in the Middle.

When I was in high school, Jimmy Eat World released a song, "The Middle", two things about the song... it was, and still is, very good and it was one of those songs a high schooler could connect to... because you know they're all the same, and you're very different.

The concept jump back into my head recently.  Because it's weird being in the middle.  Home becomes very empty because it seems like there's only a few in the middle and it's intimidating trying to find those few in the middle without having to put some of your self on the line.
Here's the song by the way, because if you're anything like me once you get a song in your head you just have to listen to it: Jimmy Eat World "The Middle"

I can think of three areas in my life where I feel like I am predominantly in the middle. Identity, politics, theology.

really just a few thoughts...

Thought Number 2:

I had this idea of being a renaissance man.  Kind of like da Vinci. Yet, the more I looked at the idea, the more  I saw it as unfeasible... that is unless I never stopped education.  I don't mean simply lifelong learning, I mean like paying to be taught and when I say never, I mean never.
Da Vinci had it "easy" the different areas of learning weren't nearly as stratified as now.

emasculated

Ever since entering seminary I've felt, for whatever reason, that I am incapable of doing what I desire to do.  Be it preaching, ministering, exegeting, etc.  It's not that I can't do it, I actually can do so quite well in situation where I feel comfortable, specifically among friends or in my evangelism class.  It's when I get in those situations that I'm not comfortable that I just don't feel like I should share my opinion.

and you were like... where'd he go?

I'll admit this semester has hit me like a sack of bricks... I was totally unprepared for it.  It is just a wee bit different having the semester work to take care of all the while tending to a young marriage.  I haven't really had much to think about other than that. Though, that's not the reason for lack of blogging, it is just the sheer volume of reading and work needing to be done. 

I've thought about where to go with this, either to express what I feel going forward or to express how I've felt about the past year.

So I saw The Adjustment Bureau...

Alison and I watched The Adjustment Bureau on Sunday afternoon.  It was a good decision, because it was an enjoyable movie and if we hadn't watched it we would have probably worked around the house and not rested... because there's nothing else to do, except for be on Facebook.
As enjoyable as the movie was, though, it kind of annoyed me, but only because I actually thought about it.... it's not as if there was any sort of glaring annoyance, it was just the theological undertones of the whole movie, which weren't veiled in the least... except calling God the "Chairman" and angels "agents" (if you want to call that veiling).  Well, the one thing that was sort of a glaring annoyance was the cheesy explanation of how agents were able to use doors as portals.

If you haven't seen the movie I hope I don't ruin it for you, but I'm not going to reveal much in the way of the plot... so no worries.

ideologue identity and I

I just thought this too funny to not put on here.

I'm not particularly sure what has inspired this thought process as of late, be it the current debt ceiling fracas or something streaming from my prior post...  I suppose it would be the former at first, and then my ruminating on it that drew connections to the latter.  Of course, none of that matters, really.

I'm like most Americans, I think.  This whole political brinkmanship, infighting and partisanship has bugged me since I actually started paying attention in undergrad.  I suppose its no surprise that its come to this, I have a few friends who are hard-line and unforgiving in their ideology (or should I say dogma) on both ends of the spectrum.  I hate talking politics with them, you can guess why... there is no room for them being wrong, not even in the slightest. They are ideologues.

I'm no foreigner to the mindset of an ideologue.  I think I expressed the fact, even though never clearly stated, that I myself was an ideologue in several areas at one time.  I have since grown out of that; at least I don't think I'm still an unforgiving, dogmatic to a fault ideologue.  I am an idealist, yes, but I have been tempered by reality.  (What does that make me an idealist realist, or a realist idealist?).  Which means I know that I very well could be wrong in many things; I need only experience or reasoning far more sound (not louder) than mine to prove it, as has been proved in the past.  OK, I guess I still can be an unforgiving jerk, but that's only because some people's reasoning is faulty... but does that make a a jerk or an ideologue?  ...it's a rhetorical question, don't answer it.

Even still its difficult not to be an ideologue.  We are all informed by ideals and, thus, an ideology.  Even the apathetic are set on the ideal of apathy.  And I find that my main qualm is with ideologues in the arena of theology/philosophy and politics...

i'm a cynic and a skeptic

It's true.  I have increasingly become more and more cynical and I hate it.
It's because I am, at the same time, an idealist; this is an odd balance, I know.

To be honest I find it extremely frustrating, and I know I'm not the only one, thankfully.  Recently, at my wedding, I was having a conversation with one of my groomsmen who had just graduated from grad school, essentially a seminary, with a degree in counseling.  He said that he has increasingly become, like myself, a cynic, and also like me, hates it.  It's a very frustrating view to have on life, the world and everyone you know.  And yet, neither he or I can seem to fight it.
It seems like a loss of innocence or naivete, but I wouldn't call it that; I think it is more so the loss of ignorance and the frustrations that come when finite hopes become infinitely impossible to realize.  I do still have hope, but I know that, in all likelihood, they will remain only hope and never become a reality.