Culture Shock

I'm writing this mostly out of a combination of amusement and frustration, in case you care. I'm tired of hearing about how Jesus must be coming back soon because of how bad America is. Please. America has a long way to go before our perversity begins to resemble that of Rome (or Persia, or Assyria, or certain regimes in ancient China, or or or or). Jesus may very well come back next week or year or decade, and if He does then I will be the first to admit I was wrong. Until such a time, however, I won't buy, and see no reason for anyone else to buy, the argument mentioned above. I don't want to spend a lot of time writing about Roman history, there are plenty of books that can be read to prove my point if you don’t believe me (like this , or this), but the fact of the matter is, as disappointing as this may be, our generation and culture is not the most perverse in the history of the world. Until I go to a dinner party and see slaves being forced to have sex for entertainment, or see naked women being forced to swim in the fountains at birthday parties, or see men killing each other (yes actually killing each other, not fighting violently in a UFC cage) for entertainment, or see enemy prisoners-of-war fed to lions or put in a wood chipper, or see women being forced to have sex with a random citizen in the temple before they can get married (Persia was a strange place), I wont concede that we have matched or surpassed Rome or Persia or those other cultures in perversity. I'm sorry, but we still have a ways to go. 

Another thought:
People might be writing all of these end-of-the-world novels and exposes because they are really trying, out of their great compassion and care for the human race, to warn all of us of our impending doom. They might also be writing them to make a profit off of your fear.

The culture shock that has been proposed to us by some individuals within the conservative Christian movement is that our culture has distinguished itself historically in its dedication to depravity and that this is a sign that the end is imminent. I would argue that, instead, the real culture shock for Christians might be that we are just another generation in a long line of generations with the same Creation mandate and the same two commandments to live by. Prepare yourself for historical obscurity.

Half Full

I admit, I've been struggling. It's been hard for me to pin down exactly why, but one thing that keeps cropping up is, of all things, the existence of evil. I know I know, Timothy Keller has a great section on it in The Reason For God, but thats not really what I'm talking about. I'm not wrestling with "Evil exists, how can God be good!" or "Evil exists, there is no God!". Nope. I'm struggling with "Evil exists......why?". I was prompted into thinking about it again tonight because the mom of a good friend of mine directed me to read her posting on facebook wherein she thanked God for His goodness for sustaining both her son and her mother when they were recently in seperate, but equally severe, car accidents. I too thank God, Jonathan is a dear friend and her mother is an amazing woman. I wondered though. What about the situations where people aren't saved, where the amazing friend and son, or the caring and loving mother, or whoever, is hit by a car and is killed. What about the people that don't barely escape, that don't just make it out, that don't survive because that steel pipe went that extra 6 inches and impaled them or that fallen electrical wire didnt dangle just out of reach of the frame of their wrecked car but, rather, fell on their car and electricuted them. You get the point. In all honesty, sometimes I think our theology surrounding evil is incredibly convenient. We say that God was so gracious to save one of our loved ones from an accident that someone else, whom is usually less known or unknown, didn't survive, and their deaths don't seem to weigh on us or bother us. Was God gracious to the person who burned alive in the wreckage?

I want to be very clear that this is not a charge against God, and I am not shaking my fist at God nor am I being cynical about any of these situations. I just don't understand. Is it really love when a father does nothing as his son is being beaten to death? God did do that to Jesus, but wasn't that in order that we might be saved? What was the purpose behind not intervening for the Jews during the Holocaust, or for the children dying of starvation and AIDS in Africa?

I guess my problem isn't with the conception that God is love. What is becoming painfully obvious, however, is that I don't have any idea what that word means.

"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night"

This poem by Dylan Thomas is incredible and I wanted to put it up for my zero readers to enjoy :

DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.



That is one hell of a poem.

Radiohead, Genius, and the Masks I Wear

I love Radiohead. I think they are one of the most original and talented bands alive and perhaps of all time as well. When I first started listening to them, I listened to them because I wanted to like them. I heard about them from someone along the way and went out and bought their album "OK Computer" after being told that it was one of the most important albums of the 90's (second only one of their other albums "The Bends", of course). The only problem was, I didnt like it. I listened to it all the time, I even got some of the songs stuck in my head, but I just didnt like it. Of course, when I talked to my friends about it, I raved about how deep it was and how it embodied the spectrum of abilities and insights necessary for a band to distinguish itself as groundbreaking and important presence in the musical world (and yes, I actually said those words, pretty gay right?) And so I continued, struggling through song after song on OK Computer and taking every opportunity to talk about its brilliance with whomever crossed my path, all the while hoping that I would be thought of as being smart, trendy, "In", however you want to say it, because of the music I muscled through. It wasn't Radiohead's music that attracted me to them initially, it was their image, their stigma, their "We're brilliant and we don't give a damn whether you agree or not" attitude. I didn't want to listen to them, I wanted to be seen as someone who listened to them, even if that meant actually listening to their music.

The above scenario has been true of me in so many instances within the world of music and in so many other areas outside of music as well. The desire to be seen as someone who does something rather than to actually be someone who does things runs deep with me, and I dont expect that I'll ever get it all out. There is something inside me that wants to be a genius, that wants to be so damn good at something that people are secretly in awe of me when I walk by or are blown away by the insights I give in a conversation. "Damn that dude is brilliant. I wish I could be more like him" I hope they think as I pass. I think these things sometimes. But my desire to attain the heights of success and ability and renown is exactly like my initial desire to like radiohead. I want to be seen as certain kind of person, I dont actually want to have to do ingenious things. Wearing these kind of masks is easier than actually doing something. Hearing about a book and then talking about it as if you've read it is easier than actually reading the book. Saying you like music that smart people like is easier than being honest about not really liking the music and not getting it. Saying you were blown away by the art exhibit when you were really bored out of your mind is easier than admitting that you dont get art or that, at the end of the day, you just dont like it very much. Pretending and conforming are always easier and they are always masks. Insightful, interesting, and creative people are nothing more than people who think for, and are honest with, themselves.
Stop pretending and stop being boring.

I'm Tyler Barstow and I wear masks. I also geniunely love Radiohead now. Go figure.