On a Pile of Stones

This semester we have a class where we share our life story with one another. This experience has forced me to look back and examine how I arrived at this place in life. As I prepare, I feel like I’m having flashbacks. The other day I was driving in the car and started to think about a painful episode as a child and something started to rise up within me. It was dark and it was ugly. I had to calm down and speak to myself remove the feelings. When soldiers return from war, they often have flashbacks, or mental dramas that recreate stressful scenes from the war and cause paranoia. Is this happening to me? Am I going crazy?

Maybe, maybe not - depends on who you ask :) But although my story is not as dramatic as a soldier back from the front lines, it's still real. There are so many moments of pain, insecurity, and confusion that rise from my life like bookmarks in an unfinished novel. But I don’t want them to paralyze me. I don’t want to constantly live looking over my shoulder. What do I do with the memories?

Thank God, I found some help in dealing with this from the Bible. After the Israelites had suffered through slavery, wandered through the wilderness, and lost a generation of people, God told them what to do with their troubling memories… Keep them and REMEMBER, I delivered you.

As the Israelites crossed over into the promised land, God told them to take stones from the Jordan River and set up a memorial (a place of remembrance; Joshua 4:1-3 below). Why? - ”He did this so that all the people of the earth might know that the hand of the LORD is powerful and so that you might always fear the LORD your God.” (Joshua 4:24) Wow, this is true!

While it is convenient to confess II Corinthians 5:17 (below) and act like some things never happened, that’s not healthy or realistic. What I realize now is that I have to keep my memories because they are apart of the narrative and testimony of my walk with God. This post today is my pile of stones, my memorial to the past. God, I remember all of the things from the past and thank YOU for delivering me.





God, how could you choose us? And after all of the ups and downs in our lives, how could we choose you? I believe it is because we were destined to be together with You. I believe You decided long ago that You loved us and wanted us as Your own. I believe the pain and the pleasures had a purpose. I pray we are able to recognize You and memorialize Your hand in our lives! Please deliver those who are still at places of pain and difficulty today. Remind us through others and from our own experiences that you are powerful enough to deliver. We love You because You first loved us. Amen.




(Mostly) Sane,
j.a.g.












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Joshua 4:1-3
1 When the whole nation had finished crossing the Jordan, the LORD said to Joshua,
2 “Choose twelve men from among the people, one from each tribe,
3 and tell them to take up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan, from right where the priests are standing, and carry them over with you and put them down at the place where you stay tonight.”

II Corinthians 5:17 - Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

On T.I. (or T.I.P.)

After watching recent interviews of the rapper T.I. by Larry King and Jamie Foxx, I have concluded that I really like him (T.I.). He is what many of us from urban communities grow up seeing everyday with some differences. He is rugged and refined, aggressive and articulate, common and uncommon simultaneously. His lifestyle resembles many of those from the ‘hood, but his grasp of people and the world goes beyond expected limitations.

Larry King seemed to recognize this as well. He asked T.I. many questions that seemed to say, where does this behavior come from? If you know better, why are you doing worse? T.I.’s reply was hard to hear, but real - I am a product of my environment. (Check out the clip below to hear more - starts at minute 7:05)




What T.I. says is true even if it hurts to hear it. He grew up around violence, turmoil, and drugs. So he participates in those things. I liken this to someone who grows up near the beach. If you ask them if they know how to swim, they will answer yes, of course. Why? Because it was in their environment. They grew up around water, so swimming is natural. In the same way, T.I.’s environment (and ours) impacted the way he developed and matured.

So what can Christians gain from T.I.’s response? I believe there are two lessons. One, our environments make us who we are. We have to take this seriously. We have to look around and ask ourselves, is this atmosphere creating the person I want to become? Do I have the right people around me? The right goals in place? The right influences? If not, we need to consciously move from our surroundings OR practice lesson two and…

Change our environment. What is compelling about T.I. is that he is now changing the environment he came from. He is going back to juvenile centers and telling children how to prevent going down the same path. He is also shifting the paradigm on what people think about black men from urban areas. This is a good example for us. As we are in our surroundings, we have the opportunity (and responsibility) to contribute positively. When we do this, others are changed by our example and our presence (Matthew 5:15, Philippians 2:15 below).

We have a choice in what we surround ourselves with. Be aware, life has a ripple effect. One thing affects another. When ripples come, we can either be the water or we can be the stone. The water moves with it’s surroundings. The stone creates ripples that can’t be denied. There are times when we need to be both. Choose wisely and you and your environment will be blessed.



Lord, please remind us that we are all products of our environment. Let us choose them wisely. Knowing this, let us also be rippled and be ripplers. Let’s be conscious of the change that happens and the change we can create. I thank You for the surroundings I have been in and the things each has taught me. I pray I continue to glean from them. Thank You for it all.




Belly flopping,
Jeremy






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Matthew 5:14-16 (NASB)
14"You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden;
15nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.
16"Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.


Philippians 2:15 (NASB) - so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world,