And So It Goes With God

Hola folks! Long time no blog. I would like to say I have been extremely busy trying to save the world but that would be a complete lie. I mean we have still been working, doing our normal tasks throughout the day, but at night our internet has not been working where we stay, and that is where/when we do most of our blogging. In Peru, it is kinda hit or miss on the "wee-fee" also known to us as wifi. You hope it is on and if not, tough luck find something better to do. Which we have... We found a board game called Settlers of Catan. I don't know if you have ever played, but I highly suggest you find it soon and get going on it. The only problem is, it can get quite intense and at the end of the game I am not sure any of us went to bed liking the others. But anyways, that has been taking control of our evenings along with a lot of peanut butter and jelly sandwich making, some good music, a little football tossing, and card decks of push-ups. Have you ever heard of that? It is something my cousin and I used to do several years back that we decided to pick up again during the week days when we are away from any workout facility. So basically, you flip a card and whatever number it is you do that many push-ups (Jack=11, Queen=12, King=13, Ace=15), but then you also do something else of that number such as some sort of abs or band curls. Kinda just got to wing it. But I am pretty positive we finished the deck of cards for the first time last night so it was a pretty proud moment for us both to say the least.

This last weekend we got a group together and watched the Life of Pi on a projector, with subtitles of course, and had some popcorn and coffee. It was an awesome evening but the movie really touched me again. Have you ever seen it? If not, it is a movie about... I won't ruin it for you but I do want to lay the foundation out. It is a movie about a kid who through a few incidents winds up stranded on a boat with a tiger for several days and lives to tell his story later in life. The whole movie is an interview between him and a movie director interviewing him wanting to make a movie about his life, because he was told, "It will make you believe in God." There is your quick briefing. I had seen this movie a few times, actually went back and watched it twice in theaters. But this night, a few quotes actually stuck out to me that touched me and made me think a little deeper.

Pi Patel as an Adult: Fait is a house with many rooms.

Writer: But no room for doubt?

Adult Pi Patel: Oh, plenty, on every floor. Doubt is useful, it keeps faith a living thing. After all, you cannot know the strength of your faith until it is tested.

In this movie, it is interesting to see the strength of this young boys faith. One thing I struggle with is when things are going really good in my life and I am "meeting my expectations", I am very good at internally and externally giving God tons of glory because I know there are plenty of reasons for why I shouldn't be able to do the things I have been able to do. That has never been a problem for me. What has been a problem though, is when things go really bad in my life and I'm not meeting those "requirements" I've set for myself, I am quick to put that blame on God. That is something I believe I have grown out of, or at least matured in this area. But it was awesome to watch this kid praise God throughout all circumstances. A quick side note on Pi, he was raised in Hinduism, grown in his faith by a catholic priest, and had decided that he just wanted to love God and live for him. Several times he talks about how he is thankful for Hinduism because it led him to believing in Jesus Christ and the cross. Once again, never test or doubt the power of God and what he can do with the littlest opportunity given to Him.

But Pi, unlike me, was courageous! He knew he was surrounded by God's presence as it says in Psalms 19...

Psalm 19:1-2... "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge."

Day after day, and night after night, Pi saw this display. As when you watch the movie, the graphics are incredible, a lot like Avatar in some scenes. But Pi knew this so when he saw it, he would instantly scream out to the Lord! But on the opposite end, when he was starving and terrible thunderstorms were screaming down on him, he did the same, he screamed out to the Lord at the top of his lungs. It was so crazy! How could a young boy, maybe barely a teenager, be so confident of God and be so courageous in his faith, having the maturity that so many of us lack. I think he understood his only rescue was going to be God. His only supplier of food was going to be his Lord. The only person he was going to be able to talk to, so he doesn't go crazy out there, was going to be Jesus. "After all, you cannot know the strength of your faith until it is tested." His was tested, there was no doubt about that.

Why does it take something so drastic to strike us dead in our tracks and turn and run to him. I know that is what it took for me. Throughout my life, I had so many wake up calls just begging me to seek this mercy and love that I had heard about for so many years. But how could I really receive that? You mean all I have to do is ask? There is no way a person like me could receive this gift... If these are all questions you have, they were all mine (and still sometimes are). Look at Paul for an example. A man who killed Christians. Who persecuted them, and was a very strong voice as to why these men were crazy. A man who still in scripture CONSIDERS, not considerED, but considerS himself the chief of sinners. Also this same man, wrote more books in the New Testament than probably most realize, gave his life to Christ to literally become a pencil for him and his plan.

"Doubt is useful, it keeps faith a living thing", that is how Pi survived. His faith became real. It was alive and living, and because of that he didn't feel dead. He had "hope and a future..." as Jeremiah 29:11 says. I know when you read this quote, you probably think "wait, I'm supposed to doubt that my faith isn't real"? The word doubt in the dictionary comes up as two things...

1. A feeling of uncertainty

2. Lack of conviction

I love the second definition. "A lack of conviction is useful, it keeps faith a living thing". For me at least, when I am not feeling convicted by Christ, I know that I am not living my life right. I know that there need to be some changes made, and the only way to really do that is by increasing your faith. We have already learned and talked about in earlier blogs, how "trying to be a better person" isn't what is gonna get the job done.

The movie goes on and has all these crazy experiences that are hard to believe anyone could even dream up without being on some kind of drug. Pi tells them as if they are so real and with such passion. When he gets back and is finally rescued and in the hospital, he tries to tell this story to reporters in the hospital room. They cannot believe anything he is saying. They don't understand how an orangoutang floated up on a bunch of bananas, how he survived with a tiger, how he found an island full of meerkats, and how he and the tiger ultimately found a way to survive all this with little food and water. So because he can't make them believe him he tells them another story very plain and dry. Simple, with no flashing lights, and growling tigers, with no thunderstorms, and no near death experiences. They take that story and build their articles off of it but the writer interviewing Pi in this story feels that the real story had all the extreme events in it.

Adult Pi: So which story do you prefer?

Writer: The one with the tiger. That's the better story.

Adult Pi: Thank you. And so it goes with God.

Writer: It's an amazing story.

Does that make sense to you? We have been given a choice to choose a life that is God filled full of adventure and tons of surprises awaiting us. A life full of "color" in Pi's terms. Or we can continue this life of black and white, the day to day struggle trying to find joy in so many other things to fill that voided area in your heart.

At the end of your life, if someone comes and asks you, "Will you be willing to let us make a movie about your life?" If you answer that question yes, would your movie be worth watching? Would I want to buy a midnight premier ticket to see the adventures and risks you've taken in your life? Or would it be just another boring black and white showing of a movie stuck in the wrong century? That is your choice to make. Make it an amazing story or not, the choice is yours!