If you and I were to swim across the Atlantic we would surely drown
I may get past the buoys
You may get farther chasing the horizon into the midnight blue
But in the end it such an endeavor would be the death of me and you

Such is the state of sinful man
Having rebelled against God
In an ocean of despair without a plan
Kicking and paddling toward a land he can never reach in his own strength

So caught up with ourselves
Were you to ask a description of our environment we wouldn’t even name “water”
It had become our home
The only thing we knew of
And how to do

“…Far too easily pleased…”
the kid content with making mud pies
not understanding the offer of holiday

Like Lot
Knowing things weren’t right
Knowing a judgment must be coming
Yet so stuck in the ways of sin – unable to move

It took your Hand forcefully leading
Severe mercy

“Flee for your lives! Don’t look back!”

Fix my salty eyes forward
So prone to wander
So prone to betray

May they remain ever forward

Hans, Frans and the Man with Arms for Legs

If being lanky, pale and Protestant was the "sexy" that Justin Timberlake thinks needs to be brought back then I would be on top of the world.

But it's not.

And even though as far as I know I am in top health, I don't come anywhere close to having a weight problem, I don't have any glaring physical shortcomings - I like many others feel the need to throw gobs of money at a gym membership and containers of protein powder which are used for a couple of days and then resume their place as a dust collector on the shelf.

God has made me in His very image, breathed life into my nostrils, loved me enough to die for me.

But I don't have huge biceps or bulging calfs and so I was beginning to doubt my self-worth and get down and in such a mood I ventured to the gym the other day- brushing aside other responsibilities and intending to focus entirely on making my chest and arms bigger.

Bigger is better right?

I mean on the judgment day I'm gonna have to give an account of my life and also report my bench max right?
The woman I marry one day is gonna wonder how many burnout sets I can do with a dumbbell right?

And so as I walked into the gym...
wishing my arms were bigger
wishing my feet were smaller - gosh these shoes look ridiculous
wishing God made me just a little different -

I mean sure I have family and friends and a great job and an education and a new truck and good health and great weather and every opportunity to succeed in life and food on the table and a bed to sleep in and every ammenity under the sun and citizenship in the greatest country on earth and freedom and safety and not to mention forgiveness for my sins and the great God of the Universe providing atonement for me - I mean sure I have all of that but I mean come on God if you did all of that for me whats it gonna hurt if you had just made me naturally tan and with a permanent six pack and 20 inch biceps?

And so as I was glancing in the mirror at the gym - working on my second set of curls I saw in the reflection a man awkwardly laboring up to the weight bench and it wasn't until he was closer that I began to understand why he looked so funny getting to the bench and why it took him so long and why he had a trainer already setting up the weight ahead of him...

His legs didn't work.

As far as I could tell he wasn't injured or sick, they probably never worked from the day he was born - he had become quite accustomed and skilled at getting around with the crutches that were attached to his arms with metal rings - the kind that you don't really ever not use, except maybe to sleep.
And it was this man who came to the bench - crutches, cursed legs and all - and after unattaching the cructches began to do a few slow curls

one after the other
slowly
one after the other

I found myself losing count of my own repititions and instead concentrating on the pattern of his breathing - admiring the strength of a man of his stature
I don't remember if I finished my set. I put the weight back on the rack, grabbed my bag and walked out

perhaps with slightly bigger arms
definitely with a greatly enlarged perspective

I went in there that day full of complaints and discontentment - wanting to make my body bigger, more muscular, more desirable

This man went in there to strengthen his arms so he could "walk"

He went in there that day I'm sure full of his own complaints and discontentment - going there to strengthen the arms which for him have become legs

and suddenly my motivation didn't seem so great and my body not so bad

and my complaint and discontentment oh so grievously sinful

I wonder how people's perspective would change if they always worked out next to a man or woman like this, instead of the silicone, sunbed, steroid, spandex clones that inhabit most of our South Florida gyms.

but then again those half empty protein containers have become great bookends...

Isaiah 46:8-10

"Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors,
remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other,
I am God, and there is none like me,
declaring the end from the beginning
and from ancient times things not yet done,
saying, "My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose."

Factory

One restaurant that I end up eating at quite often although I am not really that fond of it is Cheesecake Factory. Remember a few years ago when Cheesecake Factory was sort of the craze? The official restaurant of High Schoolers birthday dinners, the official place parents took their kids when they came to visit them at college, the official place you could take a first date and the girl wouldn't be too upset that you took her to a chain and didn't think of something more creative.

Cheesecake Factory's always anchor shopping plazas built in middle to upper class suburbia.

Well to such a restaurant I ventured the other night and once again upon eating I wasn't dissatisfied but I wasn't in love with what I had either. And the reason I have never been in love with Cheesecake Factory even when it was the craze was because they just try and do too much. I can read a John Grisham novel quicker than I can read their menu and when a place has that much to choose from you always wonder how fresh all that variety can really be. I don't think the word "Factory" helps either - doesn't really scream "freshness."

The restaurants that I love are the ones that do one or two things and do it very well.

Cheesecake does a lot of things good but really doesn't do anything great.

And the other night as I was just cracking the Table of Contents for their menu I realized that I - along with a lot of my fellow stressed out friends - have become living Cheesecake Factory's. We're running around doing a million things at once just to get by and in hopes of finding that one all consuming passion and in the midst of it all I wonder if I am doing anything great.

A lot of the time we run around and do a million things at once out of necessity and I would like to think I'm still in that necessity territory of life but at the end of the day I hope it all slows down. I hope I reach my goals. I hope at the end of the day I am doing one thing greatly and not doing too many things at once and in the end not really being effective at all.