Rebel Dragon's Lair

I am sitting in one of my favorite pubs, The Allen Wickers. I didn't work yesterday or today. I took some much needed, and much overdue time off. I needed a chance to get my thoughts together and to refocus. I want to do something else with my life. I have been consumed with my work for many years now. It leaves little time for anything else. I love to write, to create, to experience life, and in turn share those experiences and the wisdom that I gain with others. I have had little time to do any of those things. I haven't picked up a guitar in a long time. These are sad facts that make me realize I have been going in the wrong direction. Yesterday, sitting in my truck, I heard R. C. Sproul talking about this very thing. If you find yourself hating Mondays and longing for Friday, it is a good indication that you are not on the right path, and not in line with what God wants for your life. I think I am a case study in this very example. So what now? What do I do? I am sitting here pondering these things and trying to sort it out, hopefully with God's guidance. I haven't always been the best Christian. More often than not, I have been a pretty poor one. I am working on that. I need time daily to spend with God. I want a job that allows this. I want a mission. I want to find my way to serve God. I want to make a difference.

I was supposed to write about the new year and what my resolutions were and all that, right? Call it a lack of motivation if you will, or more likely, a lack of interest. Work has been a downer lately, consuming a lot of my time and at the same time leaving me feel as if I have accomplished very little. I would like to be doing something else, but this is my lot in life, and I have a family to provide for. Damn this sense of responsibility. Time is short as I write this, so I will have to conclude here for now. Simply put, my New Year's resolution is one of introspect.

This is the "Year of the Dragon" as well. My year.

To be continued...

I surprised myself by liking this song by Pink.

This is NOT the official video, as of yet there has not been one released.

December 17th, 2011 we heard that North Korea's "Dear Leader" Kim Jong il had died. I had been heavily inclined to write about this, and had only procrastinated due to the rush of trying to get everything ready for Christmas and last minute plans to travel to my parent's place in the country for the weekend. I had been wanting to make a correlation between Kim Jong il and the earlier articles I had written on Gadhafi and Osama. That window of opportunity slipped me by and so I found myself subconciously taking notes and reaching for a way to tie it into an article about my Christmas with my family. I should have known to be careful what I wished for. Apparently, I decided to make myself the object of my own experiment. To cut to the chase: I made a drunken ass of myself. I hurt a couple people in my family, in such a way that I may have caused some serious emotional scars that may never fully heal. The worst part of it is that I can't recall much of it at all. The worst of what I'm told I said, I have no recollection of whatsoever. I just woke up later that evening with a foreboding sense of something being amiss. Realizing that I had been asleep was the first red flag, because the last I could remember was hanging out in my Dad's shop prior to dinner. I lost several hours of my life without a clue as to what had happened. This is only the second time of my life that this has happened to me, in such a severe instance as this. It isn't something I'm proud of, and it isn't something I care to ever repeat. I completely lost control and was out of my mind.

Sitting here now, sober, in my right mind, back at home, I am forced to contemplate not only my own actions, but the severity of our world and how much evil lurks around the nearest of corners. At home with my family, on Christmas day is supposed to be a safe place. No one should ever feel intimidated or uncomfortable around their own family. Not only did I make others feel that way, but I made myself feel that way by whatever it was that took over my personality that day. You can laugh it off as the stupid drunken antics of a guy that can't handle his booze, blame it on the home brew or the double bock ale, but I believe it runs deeper than that. I don't have a drinking problem per se. I don't drink that much really. I don't have a drug problem. I am not a sexual miscreant. Yet there has been times in my life where I have lost control to any and all of the above. So does that make me a loser that should be cast away from society? Should I be locked up into prison, or a mental institution? Should I just do the world a favor and end my own life and cleanse the world of my filthy existence? Or am I just describing something that we could all relate to in one way or another as part of the human condition?

I think it is Sin. I'm calling it what it is. Plain old Biblical, God-and-all-that-jazz, Sin. I think our world is full of it. I am sick of it. I am tired of the destruction it causes around the globe, and in homes across our land, and even my own. I know what it is. The problem that I have, and that I think we all have, is fighting against it every day. It is much easier to drown my sorrows in a bottle of booze than to actually try and face life and all of its problems. The danger is that when you take that step, the door is open, and evil doesn't waste a minute in rushing in and trying to take over. That's when we realize we've screwed up, is we don't want evil to completely run the show, we just want to be able to dabble in it as we see fit, then pull the plug when we've had enough. The flaw with that plan, is that it doesn't work like that. There's no on/off switch. It's more like an infection. Once it is there, it has to be cured, or the host has to be destroyed. There's no way to just turn it off and go back to normal.

So how does this tie into the death of Kim Jong il? I didn't know him personally. I have never had one conversation with the man, seen him in person, even from a distance, nor could I quote even one thing he ever said. What I do know of this man, is that it is simply understood that he was evil. He was a cruel dictator that did horrible things to his people, both emotionally and physically. The same can be said of Saddam Hussein, Osam bin Laden, and Moammar Gadhafi. It is easy to point the finger and declare "evil" when it is far off and doesn't touch us personally. For me, this was a good reminder that evil is in all of us. We can't control it, and it is easy to be overwhelmed and devoured by it. I truly cannot fathom how those who do not have any belief in God or forgiveness can cope with the weight of it all on their own. Or maybe they're just "better people" than me and don't have much to feel burdened with. I do not know. What I do know, is that nothing short of a self inflicted gunshot, or some time on my knees before my God will ever cleanse my conscience once and for all of my own self perceived wickedness. I have a family to take care of, so I really only have one option without making my legacy even darker. So there is the nice little ribbon on it all. It is about legacy. Kim Jong il has left a legacy of evil. This whole experience has given me one more small prodding reminder that time is short, and I need to work on my legacy. For after all, in the end, what are we besides the lives we touch and the words and deeds we leave behind? Our essence is not wrapped up in the things we leave behind, but in the perceptions of those who live on.

Now back to work on being a father and a husband... and leaving a legacy more noble than I did this Christmas.

Found this article as a share on FB and thought it was a great read.