Tuesday, December 16
grace...
"imagine how he feels. tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of raymond k. hessle's life. his breakfast will taste better then any meal you and i have ever tasted." - tyler durden
why don't i feel like more raymond?
Gods grace is new everyday. His love never ends.
yet, i tend to just settle for "the convenient store" life. i let the idea of "too much school" get in the way of letting me experience life through God to the fullest.
what if everyday we woke up, was the most beautiful day of our lives? and our breakfast is the best breakfast we've ever tasted because we've received Gods grace and love everyday and seek him in the ordinary things of life.
i love that scene because it is so short and so impactful and they leave you to come up with your own conclusion of what happened to raymond k. hessle.
share your thoughts.
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7 comments:
awesome.
i think we should get a big crew together, watch fight club, and talk theology. profound movie in so many ways.
You're getting very philosophical on us, man!
To the topic...I have a gun, I know where you live...March 16th will be the best day of your life.
Adios!
So, i am pretty sure life doesn't remain as a perpetual 'everything is fine' state of being, when you accept Christ into your life. The truth is life sucks sometimes.
I was told by a good friend of mine whose job is investing in college students lives, and she said something along the lines of 'i won't tell someone not to feel a certain way, because we all feel all sorts of emotions throughout our lives. But in light of those feelings i will tell someone the truth, which may be something simple like "you may feel like you are worthless, or a bad boyfriend, or girlfriend, but it isn't true"' I thought this was helpful in the fact that emotions are actual emotions that we feel, but they don't have the authority of truth in our live. In fact if i was to listen to my emotions as complete undoubtable truth, then i might not be alive anymore.
A professor of mine said something similar during a conversation i had with him and he said, that if he was to listen to these emotions that he has every day, then he would be in a horrible place right now. He said the one thing that is the most encouraging thing in light of screwy emotions and the thing that pushes him through the hard times is this, 'that Christ died for me'.
All this to say, we all feel like we don't deserve Christ. We all feel like we could be more appreciative, and helpful to others. Loving, gracious, hospitable, what name you... even less down sometimes. But this is truth, That Christ Died For You. It is this fact that we can take the shit in our lives, label it as shit, and face it head on.
Life is hard, and its a fact of life that we are down sometimes, and up sometimes. Depression is something that i am continually told about from people who have been through it, or are going through it, and i am coming to grips that we all are depressed at times in our lives, and that's ok.
But in light of the hard times, we must hold onto at least one truth. That Christ died for me, and for you. This is our rock and this is what keeps me going.
I don't know, what do you think?
Anonymous,
i think you missed the idea behind the video or mis-understood my thoughts about the clip... it was supposed to be encouraging and challenge us to think more positively and find peace in the idea that God loves us no matter what; that should give us the same feeling that raymond k. hessle had the following morning.
obviously i know life sucks, but i don't need to point that out... its challenging enough to focus on the positives of life.
why do you post anonymously?
Rick Hawkins.
Sam I enjoyed what you just posted. The funny thing is that I just watched that movie the other day and really didnt put a whole lot of thought into that scene. I think its cool how God will use anyone and anything to speak to us. Weather it be through His Word, or a grusome vulgar movie such as Fight Club. I think that scene is a fairly accurate picture of what Grace means. The fact that we should be dead and are not because of Jesus. The trigger so to speak has not been pulled on us and we have life to live fully. I hope and pray that you seek that grace everyday Sam. Thank you for making Gods grace more alive in my life. Rick
True, i have misunderstood what you meant in the original post. So, attempt two. Let's see if i do better...
In light of that, i still think something is flawed. Our life and faith does not hinge on experiences. This is the problem of Evangelicalism.
Now, don't get caught up on my criticism, Evangelicalism was a great movement and in many ways i am a product of it myself.
But, as Christians move more towards the collecting of experiences, believers became more reliant on those events in their lives that were 'good experiences' or 'conversion experiences' and not necessarily on the foundation which is Christ.
Christ is the foundation on which our houses are built. Not our conversion experience, or camp experience, or ministry experience, or educated experience, or what have you. Not to say these are bad, they are not. My problem is that we rely on these experiences as if it was the whole reason for living.
It is why the 'prosperity gospel' is so destructive. If we rely on what we gain, our experience, our success, or what we have... we lose our focus. Our focus should never be on ourselves, nor what we've experienced. We begin to think poorly theologically when we rely on these things. Just think about it... where are you when life isn't a good experience, or when you aren't 'experiencing life to the fullest', or life is just down right dark? You'll probly think that God isn't there. OR, you might try to protect God by labeling the good things we have as 'blessings' from God and ALL the bad things as those not from God. Not all bad things are from the devil. In the Hebrew, it says God put a 'bad/evil' spirit on Pharaoh. Why are we protecting God? He doesn't need our protection... He's God! And God is not dependent on how we experience Him or life.
If we rely on experience we might go and have a great time at camp and yet when we come back home and fail because we are human and we fail a lot, our reliance on experience will place us in a worse position than when we first left home.
Experience is great, BUT we must place it in it's correct light.
How'd i do? ... probably not too well, huh? Oh well.
Side note... To live in Christ is to die. Our faith is absolutely contrary to our human lives. Why do we want to live in our lives that make us so miserable? Should we not earnestly pray that Christ would come and KILL us, and in that death make room for his life IN us? I must decrease, He must increase. 'For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain'. 'Life through God' calls us to follow Christ to the cross... to die on the cross with Him. For us to 'live life to the fullest' is to die to the fullest. To get to eternal life, we all must face death and die.
Oh, and i don't care about names...
I know that is a stupid reason, and places me in a strange position when talking to everyone... limiting my influence or what have you, but oh well.
If you'd like, you can throw all the tomatoes and lettuce you want. Just Joking...
...but seriously.
Sorry... a few more thoughts...
I love this scene... this whole movie in fact.
But, i think the problem for raymond is how he will look back on his experience.
Will he rely on those feelings the day afterwards, where life is at its 'peak'? And when life isn't on the 'peak', how will raymond think about where he is?
There are two kinds of people in this world. When the two people get to a mountain peak one looks at the valley bellow and the farther away and higher up peak and says, 'dammit! might as well just give up' and their journey is at an end and they go back the way they came, where as the other says, 'alright! bring on the valley! bring on the hike! farther up, and farther in!'
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