And Moving On.

Sigh.  Thus ends an era.

I've officially started a new blog.  And am finally owning up to the fact that I can no longer claim the nickname "Kernal."  It's time to embrace the new, married name, so find me here with my new, married self. 

April Showers Bring.

Navy life can throw you for a loop.  Nothing is certain, and things can always change.  In fact, most times, they do.  We're not staying here in Japan as long as we anticipated, but I'm thankful for being able to see Japan in a full year.  For now, that means sakura.  Cherry blossoms.  These are what drive everyone's plans.  Even the Japanese.  They plan picnics and festivals and base any theme upon this ... phenomenon, I'll call it.  Because it's stunning.  Here's my take.

Fantastic, no?  Sakura are in perfect bloom for only about a week, so you have to catch it when you can.  The petals are already falling.  But we get them for a blink.  The perfect introduction to spring.  

Exploring Our Home

For living in Japan, my husband and I don't get out much.   I do my exploring with American and Japanese friends, and he uses the weekends to rejuvenate.  Or has to work anyway ;)  But this past weekend, we packed up, stayed in Yokohama, and scurried around Tokyo.  We've been around the Tokyo metro quite a bit, but we were more ambitious this time around.  Here are some of the things we saw.  

This is Yokohama’s beautiful skyline.  Gosh, I love this city.   On the left is Landmark Tower.  The group of three descending towers next to it is Queen’s Tower, and the fin-looking tower is Queen’s Square.  The ferris wheel in the background is Cosmo Clock 21, at once the biggest ferris wheel in the world.  The red building on the right side is the Red Brick Warehouse.

Yokohama’s Chinatown is the largest in all of Asia.  It’s full of red craziness. 

My favorite part of Chinatown is Doctor Kiss Fish!  You put your feet in a tub full of baby carp and they pull off your dead skin in search of food.  Best pedicure I’ve ever had. 

This is the best depiction of Yokohama Station I’ve ever been able to capture.  What you see here is what it feels like ;)  I love it!

Haha, my rat of a husband.  Too much train time, I guess.

We went up to Shimokitazawa for Bear Pond Espresso.  They serve only 20 shots of their specialty espresso per day.  We got there 45 minutes after they opened, and were too late!  It was perfect, because the shop was tiny and full of fisherman-looking raggedy Japanese, and rugged outdoorsy tourists. We came back earlier the next day and got ourselves some of said espresso.  It was so ristretto.  Bold, thick, and packed with a kick.

We also hit up my favorite kaitenzushi (sushi-go-round) in Meguro.  Simply delicious!  Someone needs to introduce the States to sushi-go-rounds.  Let’s start a petition. 

I was floored by Tokyo Tower.  It is big and bright and beautiful.  When on the observation deck, you can see Tokyo in all directions as far as the eye can see.  Makes you realize how enormous Tokyo actually is.  Unfortunately, my camera died before I had the chance to capture it.  Wah wah.  

This is the Nikolai-do, the Orthodox Cathedral of Tokyo.  We worship here when in the area.  Otherwise, we have a (much) smaller parish in Yokohama.  Beautiful, hey?

No Spring Sunday would be complete without a walk in the park.  We chose Yoyogi Park in Harajuku.  Inhale, exhale. 

It just so happened that the Fertility Festival (Kanamara Matsuri) was going on in Kawasaki.  Good for a laugh, and definitely nothing I’ve ever seen before.  Yes, this actually exists.  Avert the kids’ eyes for this one!

 

Japan is simply great.  Full of history, rich culture, and reasons to celebrate.  There are times you want to run away, times you can’t believe your eyes, and times you wish to never leave.  

Those Wonderful Wives

I'd like to give you something new to pray for. And I hope to avoid my own pity - I do fit into this category, but my own situation is really not that bad. So don't pray for me. Pray for wives X, Y, and Z. Well I guess you can pray for me if you want to, heh, but just realize that I'm fine. Pray for my growth midst struggle.

Many wives of sailors start their orders in Japan thinking that separation will be more simple. Easier. Because we're already overseas. It becomes disappointing when husbands are gone more sporadically and often than Stateside duty stations. Gone, here, busy, not. Overseas stations require constant adjustment. To an empty house, to single parenthood, and then to undoing it, allowing your husband back in where you had filled the holes yourself. To inspections that require 14 or 15 hour days. And then on to the next deployment. The goal becomes about distractions and filling time.

I'm experiencing my first deployment. It's not long, and I feel good about the "training" for the future. I'll be more prepared for the longer ones. I live off-base but close. In an area with coffee shops, malls, busy-ness, and lots of lights. There's presence here. So I'm blessed. I can escape my empty house. Often the case for off-base living is endless Japanese residential area. Isolation. Quiet. I can only imagine how difficult it would be to endure deployments this way. Especially if you don't work.

So pray for your military wives today. The military cares for us as much as it can. Still, we sacrifice a great deal. Most days it's worth it; we have the strength of body builders. But we can always use more support.

Thanks.

Essence and Energies

Orthodoxy astounds me. I love the Lutheran Church - I grew up in it - but I never really knew much about what it meant to be Lutheran. To this day, I don't know the difference between the Protestant churches. Of no fault but my own, of course.

But I know what it means to be Orthdox. I love this Church which has existed since the Apostles founded it. In a world that seeks to make church more trendy and appealing, which isn't the point, it's refreshing to find a church that is what it is. And is what it's been for 2000 years. And has struggled for the sake of maintaining the integrity of the Church, protecting against heretical thought and the false prophets throughout history. That's biblical, no?

Anyway, the Orthodox Church seeks to know God while respecting His mysteries. Some of us try to explain everything, while others have given up any speculation. Neither of these things is wrong, but there's a balance. The Orthodox Church, though it has records of ecumenical councils and Tradition, isn't afraid to say, "We don't know; it's a mystery."

Glorious.

My husband and I are reading The Orthodox Way by Bishop Kallistos Ware. Most recently, we've read about how knowing God is explained. That sounds strange, yes, but there have always been conflicting ideas. God is huge. Ridiculously huge. How could human minds understand Him? Yet, we are meant to know Him, because what He wants is relationship with us. So how does it work if He's so seemingly and actually incomprehensible?

I'd like to share part of this section with you. Forgive the length. This is what happens when my mind is blown.

To indicate the two "poles" of God's relationship to us - unknown yet well known, hidden yet revealed - the Orthodox tradition draws a distinction between the essence, nature or inner being of God, on the one hand, and His energies, operations or acts of power, on the other.

"He is outside all things according to His essence," writes St. Athanasius, "but He is in all things through His acts of power." "We know the essence through the energy," St. Basil affirms. "No one has ever seen the essences of God, but we believe in the essence because we experience the energy." By the essence of God is meant His otherness, by the energies His nearness ...

... The essence, then, signifies the radical transcendence of God; the energies, His immanence and omnipresence. When Orthodox speak of the divine energies, they do not mean by this an emanation from God, an "intermediary" between God and man, or a "thing" or "gift" that God bestows. On the contrary, the energies are God Himself in His activity and self-manifestation. When a man knows or participates in the divine energies, he truly knows or participates in God Himself, so far as this is possible for a created being. But God is God, and we are human; and so, while He possesses us, we cannot in the same way possess Him.

... [I]t would be equally misleading to regard the energies as a "part" of God. The Godhead is simple and indivisible, and has no parts. The essence signifies the whole God as He is in Himself; the energies signify the whole God as He is in action. God in His entirety is completely present in each of His divine energies. Thus the essence-energies distinction is a way of stating simultaneously that the whole God is inaccessible, and that the whole God in His outgoing love has rendered Himself accessible to man.

By virtue of this distinction between the divine essence and the divine energies, we are able to affirm the possibility of a direct or mystical union between man and God - what the Greek Fathers term the theosis of man, his "deification" - but at the same time we exclude any pantheistic identification between the two: for man participates in the energies of God, not in the essence. There is union, but not fusion or confusion. Although "oned" with the divine, man still remains man; he is not swallowed up or annihilated, but between him and God there continues always to exist an "I-Thou" relationship of person to person.

Such, then, is our God: unknowable in His essence, yet known in His energies; beyond and above all that we can think or express, yet closer to us than our own heart. Through the apophatic way we smash in pieces all the idols or mental images that we form of Him, for we know that all are unworthy of His surpassing greatness. Yet at the same time, through our prayer and through our active service in the world, we discover at every moment His divine energies, His immediate presence in each person and each thing. Daily, hourly we touch Him. We are, as Francis Thompson said, "in no strange land." All around us is the "many splendored thing" ...

Orthodoxy and Orthodoxy

I just read a fantastic book. And the interesting thing is that the author so happens to be my aunt now. She's my husband's mother's brother's wife (...'s cousin's great-aunt's former roommate ...), Maria Poggi Johnson. She lives midst an Orthodox Jewish community in Scranton, PA. Her book on what she's learned is Strangers and Neighbors. Unfortunately, I haven't yet been able to meet this new aunt of mine and her family, but I'm sure they would have story upon story.

I for one misunderstood the world of Orthodox Judaism. My husband and I are Orthodox Christians, and I still understood it to be an entirely different approach to faith. Granted, there are large differences between Judaism and Christianity (oh hey there, Jesus), but Maria laid out how much we can learn from them. I still believe that Orthodox Judaism and Orthodox Christianity are pretty dissimilar, but the hearts we have behind our disciplines are closer than I thought. These Jews actually make me feel pretty lazy. While we have disciplines, such as prayer and fasting, and we each honor the Sabbath in our own way, Orthodox Jews take the law literally and to heart in observing its specific rules and regulations. But, like those in the Orthodox Church, the benefits are meaningful. They bring us closer to God and understanding His very nature. They bring us closer to ourselves and what we were made to be.

My favorite chapter in Maria's book is the 4th one. She discusses the holiness, the set-apartness of the Orthodox Jewish people. Even as adults, we all try to fit in, conform to what it is that people are doing. I think we have an underlying fear of exposure. Blending in is easier. The Orthodox understand they are different, but that is not their curse; it's their calling. They are meant to stand out, to be God's people and to be known as such. What an amazing call to receive with fervency and with so much joy.

I highly recommend this book, for each chapter is just as good. And there's a lot we all can learn, no matter what our faith.

Preparation is Not so Exciting.

I let blogging become daunting. By pretending I need to write epically. About great lessons I'm learning and adventures I'm having. This blog is titled for adventure anyway. But there's something beautiful in the subtle, too, I guess.

And I'm thankful for the normal tidbits of life. The first month of my marriage involved a lot of moving around. We stayed home, in Minneapolis, the first few days, to spend time with family, as our move to Japan was imminent. Then it was off to Madison to visit our sister (I claim her now, too). Then a mere 7 days after our wedding, we flew off to Newport, Rhode Island for three-week Navy training, Surface Warfare Officer (SWO) school. In those three weeks, we spent both weekends in Boston, scurrying around, and shoving as much into two weekends as a couple of passionate people can.

Then we finally arrived in Japan. And by then we were both exhausted. Ready to settle down, stay in one spot, live in a place you can call home. Even then, there were endless places to explore, as Japan is a culture chocked full of history and distinction, and our peninsula is riddled with beaches and coffee shops and yakiniku stands and shrines and a giant Buddha. Oh, and Tokyo's just around the bend. Don't even get me started on how giant that metropolis is.

I guess you could say, though I thrive on excitement and thirst for adventure, I now appreciate a little differently those norms in our lives. Those doing-laundry, feeding-the-cat, making-lunch days. So I'm going to tell you about my latest project. You see, I find little necessity to find work out here. My heart lies with wildlife, African in particular. So I'm trying to fill my time wisely. I want to be inspired. And I want to be ready for the future. I still want to work on safari, and it's inching closer. It won't happen for another 4-5 years, of course, but I refuse to compromise this dream that lays so heavy on my heart to wasted time. That would be silly.

My goal is to learn as much information as I can about African wildlife before venturing to train there. On my own, I can't learn everything I'll need - first aid, how to fire a rifle, how to approach megafauna, how to camp ... But I can learn wildlife identification. And I can learn their ecology and behavior, too.

So our office has been transformed. The wallpaper now consists of photos of antelope, giraffe, and, as of today, hippopotamuses. I have made flash cards to quiz myself. Yes, this is actually true. Like a 7th grader would do ;)

But it's fascinating. I've learned that there's actually a deer in Africa. A deer. In a small blip in Northern Tunisia. Nothing else in Africa has antlers. I've learned there's a thing called a chevrotain, and that most hooved animals (ungulates) are ruminants (cud chewers). Even giraffes. I've been a bit disgusted to discover the giant forest hog. I thought I'd seen a lot. I've experienced bush babies and vervet monkeys and the African lion and hippopotamuses and the common warthog and wild dogs and, for a split second, a serval. But I am yet again mind blown by the animal kingdom. The vastness of it can't be covered. We know so little, and while I'm thankful for the wild places still out there, I'm also thankful we try to discover hidden treasures like these.

I hope you visit me on safari someday. Plan for 2017. I think I'll be ready by then.

She Floats, But Do I?

My husband adopted a cat before I came out to Japan. His name is Lord Byron, and I know we have him because of me. So the house won't feel so empty when Curt is underway. But I have a feeling this cat is going to, at times, drive me insane. He just spent 3 minutes at my side meowing into my ear. And this cat has no subtle meow.

It makes me realize even more that love does hurt. A cat is not enough. Sam from Love Actually was right. There is something agonizing about being in love. Because the more you love, the more you have to lose. And the more absence hurts. Marriage is no solve-all, my friends, and thank God I wasn't looking for one when I got married. It's actually a tough road that beckons your commitment to a fierce relationship requiring your heart and your selflessness. And if you build a crappy marriage, you have to deal with mending it, or just maintaining it, I guess. If you build a great marriage, you've given yourself a lot to lose. And that's scary. Because maybe you will someday.

But hey, love is risky. As it should be. And just as painful as it is rewarding.

There's something heavy that lies in the unknown. In the Navy, we face an uncertainty of when he (or she) will be gone. For how long. And when they're coming back. And for how long. It's been a blessing that Curt's ship has been docked for our first few months out here. I've been able to adapt to an overseas station with my husband. Most spouses aren't so lucky. But the Shiloh is warming up her joints and stretching our her back. She's soon ready to go out and taste that salty water.

As I sit here and sigh in the face of reality, I somehow feel like not talking about it. I'm not sure I've ever felt this feeling before. LoL. Separation is imminent, but I'm breathing in slow realization and preparation. Quiet preparation. Quiet confusion. Of what to do. Of how to deal. Or how to let it teach me.

When I'm in our 3-story, small Japanese house, I am just a person in a building. When Curt's here too, it's our home.

I'm about to learn a lot, struggle a lot, and probably change a lot. So here's to hope, here's to God, and His desire to burn away the chaff. Here's to a better me, a refined character, and a heart that keeps beating.

Welcome Back, G-Dub.

Today base is bustling. The commissary is twice as busy as it usually is, and will probably soon have empty shelves. There are men and women walking around in dress uniform. And there's just something in the air. Today, the USS George Washington pulled into port. It's been underway in various parts of the Pacific since I got here two months ago. The GW is the one and only aircraft carrier stationed at Yokosuka Naval Base. I saw it when I visited my husband in Japan in August, and I was amazed at the large hunk of metal before me. That thing is giant. And astounding. How something that big and heavy floats in water is beyond me.

Anyway, that's not the point.

There are families walking around base today. Members of the GW crew with their wives and children, just walking around and enjoying reunion. Soaking it in. Families in the military don't have the easiest lives, but it's the moments like that, when you see your husband's face for the first time in months, that keep us going. And all of base shares in your joy. Since moving to Japan, I haven't had to see my husband go underway, but I'll definitely remember today when he does. We military wives (and husbands) don't sign up for this. However, we can take pride in the honor of this calling, and joy in looking ahead to reunion. After all, it's all worth it.

Draw Me a Sheep.

I’ve been bogged down lately. I’m usually pretty enthusiastic about journaling, about getting my thoughts down on paper. I guess you could say I’m old fashioned. ;) And I also typically love to blog. I always have something to say. And you’d think that would be true especially now.

But I think I just wanted to think simple thoughts for a bit. As we grow up our thoughts, ideas, wonderings become so profound and complex. I guess you could say that’s an evolution, but sometimes, I just need simple wit to make me smile. Period.

I didn’t intend to read The Little Prince again, but something brought me back to it. Man, I love that book. It’s clever and simple and creative. It also made me laugh out loud in Starbucks. Yup, I’m now that girl. It’s interesting, because Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote this book at the end of his life. You’d think what he expressed through his characters would be deep, enriched. Maybe he found something more important out there in that desert ...

{oooh left you hanging so that maybe you’ll read it for yourself}

So I guess I’m not going to say anything profound this time. But just give the world a reminder of The Little Prince in it’s plainness. Here are my favorite bits.

‘Grown-ups never understand anything for themselves, and it is exhausting for children to have to provide explanations over and over again.’

‘I have spent lots of time with grown-ups. I have seem them at close range ... which hasn’t much improved my opinion of them.’

‘[Upon discovering the only rose he sees isn’t the only one at all] You’re not at all like my rose. You’re nothing at all yet. No one has tamed you and you haven’t tamed anyone. You’re the way my fox was. He was just a fox like a hundred thousand others. But I’ve made him my friend, and now he’s the only fox in all the world.‘ And the roses were humbled.

[The fox] ‘Here is my secret: One sees clearly only with the heart. Anything essential is invisible to the eyes.’

[The fox, again] ‘It’s the time you spent on your rose that makes your rose so important.’

{Reminds me of the idea that man loves most what he has worked for.}

‘Only the children know what they are looking for.’

‘You risk tears if you get yourself tamed [in this sense, meaning attached, tied to another].’

Wowza! It has been forever and a day since I last posted. April? Really? I've been thinking about this lately, but have shied away from it because a ridiculously amount of stuff has happened in my life.

I don't know if I can even call myself Kernal anymore. I'm actually a Gaynor now! I guess you could call this blog The Adventures of Gaynors (ha - not quite the same ring) since life is only getting more exciting from here. Curt and I got married a measly 25 days ago. Since then, we've scurried around Minneapolis, spent a weekend in Madison, and set up camp in Newport, RI for a three-week Navy school. We travelled both of the weekends we've been on the East Coast to Boston. If that's not enough moving around for you, I start the 26-hour journey to Yokosuka, Japan tomorrow morning. This is our current station, where we have a small three-story Japanese house a block off-base and a very loud adult cat named Lord Byron. What a life. It's no wonder I'm anxious to get there and make a life for us. And to see what "normal" married life is like.

So as life settles down, I hope to post more often. So stay tuned, but knowing me, don't hold your breath.

(for the record, I will still hold true to the Kernal name; especially since my husband still calls me CK. I'm not the only one this name transition is weird for ;)

Father, Son, Spirit.

My venture into Orthodoxy has often left me wondering about things I thought I had a handle on. When you first become a Christian, you start to learn about the basics - Creation, Christ’s death and resurrection, etc. I thought I was set on these. Not necessarily that I understood them fully, just as much as I could. Of course I let the mystery that is God be what it is. But I could, with confidence, put a word or two to these basics to try to explain them.

Now I feel like Orthodoxy is ripping things open to go deeper and hashing out more than I ever thought I could understand. Confused? Me too. And the topic of the day is the Trinity. Lord Almighty. I always knew it was touchy, and not really something that would ever cease blowing my mind. Growing up, I was a Lutheran, and we never looked into the idea of the Trinity much. So when people try to explain it, I realize what a fine line exists.

Get this:

“One essence in three persons. God is one and God is three: the Holy Trinity is a mystery of unity in diversity, and of diversity in unity. Father, Son, and Spirit are ‘one in essence’ (homo-ousios), yet each is distinguished from the other two by personal characteristics. ‘The divine is indivisible in its divisions’ (Gregory of Nazianzus, Orations), for the persons are ‘united yet not confused, distinct yet not divided’ (John of Damascus, On the Orthodox Faith); ‘both the distinction and the union alike are paradoxical’ (Gregory of Nazianzus, Orations).”

But how do they relate to each other? Apparently, the Father is the source, the origin, and the Son is begotten from the Father. The Son is equal to the Father and coeternal with Him, but is not sourceless like the Father. The Spirit also has a source in the Father, but has a different relationship than that of Son and Father. The Spirit proceeds from the Father.

This was a big source of trouble for the Church and disagreement on it, in part, led to the division between the western (Catholic) Church and eastern (Orthodox) Church. It manifests in what’s called the Filioque. Yup, three little words that the western Church added to the nicene creed.

In Orthodoxy, you’ll hear: “And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified, who spake through the prophets.” [see John 15:26]

In Catholicism, you’ll hear: “And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and Son together is worshipped and glorified, who spake through the prophets.”

Small difference, hey? That’s what I thought!

Oh my mind is so small.

I won’t get into this right now, but it just helps you realize how much of a fine line knowing and understanding God is. I like this and I hate it. I like it because the Truth of God should be specific. God isn’t about to change, and His Truth is fine-tuned to who He is. It won’t change for anything. I’m not even convinced it can.

But I hate it because I feel like at any point I can become a heretic. His nature is specific; this point of God’s essence is indeed a point. But then, how do we hit it? It’s ironic that I’m sitting next to a dart board right now. God is like the bulls eye; and He isn’t about to move. He shouldn’t. But I feel like I’m three apartments down trying to whip darts and hit God. Seems impossible.

There was a heretic in the third century, Sabellius, who said that Father, Son and Spirit weren’t three distinct persons, but simply different ‘modes’ or ‘aspects’ of one deity. How is that different from the idea of three in one? When I think of God as three distinct persons in one essence, it sounds very similar to me as three modes of a single being. The more I think about it, the more I get it, which is comforting. But still, how do we stay in the careful balance of acknowledging the three-person nature of God without beginning to sound like a tritheist?

The ability to easily misunderstand God is, I know, allowed. And I know that God is ever-patient and gracious. I guess this post is incomplete in that I can offer no answers or remedies. I can only continually realize that I am utterly small, and though God makes Himself known, it takes forever to understand Him. It’s a good thing I have that long.

Trading a lie for the Truth

I get monthly e-mail newsletters from the church I attend out here in Madison. Good for information and to keep updated, but I never really took the time to read the reflections before. I did this time around and it floored me. Take a peek:

St. Nikolai Velimirovic

On the Purpose of Self-Denial

{crazy emphasis added by Carrie Kern}

The first man, Adam, also denied himself when he fell into sin, but he denied his real, true self. Seeking from men that they deny themselves, the Lord seeks that they deny their false selves. Put more simply: Adam denied the Truth, and clave to a lie; now the Lord seeks of Adam’s descendants that they deny the lie that cleave once more to the Truth from which they had fallen away. Therefore, to deny oneself means to deny the deceitful non-being that has been imposed on us in place of our God-given being. We must deny the earthboundness that has, for us, replaced spirituality, and the passions that have replaced good works; the servile fear that has darkened in us our sonship of God and the grumbling against God that has killed within the spirit of obedience to Him. We must deny evil thoughts, evil desires and evil deeds. We must deny the idolatrous worship of nature and our body. In brief: we must deny all that we reckon is “me”, but is in reality not us but the devil and sin, corruption, illusion and death. Oh, let us deny the evil habits that have become second nature to us; let us deny this “second nature”, for it is not our nature as God created it, but an accumulated and hardened illusion and self-delusion in ourselves - a hypocritical lie that goes by our name, and we by its ... For, by this [self-denial], the old, animal-like man in us is put to death, and the new man, made in God’s image and immortal, is raised to life. As the Apostle says: “Our old man is crucified,” and explains at once why: “that we should not serve sin” (Romans 6:6)... [And by this self-denial] we shall find our strength in Him our courage and our consolation. He will be to us light on a dark path, health in sickness, a companion in loneliness, joy in suffering and riches in want. A lamp is left burning all night in a sick-room, and in the night of this life, Christ’s inextinguishable light is needed, to ease our pain and keep alive our hope in the dawning of day.

Doesn’t it make you ask the question, who am I really? What am I like in essence? What is this full self of mine?

I’m an expert at asking questions that can’t really be answered. I’ll just put that out into the universe and let it sit. But that sure is mind-blowing.

Oh There's More

I’m reading a book to learn more about the Orthodox Church. I’ve been attending on and off for about a year, depending on when I’m in the country and when I’m not borderline freaked out by how different Orthodoxy is from any other Christian experience I’ve ever had. I expected this book to be mostly historical - about what was discussed at ecumenical councils, the crusades, etc. And granted, these things are discussed. But the heavy, intense, mind-blowing, deeper-than-I’ve-ever-thought-possible theology of many of these councils is also brought up. One thing I absolutely love about Orthodoxy is that I experience the Christian thought that’s been going on for 2000 years. It feels more linear than protestantism - and don’t get me wrong, I grew up Lutheran, but an older Church with a longer period of trying to figure this whole church thing out opens you up to a little more. Though I’m a deep thinker - there’s always a question or seven in my head, which lead to a question or seven more - by pursuing Orthodoxy, I’m being opened to mind-blowing things I never even thought about. The Orthodox have thought long and hard about who God is, and it astounds me.

Bear with me. I know nothing. So this post will probably be choppy.

Fourteenth century. The seven main ecumenical councils (a bunch of bishops getting together to discuss the Trinity or the nature Christ or the use of icons, etc. in order to avoid heretical thought in the Church) have come and gone, but the ideas are still being applied in new ways centuries later. Barlaam the Calabrian professed that we can only know God indirectly, that the immediate experience of God is impossible in this present life. I’m trying to avoid overwhelming detail here, but Barlaam met a crazy dialogue with St. Gregory Palamas (really awesome Greek hermit monk and then Archbishop of Thessalonica), who disagreed wholeheartedly with him by explaining that we know the energies of God, but not his essence, an idea that comes from St. Basil. From here, I think I’ll let the book speak for itself ...

“‘God is not a nature,’ [Gregory] wrote, ‘for He is above all nature; He is not a being, for He is above all beings ... no single thing of all that is created has or ever will have even the slightest communion with the supreme nature or nearness to it.’ But however remote from us in His essence, yet in His energies God has revealed Himself to us. These energies are not something that exists apart from God, not a gift which God confers upon humans; they are God Himself in His action and revelation to the world. God exists complete and entire in each of His divine energies. The world, as Gerard Manley Hopkins said, is charged with the grandeur of God; all creation is a gigantic Burning Bush, permeated but not consumed by the ineffable and wondrous fire of God’s energies.

It is through these energies that God enters into a direct and immediate relationship with humankind. In relation to us humans, the divine energy is in fact nothing else than the grace of God; grace is not just a ‘gift’ from God, not just an object which God bestows on humans, but a direct manifestation of the living God Himself, a personal encounter between creature and Creator. ‘Grace signifies all the abundance of the divine nature, in so far as it is communicated to men.’ When we say that the saints have been transformed or ‘deified’ by the grace of God, what we mean is that they have a direct experience of God Himself. They know God - that is to say, God in His energies, not in His essence.”

I don’t know if that blows your mind in any way. But it sure blows mine to even think about God’s energies permeating everything and the world as being a Burning Bush of God Himself. Even try to picture that ...

It seems like many heretics in history have made the gulf between us and God too wide. And this is where Truth comes in; it is here to “safeguard our direct approach to God, to uphold our full deification and entire redemption.”

I have in the last year felt humbled by the Holiness of God. I have even let it go too far - to the point where I feel unable to approach God. At all times. But I need to remember that in all these things I’m learn and in all these ways I’m growing, there is an opportunity for direct experience with God’s energies, that I too can be a Burning Bush, a wondrous fire of God’s energies.

Wow.

Reminiscing

The program I participated in last semester, the School for Field Studies, just posted a promotional video of our Center Director, Moses Okello. I want to share it because it's a perfect four-and-a-half minute depiction of what we did last semester, and a mere but representative glimpse into our experience. Dr. Okello was our backbone last semester. As center director, he wasn't able to be around very much. But he did all he could to enthuse us about wildlife management and experiencing East African culture. He even inspired us to have a goat slaughter and roast, and of course, for the guys to participate in male bonding by eating goat testicles. You can only imagine how interesting this Moses Okello is.

Anyway, check it out the video here.

Sincerity

I started my second job tonight. We opened Tanner's Bar & Grill in Middleton, Wisconsin. Going into it, I thought it would be terrifying. Receiving the menu yesterday and having only 4 hours of training, which mostly involved cleaning, under my belt, I thought it would be a nightmare of now knowing what I was doing. I don't know if you've ever had to memorize a menu before, but it's difficult.

I learned a lot tonight.

Oh it definitely was chaos. Tonight was our soft opening, so we offered free food and the drink profit will go to the American Red Cross. Yeh. Free food and good drinks. It was insanity. The food took forever because our kitchen was so backed up. I mean, why get two appetizers when you can try four for free?! So people had to wait for their food. We were a bit sloppy, unorganized, and we definitely tripped over our feet.

But people liked us.

One of my tables was of four guys. They ordered 4 entrees, an appetizer, and 8 beers. The food took an eternity. I felt awful. But when I got my tip, they gave me 25%. I was shocked. What did I learn? Sincerity matters. The beauty of life is that you don't have to be perfect. You can mess up and make mistakes constantly, but people will take you as you are if you're sincere, if you are genuine. If I had given them great, speedy food, but was a crabapple, I wouldn't have received 25%. Not a chance. But I apologized probably 25 times because I really was sorry. And instead of hide the disorganization (although it was pretty obvious) and owning up to it, it was owned up to.

I guess my encouragement is to be sincere. Don't hide your mistakes or the places you're imperfect. Own up to them and you may find that people take you as you are, and that is far more beautiful than trying to appear put together.

My other encouragement is for you to come out to Tanner's. Wednesday, Thursday, come get free food. We're starting a limited menu tomorrow (we learned our lesson and will not back up our kitchen like we did tonight!), but food is free and drink profit goes to the American Red Cross Badger Chapter. You won't regret it, friends.

Be Ye Perfect.

My mind is blown. I feel numb. And my heart is doing some sort of fluttering thing inside my chest.

C.S. Lewis is getting intense. Throughout reading the last section of Mere Christianity, all I’m thinking is, Frick God, what do you want from me? When He says He wants all of me, I don’t understand. How? How do I do that?? How does this work??

Yeah, pretty resistant.

God said that we should become perfect. And apparently, He meant it. That’s actually scary. Lewis interprets this as, “The only help I will give is to help to become perfect. You may want something less: but I will give you nothing less.”

God is crazy.

“Make no mistake. If you let Me, I will make you perfect. The moment you put yourself in My hands, that is what you are in for. Nothing less, or other, than that. You have free will, and if you choose, you can push Me away. But if you do not push Me away, understand that I am going to see this job through. Whatever suffering it may cost you in your earthly life, whatever inconceivable purification it may cost you after death [Interjection: I assume Lewis is referring to purgatory?], whatever it costs Me, I will never rest, until you are literally perfect - until My Father can say without reservation that He is well pleased with you, as He said He was well pleased with Me. This I can and will do. But I will not do anything less.”

BLAH!

Ok so it’s in God’s power and will to do this - and I need not get myself to perfection. By surrendering everything, God’s way can be made to make me more like Himself. But I can’t wrap my head around what this means for good gifts. It seems all take, all you do is give to God, which actually seems worth it because He’ll give you Himself and make you perfect. What is better than that? But how do good gifts come into play? How can I accept marriage, children, a good family, health, etc. when receiving anything but a new heart doesn’t seem like part of this equation. It may make sense to you, and as I’m typing this I feel like it’s a no-brainer and should make sense to me, too. Well, it doesn’t.

...

I was reading Romans 12 as well earlier today:

I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all He has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice - the kind He will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship Him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person [a perfect person?] by changing the way that you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect (v. 1-2, NLT).

And then Paul goes on to command morality, to inspire people of virtue:

- Be humble (v. 3)

- Do well what you’re good at (v. 6-8)

- Love people sincerely (v. 9-10)

- Work hard (v. 11)

- Be patient (v. 12)

- Be generous and hospitable (v. 13)

- Be at peace with people (v. 16)

- Avoid revenge (v. 17-19)

- Do good (v. 21)

Is that God’s full and complete will for us? To be moral people? To be perfect? I haven’t been able to shake the idea in my head of a blueprint - go here, do this, etc. Does God work specifics like that? Or does He make us who are and establish guidance to be virtuous, and then give us creativity to take steps in life on our own? Is it - go here, do this - or - be good, love people, figure out the rest based on that ... ?

I always though of free will in this sense - the creativity to figure out one’s own life. But maybe it’s simply (and only) the power to choose (or not choose) life with God. If He takes all of us - does it mean we surrender that creativity too?

I think I’m always asking myself, what kind of meaningful life work am I going to have? But I need a mental shift that fosters other questions. What can You use me for? How can I glorify You? How can I become less? What kind of meaningful work can You do with my life?

This is heavy stuff.

“We may be content to remain what we call ‘ordinary people’: but He is determined to carry out a quite different plan [to bring us beyond the ordinary and into perfection]. To shrink back from that plan is not humility: it is laziness and cowardice. To submit to it is not conceit or megalomania: it is obedience.”

BAM. And that is what life is about. The relationship we have with God which entails our trying and trying again, day in and out, to give up, surrender, forgo rights to ourselves, that God would make us perfect, like Himself, complete creatures who are brought back to what the Creator intended.

Thoughts?

I haven’t blogged in over two months. Last time I posted, I was in a rush about to leave Kilimanjaro Bush Camp for Nairobi to catch a plane to Athens, Greece the next day. Phew a lot has happened.

So the nutshell! I flew to Greece, got engaged (:D), got stuck in London, finally flew home, had Christmas, went to camp, saw friends, moved back to Madison, have two jobs now. Oh, and I graduated. Oh, and I’m getting married.

See why the nutshell is all I can handle to tell you?

But wow, God. WOW GOD. He is challenging me in ways I can’t even describe. I’m finally opening up to Him again and although I’m still not in tune with Him and can’t understand Him as I used to, I’m getting to know Him again. I’ve had moments of sorrow and moments of utter joy. I’ve sat and heard nothing. I’ve sat and heard too much. I’ve been spiritually attacked and I’ve learned of my own (Christ-given) authority. I’ve have been over- and underwhelmed. I have been confused. Well, most of the time I’m confused. But my life in the Lord has become so dynamic.

I’m reading Mere Christianity. Clive! You blow me away! Highly recommend. Anyway. Today, I was reading his answer to the question, Is Christianity hard or easy? His answer is both. But I’m not going to get into that. I’m simply going to offer how he sums up what Christ asks of us.

“The Christian way is different: harder, and easier. Christ says, ‘Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have no come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked - the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours.’”

Guh. Munch on that one.

Closing Time

12.11.10

It’s over! We are about to leave Kilimanjaro Bush Camp for Nairobi. I will fly out tomorrow to spend the week in Greece. And then I’ll be home.

I’ll write later about our community presentations and how the semester wrapped up, but for now my concern is getting myself around the world!

Re-entry. Oof. I am so excited to see all of you. But unsure of how I’ll react to being home. All I ask is that you’re patient with me. Coming back home is not easy when you’ve been to a developing country. So it’ll be a process. Nonetheless, I am beyond excited to tell you all my stories and to hear yours.

I’ll see you all soon!

Shakin' in my Boots

12.03.10

An Emerson quote helped me come here. I was pretty scared to study abroad in East Africa. There were times I was terrified. I was scared of being overwhelmed by this program, by not being good enough for it. I was scared of finding that the other students were genius scientists who would intimidate me. I was scared of not having time to truly prepare myself for leaving, and being caught up in a wave of culture shock.

“Always do what you are afraid of.”

So I came, of course. Despite feeling unprepared and apprehensive of the unknown. And I found that, in part, my fears were realized.

I am overwhelmed. I’m not enough to solve wildlife management problems. But that’s true for everyone. We are all striving to find solutions. And heck, to even fully understand the issues. But they are huge. They involve immense tension between wildlife and people in a mess that makes you feel like you can’t possibly please both sides. I’m not the only one to be humbled by East African wildlife management.

And these students are brilliant. But not in the ways I expected. They are personable, and they think about spirituality and world issues and how to be a good community. They’re real people. Go figure. And they’re so intelligent. In ways that aren’t stuffy and superior. They can articulate their knowledge in ways that make sense to the world. Wow. And they don’t intimidate me, thank God. They inspire me.

And I’m always shocked. I’m shocked right now. But it’s something I can handle. I fly out of Kenya in 9 days. And the weeks following that will be quite an adventure in itself. Life is shocking, isn’t it?

My scare right now is DR! Directed Research. It seems huge. And impossible. And beyond my capabilities. But I’m a research trainee, dang it. And although these next few days of write up and presentations terrify me, I am allowed to make mistakes and not know everything. I’m allowed to be scared of it. But I’m obligated to breathe, think, and work through the very thing that makes me afraid.