job

Xaikayla 2007-01-01 04:24:28 ET "so where does wisdom come from? And where does insight live? It can't be found by looking, no matter how deep you dig, no matter how high you fly. If you search through the graveyard and question the dead, they say, we've only heard rumors of it." Happy new year

turbo 2007-01-05 04:13:40 ET wow. i think i like you. thanks for that quote...

Xaikayla 2007-01-05 04:19:10 ET I read it that morning and it was how I felt. So I shared. I am glad it spoke to someone else.

turbo 2007-01-05 04:24:11 ET that chapter has been circling around in my head for months but i kept ignoring it...

Xaikayla 2007-01-05 11:01:04 ET That specific chapter in Job? I am reading through it at the moment.

turbo 2007-01-05 14:24:30 ET yeah, particularly the verse(s) you posted. i'm not sure why...i've just been really confused lately so maybe that has something to do with it.

Xaikayla 2007-01-08 10:28:09 ET I have been dealing with confusion as well. There is something poetic and beautiful about Job's suffering.It makes it ok that I am confused. What are your thoughts on Job?

turbo 2007-01-08 14:26:14 ET the last time i read the book i got a lot out of it. the ending really spoke to me. at the same time though i often find myself thinking about it and feeling that all the stuff that happened to him was sort of fucked up. it frustrates me because to an extent i can relate to it really well, even though my suffering is more just internal and i haven't had so many outside things taken away from me really as i've just sort of been ripped apart internally and am scared of becoming someone i am not.

Xaikayla 2007-01-09 07:08:21 ET Suffering is fucked up. I don't know what to do when it happens to someone else anymore than when it happens to me. Death of self is suffering. It is confusing. it's what I am going through as well. Wisdom seems like the answer but it is as illusive as God is at the moment. Oh.. another quote from a study I read on Job and Ecclesiastes said As such, Wisdom is wide ranging, collecting under it's umbrella diverse and unlikely fellow travelers. What keeps the feet of these faith-travelers on common ground is Wisdom's unrelenting insistence that nothing in human experience can be omitted or slighted if we decide to take God seriously and respond to him believingly. I am as frustrated with Job's Friends as I am with my own "counsel" From my Mother, to my closest friends and some who are not, I am given advice that only makes me feel worse. I am eager to get to the part where God talks to Job but I am not there yet. Part of it is I have such hope for an answer I am scared to be disappointed. mostly though I am having trouble getting through the BS spouted by his friends. I am living in the Bible belt. I can tell you that that crap is spouted on a daily basis in the grocery store. The idea that "just apply Jesus and you get instant perfect life" doesn't EXIST in the Bible and yet it is common knowledge that if your life sucks then you are sinning. or you've done something wrong.

turbo 2007-01-09 15:16:28 ET yeah, i could not handle living in the bible belt again. i'm at least glad i'm living in l.a. - although voices from my past keep telling me there's something wrong with me because i live in l.a. and work for an industrial club, among other things. that is my biggest frustration and stumbling block, i believe, is that nearly every older 'christian' i've ever known, and what the church has become in general, is so fundamentally flawed it's become damn near impossible to even sort out the truth from these people. god's people and the church strike me as mostly closed-minded morons who aren't living as jesus would want them to at all. but then since i'm one of few who thinks like this, i'm the anomaly, and therefore i'm the one who's made to feel like the problem. i'm sorry but i simply can't believe that fundamentalism is anything but bullshit. god doesn't need or want me to change how i dress or change what music i listen to, who i hang out with, etc. etc. to be more 'perfect' to become saved. i had always thought that god could and would use anyone and anything in any situation for good, and evil only has as much power as we give it. it's gotten to the point where i don't even know what right and wrong is half the time because the christian church has set up this stupid religion full of false standards for what is 'sinful' and what is not. it's hard for me to even read the bible anymore lately due to all its misinterpretations and the voices i hear reciting it for their own needs and not god's or my own. and then i've been told i'm selfish for feeling this way by fundamentalist christians, which just makes me feel more like shit. how am i selfish to believe that god wants to save those like myself and not just the 'perfect' christian bible thumpers that strike me as nearly as bad as the pharisees in the new testament? it's so frustrating. the one thing it seems that christian people oft times try to do is be like jesus without realizing that they aren't or never will be like jesus. that's why we need jesus. if we were jesus, we wouldn't need him. and no one is as wise as he is...but i know some people who sure as hell like to act like they think they are. there's so much noise coming from the 'christian' community for someone like me to deal with that it's enough to make me want to shoot myself in the head at times. and i'm just frustrated with myself as well because i don't know what thoughts are me and what are god's because some of my very own thoughts seem to make more sense to me than the thoughts the church likes to tout as god's ideas. and then other's of my own thoughts just lead me nowhere. i've been way too introverted and thinking too much for too long now and i need to figure out what to do about it...i'm just terrified of becoming a part of the religion of christianity because i don't believe it is what god wants at all.

Xaikayla 2007-01-09 15:53:55 ET This has been my frustration with the church for years. Jesus spent his time with the outcasts of society. I can tell you as the daughter of a bible study teacher, I spent much of my life Fending off thoes who would resave me. I just had a conversation with some people at work on how heavey metal can no way be anything christian. There is hope. Some of the non denominational churches allow more sence of self and freedom of expression. I think that there is nothing wrong with working in an industrial club. Jesus stated that true religon is caring for the orphans and widows. The rest really is just crap we feel we need. My mother often confronted me with the "what does light have to do with darkness" speach. She rally didn't have a rebuttal when Iasked what good is a candle in sunlight. Don't let mass fear keep you from God. The pastor in Denver being exposed is just more proof that the perfect facade is pure shit and people want what is real.

turbo 2007-01-09 16:03:11 ET heh...whenever i had an older christian asked me why i wore black so much i would just ask them if they'd ever heard the song 'the man in black' by johnny cash or read the lyrics. they usually didn't have a rebuttal to that.

Xaikayla 2007-01-09 16:07:12 ET I was always accused of being a witch.

turbo 2007-01-09 16:09:47 ET fun! x_x yeah where do you live again? the southeast somewhere? i mean i couldnt stand growing up in north dakota, but i would imagine living in the south to be even worse...

Xaikayla 2007-01-09 16:13:19 ET my husband and I moved to The Nashville area of tenessee last august. as a california girl, this has been some getting use to.

turbo 2007-01-09 16:18:16 ET yeah...as much as i enjoy visiting other places in the u.s., i really don't think there's anywhere i would want to live in this country other than l.a. i've never really been out east though other than florida...so i need to visit more places out there. admittedly, while growing up i never thought it would be a problem, now that i've lived in los angeles for several years i've found myself having difficulty shedding a lot of the things i was taught growing up, even though i never fully believed them - things like los angeles will kill you, diversity is bad, liberals are evil, etc. i mean i used to not have many problems formulating my own opinions until i started living alone with only the voices of my past to yell at me when reality around me is basically contradicting everything i was ever taught about a place like l.a. - not that i ever believed it anyway...it's still just there. i don't know how to explain it...it's an added frustration. i really hate my past and the environment i was forced to grow up in, and i know i shouldn't...i wish i could find some peace with it but no matter what angle i look at it, north dakota fucking sucks and it sickens me that people just live their entire lives in places like that without knowing anything else exists.

Xaikayla 2007-01-09 16:34:46 ET I grew up in CA and I was taught that LA will kill you *giggle* Don't be too hard on yourself about your past. Paul Talks alot about transformation of the mind. Corinthians 10, I think, is a good chapter. We are human. we fear what we cannot control. Everyone likes their safe boxes. it's sickning, true. I have little patience somedays with the religious majority I meet here. I married into a missionary family. One with none of the emotion and Passion in which I live life. God Is teaching me patience and how to choose my battles.

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