The Absurd and the Self

Sorry for the delay in writing a new blog post. It's not that things had gotten less interesting around here, I just became more preoccupied with school and friends and such.

I guess I'll start with Thanksgiving. Most of you, mainly friends at DU (Erin), get a real kick out of me eating turkey in Turkey. While I never really bought into how funny it really is, you persisted on its laughable value. So, I will be having a real turkey dinner here tomorrow night at my friends place and I am indeed excited to eat turkey in Turkey. But more laughable than that is the name of turkey here, it is hindi. And then in the Turkish language the translation for the country name India is Hindistan. So in a way in the eyes of the world Turkey is Turkey but in the eyes if the Turks, India is Turkey. Of course it is not as confusing as this since; one, the language difference; and two, in Turkish the name for Turkey is actually Turkiye. I hope that makes sense haha.

A week or two back Louis and I were waiting for our class to start (which the teacher never showed up to) and another exchange student told Louis and I that the post office on campus was looking for someone who had recently mailed a package to the USA, Louis had done so recently. So we went to the post office and imediately got lost in translation. After some time we convinced this Turkish girl that she did in fact know english and we learned that the mail truck caring Louis's package got stolen! Yes the entire mail truck, we are guess it happened somewhere in Istanbul maybe by pirates or hooligan kids. Louis and I were actually not surprised at all, this is totally somethign that would happen in Turkey. So we laughed for the rest of the week about it. But the post office ladie did say that she would gladly mail another package for him for free, yet she never offered a refund for the one that was stolen. haha

Some time after that incident, I was waiting for my laundry to finish. The time had come so I made my way down to the laundry room. No one was there but I saw my bag and took it. While I was walking out the laundry man came back in and embarked on a Turkish tiraid. He kept pointing at the door and saying the one english word he knows many times, "Problem! Problem!" Thankfully a Turkish student showed up who could translate for us, he explained to me that the laundry man was accusing me of breaking into the laundry room. He insisted that the door was locked and that I broke in. He said he was going to give my name to the security gaurds and the administration. I pleaded my case that the door was left open but he did not seem to believe me. For the sake of not getting too irretated with his incompetence I left. Recently, I had to do laundry again of course, so I got another chance to explain what had happened to him. He seemed to understand so he and I are back on good terms. But to my surprise on this visit to the laundry room I found that the glass laundry room door was shattered! haha so someone actually did try to break in.

So if you have read my blog posts from the past you know that the dorms are less than horrible but we have found a way to make it a little more fun. First the setting, all of us exchange students are on the same hall and most of us share a view of a court yard. It is not much of a courtyard though, it's completly concrete. As of late it has seemingly become a contest among all the students with a view of the courtyard to throw stuff out of their window which will make the loudest noise possible upon impact. Now our room is on the 4th floor but it is actually 7 stories above the courtyard. To contribute to the concert of falling objects Louis and I have found ammunition to throw ou tthe window that leave nearly no evidence, they is next to no clean up, and it is really loud! Shopping bags filled with water! It's amazing, it is so loud and so much fun! haha

Now more serious stuff. I have started reading God's Gift to Women by Eric Ludy. It's really good, a little corny at times but good. The book is more or less a commission to all men to wise up, notice that all you have been living for, striving for, is a lie. The target is Christ and we must turn our hearts that direction. Anyways, I have been thinking a lot about that and today it got me depressed for a little bit because it was talking about how some men have are so well versed in acting their role that we even become fooled. In other words, in terms of our so called faith we know what to say, how to act, everything so that people perceive us as possibly being righteous while we are actually far from it. The author confesses that he was this exact person growing up and through high school. I must say this hurt to read due to my, i guess you could call it "spiritual development" or more eloquently God's work, in my life the fast couple of years. Because He has changed me I have since realized that I was "that" person in high school and before. But I wont get into any sob-fest now. I want to just emphasize how consumed by self we can be and in particular the "religious" self. I give that specification because I, like others, become consumed by using religion as table to stand on and look down on everyone else. Now many of us would say, "I know I'm not that person, I am righteous, I do it right." But I think that is the very thing we must show caution towards. I am not calling everyone liars, don't hear that, I'm just saying there is a big differnce between self concept and self awareness. We may see ourselves as great people thus the concept we have of ourselves is, on our terms, healthy. But are we truly even aware of ourselves? Can we objectively and honestly say we are on the right path? It can be done, but not without a great deal of humility. And also accountibility and this is mainly why I write this I think. I need this accountibilty, don't let me become what I used to be. So thats my rant, it's not one of my finest but oh well. I miss you all and I cant wait to see you!

Reality... or so we thought

First, let me apologize for not writing an update sooner. This past week and the week to come are pretty busy due to midterms, even though classes have been inconsistent in attendance, work load, and difficulty, i still get a little stressed at the idea of taking a test. So due to the increase in study time i have had less time to think about things of more spiritual nature, which of course interest me far more than anything academic. So in the midst of tests and school I have had little time to refine my view on any specific topic but rather i have been introduced to many new things which i will have to spend time thinking about. Therefore, i will take some time now to organize my thoughts in front of you so forgive me if this is a bit drawn out.

Last week our school was screening the documentary "What the bleep do we know?" It is a film which brings together a number of scholars to talk about the field of quantum physics. Need less to say i found it very interesting and thought provoking. even with the smoking break the Turks had to take in the middle of it. The film brings up too many topics for me to talk about everything but i will talk mostly about the ones that were of particular interest.

The first has to do with the reality we all live in. It is interesting to think that every one of us has a different reality, or at least perception of reality. So while there maybe this unfaltering true reality what we perceive of that reality is actually what makes up our own reality. But from there one can argue how "big" the differences in perception are. for instance, one person may view a table clothe at blue and the next person may see it as green, this is of course a very simple difference in reality but then how far does the metaphor go? there are many instances were people confuse their realities in a way that makes them more comfortable. like when a loved one dies, there are accounts of people not acknowledging their death and going on thinking they are alive. so i don't know, although there is a "true" reality, the reality that is true to us is the one we perceive and choose to accept. now keep in mind this is of course theory what you make of it is your own preference.

Now, without a doubt to some of you, to religion. They do speak of religion in this film and how can you not when something like the meaning of life is brought up. And they, as many sciences do, reduce religion. The idea is that religion is was built out of insecurity. We are all so insecure about our purpose of life that we created religion to make us feel like our lives have meaning in the grand scheme of things. While i do think religion gives us these things, i do not believe that these are the means to this end. With out getting to specific on history, would an insecurity last through generations of people and expand as it has? would millions of people dedicate their lives to an insecurity? now some might say "well the person dedicating their life to it would not think it an insecurity, thus they would not even recognize it as such." true, but then how do we account for the relational aspect of out faith with Christ that many of us have? What about the those times when God seems so real we cry? or laugh out loud? do we attribute these to mass hallucination? i think that would be very ignorant for anyone to do.

Next,still religion but different idea, they bring up the idea of "Christ in us" which they then turn into the idea that we are all gods, we make our own reality, we create our universe around us, we are god. This made me think of things in turns of human nature. Is it really a belief to think you are god? i think not, i say just go about your life as you would normally and you will in due time treat yourself as if you were god and then make yourself into your own god. this is worldly human nature also known as sin. but then i get caught by the idea of there being an even more natural human nature, or maybe a "higher calling" as some may put it. since we were created by God and created to live in and for Him, would it not then be human nature to do so? are we actually going against our original human nature in sinning? thinking of this now i feel i have answered my own question by recognizing the fall. at the fall of man, did our human nature change from living in God to living in sin? i suppose so, but i honestly like the more optimistic view of us being meant to live for Him.

All right i think that is enough for now. I miss you all!

Thoughts on missions and Turkey update

Yeah so while it is still fresh in my head i wanted to tell you all about this thing going on in my head. it started about a week or so ago when one of my roommate's friends sent him a link for a product being offered on this website: http://www.kingidentity.com/ check it out, especially the doctrinal statement, which scares me a bit. But for those who dont want to read into the website ill tell you a bit about it. Kingdom Identity Ministries is a non-profit Christian outreach ministry, and after reading their mission statement they seem like a great organization seeking to bring God's Kingdom to earth also they claim that 100% of all tithes, offerings and such received by the ministry is used to advance the Kingdom of God. So it does sound great but then upon further examination of the website you will see at the bottom of the home page a link which says, "White Christian Ladies Only" it is a job posting, but what caught my attention the most was the part that says she must be "racially pure." so then i went on to look at their doctrinal statement, and it looks all good, saying they believe Christ is the only Son of God and that salvation is through faith not of works. But then things get weird when they say, "We believe the White, Anglo-Saxon, Germanic and kindred people to be God's true, ;literal Children of Israel. Only this race fulfills every detail of Biblical prophecy...this chosen seed line stand far superior to all other peoples in their call as God's servant race." Also "race mixing is an abomination in the eyes of God." This is related to what they said about the women being "racial pure" so they cannot have a husband outside of the "chosen race." They also have a sticker in the "special items" section that says "don't be a race mixing slut." So what am i getting at with this, well as said in the title i got to thinking about missions work. We do all these mission around the world to introduce people to Christ for the first time which is all good and great we are of course called to do just that. But do we forget about whats in our own backyards? are we not called to show Christ to everyone? i feel that often in the case of extremist Christianity like this we go on saying, "let them believe what they want", or we say sorry for it, "i am sorry for what has been done in the name of God." ok while i think that saying sorry for what has been done in the name of God but actually been outside his will is good i do not think we should dismiss these people as being outside our mission field. should we not try and show them the real love of Christ instead of letting them go on discriminating against other races and spreading that distorted view of God? we feel so often feel convicted to bring Christ to the people around the world who have never known or heard of him, but what about that people who have a grossly altered idea of Him than what we know to be true. I dont want to sound like i am down playing missions around the world, they are amazing and we should always do them, but what keeps us from going to places like this were people hold these views and then attach God to it to justify their racism. my mind is kind of a jumble with these thoughts and i dont think im really getting my point across well so i think ill stop there. but as a conclusion, just think about this, when we are called to spread the word to the corners of the earth doesnt that included Harrison, Arkansas where this ministry is located? Dont all people deserve to hear the Good news, even the ones who have heard it and since then twisted it? also should we fear that people are out there still using God's name to justify something as simple as not hiring a women for that secretary job i mentioned earlier? so think about those things and so will I and hopefully i can come back with a clearer view on this issue.


Turkey update: So Martine was here this past week and it was awesome! So great to have a familiar face here and it is just fun to have a friend here to share this experience with. We just had an awesome time, we went and saw a lot of stuff I have already been to but we did some new stuff like go to these islands off the coast of Istanbul called the Pricess Islands. There are no cars allowed there so we rented bikes and rode around the island for a few hours. We went up these massive hills because at the top were monasteries and great views. I think the best way to hear about what we did is actually to look at the picks on facebook. I mean a picture is worth a thousand words and if its an album of 60 pictures thats a really long blog post, and i dont type that fast. So check them out, it was a lot of fun. A few other highlights are that when Martine and I were on our way back from the airport there was a piece of the road on fire, not too big but traffic was still diverted. We saw these really cool carnie people who were a traveling band in which one of the instruments was a tuba. We climbed Ataturk mountain, not really its just a hill. and we saw some of the coolest sunsets ever! alright other than that school is just like it has been the first 6 weeks, slow, uneducating, and no class half of the time. but the sight seeing and stuff is great! I miss you all!