praying and hoping, but what can you do?
I came across this today, Jon Foreman of Switchfoot writing about confusion, the fires in san diego, injustice... the world. It doesn't make sense in a conventional way, though I think the only way to truly grasp some of the defiant concepts he is trying to get a handle on is the roundabout way he goes at it.
J. D. Salinger and St. Paul and dark black smoke
by jon foreman
So I'm listnin' to the jason molina box set. reminds me a bit of sun kill moon in a really good way. with some atmospheric "spirit of eden" things every now and then.
it's grey out. it was grey out yesterday. but it's not raining. it was raining yesterday.
still trying to get any news about home. rough. feels like a world away. fires.
So I find it strangely appropriate that we're touring to support habitat for humanity, an ironic twist in the plot, with the homes burning back on the west coast. It's so strangely fitting that I wrote a song with Thieson for this tour on a bus that burned down a few hours later. But you see, this plot, this divine comedy strays awfully close to tragedy.
It's a strange book and I'm inside it. So I'm trying to pin down the details about the the plot in this book. The one where I'm the protagonist in a plot much larger than I am. A book that I can't simply put down when I'm frustrated. With no bookmark, no remote control. The pages write themselves with very little effort of my own. And yet I'm in there. I'm written into the book.
I was wondering today whether the houses that we help build with Habitat in SD are still standing. I don't know how this ends.
Ruth has gone on downstairs, the bass frequencies are vibrating everything in the room... and a world away houses are burning down in my hometown. What can you do?
The good guys get gunned down. The bad guys do fine. That can't be the end of the story... But the fires are still burning back home... and this thought kept running through my mind all day, "Oh God, have mercy on me a sinner." I think that's the prayer in Franny and Zooey... But St. Paul says the same thing.
Pray that God is merciful,
jon
It made me think about how it's raining in Florida, but there's fires in California. How we have too much of everything or nothing at all, but neither is ever final. there's so many words and ways to describe so many things wrong with the world, and yet we just keep trying and trying and trying, as if somehow when we explain it correctly, something magical will happen. the injustice will disappear? the problem will be solved? No, not really. we're all just throwing empty words into a bottomless pit to make ourselves feel better, myself included, and I wonder why. Does it make us feel better to have everything neat and labelled, even if that label says "DESTRUCTIVE: work in progress", and the "work in progress" part will never change, because no words, mathematical formulas, or scientific discovery can truly control God. what are we doing? it should be something along the lines of living... hoping, praying, wishing, trusting, loving, feeling, changing, growing? What am i doing?
time to find out.
J. D. Salinger and St. Paul and dark black smoke
by jon foreman
So I'm listnin' to the jason molina box set. reminds me a bit of sun kill moon in a really good way. with some atmospheric "spirit of eden" things every now and then.
it's grey out. it was grey out yesterday. but it's not raining. it was raining yesterday.
still trying to get any news about home. rough. feels like a world away. fires.
So I find it strangely appropriate that we're touring to support habitat for humanity, an ironic twist in the plot, with the homes burning back on the west coast. It's so strangely fitting that I wrote a song with Thieson for this tour on a bus that burned down a few hours later. But you see, this plot, this divine comedy strays awfully close to tragedy.
It's a strange book and I'm inside it. So I'm trying to pin down the details about the the plot in this book. The one where I'm the protagonist in a plot much larger than I am. A book that I can't simply put down when I'm frustrated. With no bookmark, no remote control. The pages write themselves with very little effort of my own. And yet I'm in there. I'm written into the book.
I was wondering today whether the houses that we help build with Habitat in SD are still standing. I don't know how this ends.
Ruth has gone on downstairs, the bass frequencies are vibrating everything in the room... and a world away houses are burning down in my hometown. What can you do?
The good guys get gunned down. The bad guys do fine. That can't be the end of the story... But the fires are still burning back home... and this thought kept running through my mind all day, "Oh God, have mercy on me a sinner." I think that's the prayer in Franny and Zooey... But St. Paul says the same thing.
Pray that God is merciful,
jon
It made me think about how it's raining in Florida, but there's fires in California. How we have too much of everything or nothing at all, but neither is ever final. there's so many words and ways to describe so many things wrong with the world, and yet we just keep trying and trying and trying, as if somehow when we explain it correctly, something magical will happen. the injustice will disappear? the problem will be solved? No, not really. we're all just throwing empty words into a bottomless pit to make ourselves feel better, myself included, and I wonder why. Does it make us feel better to have everything neat and labelled, even if that label says "DESTRUCTIVE: work in progress", and the "work in progress" part will never change, because no words, mathematical formulas, or scientific discovery can truly control God. what are we doing? it should be something along the lines of living... hoping, praying, wishing, trusting, loving, feeling, changing, growing? What am i doing?
time to find out.