6.16

 Still somewhat failing to keep myself afloat.  I've been praying incessantly today, asking God to revive my spirit, to impart His will to me, to replace my will with His.  I at one point earlier today thought I was perhaps violating Jesus' command to stop using so many words because talking more does not increase God's knowledge or level of concern.  But I just don't know what to say.  I run out.  Idk.  Jesus didn't exactly chant His prayer, but He did model for us an example of urgent prayer in the garden of Gethsemane(is that the word I'm looking for?....🤔..uh...)

I'm distracted.   My sister just texted me.  Doubtful this is the final chapter here.

CONT'D

I'm back.

Hmm.  I don't know if me praying is of any consequence.  I felt like I was being disrespectful of God's promises or ungrateful or something... like "Relax!  I don't need to radically transform you.  If I decide to do so, you'll find out in due time.". Idk.  I don't even know what specifically I want or need from God.  I'm already saved from His wrath.  I think...?  I would like to be more productive in my walk with God.  I don't personally care so much about the particular sins I commit.  I just don't want to be hiding from the church to avoid mis representing the church to outsiders.  People come in and they're like "Look at what kind of change God has made in ordinary people!  We WERE ordinary but now we're a bunch of weirdos!  But don't gaze to long at that guy over there.  He's stupid...or something...". Idk.  I guess I should just quit trying to measure myself by other churchgoers.  I'm not your average church goers.  I might grow to be more like one as time goes on.  I might not.  I need to quit latching onto every piece of word that I get sent to me.  I need to take what I get in context.  I do think my pastor was into something when he said quit judging your brother based on the different measure of faith he's given.  I don't think the people I'm being desciples by truly agree with that notion.  That's on them. I need to seek approval from God.  Not let myself be sized up and chopped down by other people.

DS

 Going through Romans this week starting yesterday.  It really is a confusing composition.  Maybe more confusing to me because I'm so filthy.  I did manage to go Monday and Tuesday without engaging in immorality but slipped a couple hours ago.  I should be a lot more grievanced about the fact that I didn't keep it together on Sunday.  Today is no less important by the calander.  It's not important to me and it doesn't strike me as a day of particular consequence but who's to say what the ramifications are in my activities?  Maybe someone saw me through the window or for all I know maybe I have a digital stalker...  Maybe I'm being investigated for some suspicion of criminal activity and the detective was ill effected by my deeds.  If he's, whoever, if anyone, saw my deeds, as a non believer, I might have given them added fuel to dismiss Christianity and if a believer I may have thrown about undue temptations.  idk.  Not terribly likely anyone witnessed what I was doing although God certainly did and I should be grieved to tears by this but I'm just so dull.  :/

sinectopy

 Well, I managed to not actively engage in sexual immorality yesterday, but I had a rather unproductive conversation with my accountability partner.  I don't know if this is going to work, having him AND someone else of the same wavelength.  I'm not interested in trying to PROVE my salvation by ticking off every box in a checklist.  That seems to be the goal of my bretheren and I'm just not interested.  I don't appreciate being argued with.  "You don't resist,  You FIGHT!"  I'm guessing the scripture that says "resist the devil and he will flee from you" is not applicable in this context.  I even quoted that back to my accountability partner and then he accused ME of "arguing with The Word"  I wasn't arguing with the word.   I was trying to coax the guy into quit being so vague.  

I need to delve more into His word.  I don't need all this other crap.

Auyrg

 I don't really know what to say...  I know I should not get so frakn ayenge'ry about fraKn anything much less at the qty and depth I do.  

I don't think I said anything dishonest although I might've unduly characterized certain things or over simplified unjustly etc etc.....

Had a productive counseling session today.  At least I think.  Time will tell if it's actually helpful.  I think this guy who has ventured to help me with my sinful patterns of behavior will be a good guide in my life.  I can already see it.  The biggest obstacle is my own dullness of heart and stubbornness.

On a separate note, I don't know how, but I managed to burn 100+ calories today without even going for a walk.  I ate a lot more calories today than I did yesterday tho.  Yesterday I actually ate **mayyyyybe** 2,000 calories... I really don't think it was more than that.  I ate lunch at IHOP today, that's where we had the counseling session.  So that was 1.2k calories right there.  And then I had three sandwiches for dinner.  Breakfast was somewhere between there ie two sandwiches.  Then I had a couple eggs and a protein drink at the lake afternoon time, 2:30ish.

Not much else to say about anything... I'm supposed to be trying to get to sleep... I'm typing this on my phone...rrk!  Ok.weyll...g'nite

Dirty laundry

 My mom is grieved by all the times she raised her voice at me and the fact that I never know if I'm doing the right thing with her constant nitpicking and contradicting and/or ineptly worded instructions is not her doing, but is the result of my mutated form of logic...

I should be grateful for the sense of humility that has resulted from that except I have so much "pride" that I'm apparently a danger to my nephews.  This probably doesn't make any sense unless you're around all the bullshit I've witnessed.  My primary offense, according to one of the elders of the church is that I don't forgive at the drop of a hat.  My sister says if I want to ever live here, I need to quit offering to be helpful with the kids.  I don't get the connection.  I was kicked out because of pride, but somehow wanting to be helpful is the most vile manifestation of that.  Wtf???  She of course wants me to be helpful but in order to be so, I have to agree with every crevice of her thoughts or else I make her job more difficult.  I can understand that since she's explained it in detail.  I don't understand what the hell happened to all the concerns over the panic attacks that my brother in law doesn't understand why I care of I'm being blamed for... ("If she says you're innocent of wrongdoing what difference does that make to you?".  Probably nothing if he doesn't agree.  I wouldn't have been aware of what was going on if he hadn't told me how awful I am because of it....   Yes, I'm so idolotrous for thinking lowly of this Bs.  That was his response to my email where I TRIED to articulate my thoughts on the matter....)

I don't know who reads this.  I don't think anybody gives a crap.  If I thought anybody did, I would assume it'd be my mom or my sister.  Except my mom is incapable of doing anything differently and my sister is lovestruck by everything about her husband.

failing to honor

 Been sucking the grave this past week or so.  I believe it'll all work out.  I just need to figure out how to quit being so damn lazy.

It's a joke

 https://www.etonline.com/amy-schumer-cancels-comedy-show-after-covid-19-diagnosis-183737

What the heck?   Netflix Is A Joke is not the same thing as Netflix is a Joke.  These publishers could have at least italicized the text.  It's not like it's common knowledge that there is a festival called Netflix Is A Joke.  I certainly didn't know that.  I figured it out, after rattling my brain trying to figure out what the hell I was reading.  I thought it might've been a typo.  The same exact article is being published at numerous outlets.  While reading the first one I came across, I thought it was maybe garbling up a sentence that consisted of an opinion.  "Amy Schumer had to cancel Saturday’s comedy set at the Netflix is a Joke festival -- after testing positive for COVID-19." Someone that doesn't know how to write or read English very well, which is half the internet, to varying degrees...even TIME magazine's online content is prone to have typos...could have easily taken a sentence akin to:

"The fact that Amy Schumer had to cancel Saturday's comedy set at The Netflix is a joke worthy of a festival..." and coughed up the above sentence.

Rg

transactional forgiveness

 I'm not sure I understand what my pastor was saying this past Sunday (yesterday).  He was saying something about God's grace is conditional or something.  Sounds like I'm going to Hell.  I don't know.  I think there might have been some important details that he left out.  He said "God showed you your sin, you repented, therefore HE forgives you"  I don't know.  The leadership there makes this emphasis on the supposed difference between "changing your mind" -- what the original Greek New Testament is translated into English as "repentance" -- and the "Real" meaning of the word "repentance", which is a "whole person turning away from"...  If we wholly turned away from sin, all of us would be without sin, period.  We might have some daunting recollections from the past, but we would not have anything PRESENTLY to deal with.  If you change your mind, naturally you're going to act like it.  People at the church I go to seem to think "changed my mind" is akin to "I'll make a note of it".  I have no idea where they get that from because that's not what it means...that's not what I mean when I say it.  Sometimes changing your mind may be like flipping a coin.  You flip it, and you flip it again.  There's no limit to how many times a coin can be flipped except what gets set by God.  The complete turning away from sin requires a complete and permanent change of mind.  Which is harder to come by, and as I have always understood it, is a process.  Salvation is not a process.  I've never understood it to be one anyway.  Present tense salvation, salvation from our sins, also referred to as sanctification, is not an instant thing and is a process, but I've always been told "God doesn't wait for you to get your act together before He saves you.  He accepts you as you are"  Maybe I'll hear this coming Sunday that THAT'S un-Biblical.  idk.
I realize I'm making things harder for myself by not rushing into agreement with God and fighting to stay in agreement with God.  I don't know how I am fault for that.  I don't know what I could have done differently except take heed to God's word WAY sooner than I did.  It was about the time my mom started trying to impart the knowledge of God to me that I started getting caught up in filth from the internet..........  IT seems rather stupid that I didn't submit to God sooner.  I mean, on what basis was I making judgement against an eternal God?  Yes, I don't like the fact that so many people are going to end up in Hell.  I can still say that I find it difficult to reconcile the passages in Revelation where the heavenly chorus is shouting "THANK YOU GOD!" for pouring vats of acid on the people of Earth.  It says HE IS JUST AND RIGHT for these judgements. And I know there's a lot of people that are deserving of the depths of terror and heights of torture, and many more people deserve to have a serious beating, but the whole world, or most of it?  I certainly can't bring myself to feel that way about the trajectory of my life, least of all my lust for female sexuality.  I know I should out of respect for God do better in the coming days.  I went 3.75 days without acting on it.  Maybe I can up that to 5.25 days, or a whole 7!  I think 7 is setting too lofty of a goal for me.  I'll start with 5 and if I can stave it off another day or two.....we'll see.  I should have read The Bible some yesterday.  I should have read it earlier in the day as of now.  That probably would have helped...

"What image do you have of yourself?"

 Part of this book about dealing with idolatry has a questionnaire about how to identify idols.  A question about self imagine came up.  I don't know how to succintly answer it so here's me typing up a blogpost about it....

I see myself as young and kind of a rebel, an okay-y guy, sorta, a deconstructing sort, always trying to make sure his i's are crossed, etc., always re-thinking things and double checking...  but often getting his priorities out of sorts.  re-thinking things always, but not always re-thinking the things he should be re-thinking........  Getting lost in the small things.  Disorganized in thought.  

Not sure what else to say about how I see myself.  I don't know what to say about my future self (it was actually two questions in one bullet point).  I've never met him, nor have I heard anything about him.  I imagine my future self will be older.  Hopefully I'll be wiser....

Would it were NOT true?!

 "If only it were true"
"He says it as if it were true"

I can't recite the exact function of words like "would", "were", "it", "and" etc...but I know damn well "would it were true" is nothing more than a mishmash of words.  They try to justify its existence as "The subjunctive mood".  WTF?  Is that a sophisticated way of saying "incoherent mutter"?

But given that it seems to be a very commonly used incoherent mutter, it seems maybe I'm also the only one who thinks the sentence that opens this Facebook post could benefit from some re-wording.

It SEEMS, based on the way I learned how to talk (American English), that it SHOULD say "Van Gogh, in being himself, resulted in distinction and success,..."  I have no idea how to read that sentence without pretending it has a different sequence of words on the page.  When I first tried reading that, I went through it 3 times and had to go backwards and see if I missed something.  I've learned through reading broken English all over the web that if you just continue looking at the other words used, you can figure out what the author was probably trying to convey.