed our hearts. Now we love Him and obey His good laws, relying on His accomplished perfection as our substitute both in His life and death, since we can’t rely on ourselves.

I’ve had that big change in my life. I don’t know exactly how it happened, except that I know that I can’t trust in anything, or anyone but Him. Having a relationship with Him is the happiest part of my existence. In fact, it’s my whole existence. I’ve been growing in that faith almost my whole life.

So how does that help us with our “lesser” problems?

Tripp says at the close of his first chapter:

“The good news of the kingdom… It is the news of a Redeemer who has come to rescue me from myself. His rescue produces change that fundamentally alters my response to these inescapable realities. The Redeemer turns rebels into disciples, fools into humble listeners. He makes cripples walk again. In him we can face life and respond with faith, love, and hope.”

So, what about the smaller changes in our lives? It’s the same way. A Christian grows and changes all the time, instead of attempting to do as they did before, and ending up going around in circles and getting worse. A Christian sees their wrongdoing in relation to God (reflecting or not reflecting God’s glory), and seeks to make that right. The Holy Spirit opens their eyes to see how their behavior offends God, and the person sees themselves as responsible for their actions, growth, and change. What can a caring relationship do? That caring person’s responsibility is to “preach” the truth, confront sin, and expose. That’s all people can do (on either side).

But is this devoid of love? How can it be? A loving relationship occurs when there is honesty and truthfulness, but also acceptance and a covering over everything in love. Certainly, it should never be a self-righteous moralistic nagging. And it never be a tit-for-tat bout, or a decision to split the evil 50/50 between them...

Do we have the right to judge them either? God is the only Judge and He will indeed judge the world when He returns. But He has forgiven us and He urges us to forgive. Remember, we owe Him much more. However, it is to be noted that like our coming to God, who willingly forgives, a restored relationship does not occur until the person, acknowledges their fault and accepts the forgiveness.

Love always puts the other above him/herself and puts behind him/her a multitude of sins…

Our greatest need is God’s forgiveness of our sins. Only He can transform our hearts so that we do solve our lesser problems of curbing our cruel tendencies, having a loving relationship, having peace, and glorifying Him with our lives. His ways are best, although He always works through a process of changing us. If you don’t know Christ, won’t you please stop relying on methods that though lightly Christianized don't include dealing with God in all of His holiness, and today put your trust in His provision of Christ for the forgiveness of your sins?

From the sublime to the less sublime, I would obviously like to take classes at Westminster Theological Seminary in PA, but we’ll see how that goes. Right now, on Monday, I will start training to oversee Art Therapy sessions at a Domestic Violence Center for women and children. I also appreciate using Art as a concrete part of counseling. Art is a deep way to communicate, and it “reveals”, gives you something to “do”, and allows you to have something to “look at”. I find it easier in some ways.

For me, I have found that so many blocks have become “unblocked” by even practicing Art Therapy as I am doing for a class which I am taking, designed for Teachers to teach Art Therapy.

At any rate, I know that ultimately beyond those things, I would like to produce a body of art from me that reveals those things about me, chronicles my thoughts on life, brings healing, and sparks a deep joy in those who hear me.

And that’s about as far as I’ve gotten so far………. :)