The Headbanger Theologian

The fool

About 4 years ago I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis. This diagnosis changed my life forever. I had to modify the way I lived my life and undergo serious drug treatments in an attempt to get the disease under control. These drug treatments left me feeling ill and handicapped my ability to function normally. What sucked even worse was that the drugs I was forced to take did not alleviate my symptoms at all.

In the last six months or so, I became much more proactive about my disease. I was more aggressive with my doctor and pushed her to give me a reason why these expensive drugs were not having any positive affect. After two appointments in a row where I felt like I had come up against a brick wall, I decided to seek out another doctor.

It took a couple of weeks to find one here in town. Thankfully, I ended up getting an appointment with a well respected rheumatologist. After a couple of weeks of waiting they managed to slot me in earlier than my original appointment thanks to a cancellation.

The doctor asked me my history and then examined me quite thoroughly. Once he was finished he gave me a great surprise by telling me that he did not believe I had Rheumatoid Arthritis. He sent me for blood work and x-rays that same day. Over the next four weeks I waited anxiously for my test results. Finally I got an appointment and Tiffany went with me to hear the results. We were both prepared for the worse.

After what seemed like an eternity of waiting, we got our chance to sit down with the doctor. He went through my test results and they confirmed that I did not have Rheumatoid Arthritis. Much to our shock, the tests showed that in fact I don't have anything significantly wrong with me. What I do have is very low vitamin D levels. This condition is commonly known as Rickets. Chances are that I will have to take vitamin D supplements for the rest of my life but according to the doctor I should be pretty much back to normal in 6 to 8 months.

I probably wouldn't have believed him but he took the time to show me all my test results and to explain what each of them meant. There was no denying it, there is nothing wrong with me. A variety of emotions rushed through me. I was angry at the way my life, and the life of my family, had been so negatively impacted by this misdiagnosis. I was angry about all of the drugs that I had taken and how sick they had made me.

Don't get me wrong, I was happy too. Suddenly my life had been given back to me. I didn't have a terrible disease hanging over my head anymore. I could actually look forward to a healthy future. My family and I could begin to live a normal life and do normal things without fear of destroying my joints. I could also resume doing some of the things that I used to love to do. Top of that list was making music. To that end I got a new bass for Christmas.

The last emotion I felt was embarrassment. I felt like a fool when I realized that many of the symptoms of RA that I was feeling did not actually exist. They were manifestations of my expectations of what this disease would bring to my life. They were all in my head.

I suppose it speaks to the fragility of my ego that this was probably the most powerful emotion that I felt. I didn't want to be the fool, but there was no denying that my imagination had fooled me. This is a way better outcome than suffering through a lifetime of RA, but it still sucked in it's own way.

It has been a couple of weeks now since I found out the truth. I couldn't gather my thoughts on this enough to write about it before now. Truly, my ego didn't want me to write about it at all. I have to though because regardless of the damage done to my ego I have been given many gifts. The gift of a normal life. The gift of not having to make my family change their plans or worry about me. The gift of music.

Each of these gifts is from above. God has taught me some important lessons about how little I truly rely on Him, and how much I can rely on Him now that I know the truth. Not the least lesson is that my ego is something that holds me back. It is something that I must shed if I can ever be who I was created to be.

Like most of the important lessons we learn, these were not easy. I will, however, learn to thank God for them. Even if it kills me.

There you have it

Angel Nieves Diaz, a career criminal executed for killing a Miami topless bar manager 27 years ago, was given a rare second dose of deadly chemicals as he took more than twice the usual time to succumb. Needles that were supposed to inject drugs into the 55-year-old man’s veins were instead pushed all the way through the blood vessels into surrounding soft tissue. A medical examiner said he had chemical burns on both arms.

“It really sounds like he was tortured to death,” said Jonathan Groner, associate professor of surgery at the Ohio State Medical School, a surgeon who opposes the death penalty and writes frequently about lethal injection. “My impression is that it would cause an extreme amount of pain.”

Via

Another political quiz thingy

Yesterday I posted the results of a political quiz I came across at the Boar's Head Tavern. This post voiced some displeasure with the content of the quiz and suggested another. Here is my result.

Frankly I was a little confused until I saw this graph.

Apparently the Dalai Lama and I see the world in very similar ways.

What a shock

Your Political Profile:

Overall: 15% Conservative, 85% Liberal

Social Issues: 25% Conservative, 75% Liberal

Personal Responsibility: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal

Fiscal Issues: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal

Ethics: 25% Conservative, 75% Liberal

Defense and Crime: 25% Conservative, 75% Liberal

How Liberal Or Conservative Are You?

Fear

Without the anticipating fear and the compelling anxiety no finite being would be able to exist. Courage in this view, is the readiness to take upon oneself negatives, anticipated by fear, for the sake of a fuller positivity. The Courage to Be by Paul Tillich, page 82

Fear is an odd thing. On one hand it can protect us, keep us from harm, and possibly saves our life. On the other hand it can stifle us and stop us from ever really living at all. I thought what Tillich said in the quote above was brilliant. Sometimes we have to face our fears so that we can experience life to the full.

Angry

My book The View from Here tells the story of my Christian metamorphosis, how I went from liberalism to conservative Christianity and back to the middle (though I suppose I do lean just a little bit to the left). In the book I talk about the first church Tiffany and I went to, and all the unhealthy things we experienced there. Yesterday I saw the pastor of that church.

Ironically, I was talking to some people who were friends of ours from that church. They came to see me at work to discuss some of their Christmas shopping ideas. We were standing in an aisle of the store talking when my old pastor, and their current pastor, walked up the end of the same aisle. He didn't see us at first and it wasn't until I made a joke about us having some kind of reunion that he noticed us. We all made some small talk and then the pastor quickly said goodbye and moved on. I was very friendly to him in the brief time he talked to us, I smiled broadly at him and joked around. In the back of my head though, a tiny explosion of anger went off.

I guess there is still part of me that is angry for everything we went through at that church. I am angry at his hypocrisy, how he refused to marry Tiffany and I because she had been married before, all while his family has it's own skeletons in the closet. I am angry that he called into question my motives for being involved in youth ministry. I am angry about the way that he has treated other people as they grope in the darkness to find God. I am angry that my wife was so hurt by what she experienced there that she may never go to church again.

I know the Bible says that we are supposed to forgive and I thought that I had, but that little burst of anger I felt yesterday tells me different. I guess forgiveness in this area is something that I have to continue to work through with God. I will use my anger constructively, to never forget what I went through and to hopefully never treat anyone as badly as we were treated.

Beautiful

Yesterday I went to the funeral for my friend's son. In the hour or so before the funeral I had terrible butterflies in my stomach. I am not sure why that is, but it always happens to me before a funeral. When Tiffany and I got to the church those butterflies were replaced by a dull ache in my chest. Just like when I first heard about this child's death, I found it impossible to pray. I just didn't have the words.

When the service began, we all rose as the coffin came into the sanctuary followed by my friend and his family. As I saw the tears on their faces my chest got tighter and the ache turned into a sharp pain. I hated to see their pain.

We all sat and the pastor came forward and said a few words. After he was finished, a very interesting thing happened. A man and woman came forward to play some music, however, instead of the mournful songs that I expected, they began to play songs that praised God. I sat there quietly, honestly I was having trouble processing what was happening. After a few verses I saw my friend sitting a few rows in front of us slowly lift his hand toward Heaven, praising his God.

The rest of the service continued like it began. They celebrated their little boy's life. Over and over again those who spoke testified to how God had been with them through this whole difficult ordeal. Yes, there were tears shed, but it was not the tears of utter hopelessness. They were sad that this boy who had been a gift to them was gone, but they also knew that they would see him once again in Heaven.

It was the most beautiful funeral I have ever been to.

A terrible balance

Last week I got word that the ten year old son of a friend had passed away. As I reeled from this news I have to admit that I found it impossible to pray. I was so numb that I couldn't put together enough emotion to cry out to God in anguish.

On Saturday I went to the hospital and had the privilege of holding the two day old son of another friend. In that moment I praised God in my heart for the beautiful gift that I was holding in my arms. While I held that healthy newborn the thought crossed my mind that the loss of one young boy and the birth of another could easily be chalked up to some terrible balance that the universe is required to maintain.

Karma is a popular notion in our society. The idea that the deeds of a person will be paid back to them in kind.

But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust (Matthew5:44-45 NKJV).

I don't believe in Karma because I have seen the opposite happen far too many times. I have seen people who are not kind prosper and I have seen wonderful, God fearing people suffer through terrible tragedies. Just like my Christian friend who lost his son last week.

People naturally wonder where God is at a time such as this. I have heard some say that there must not a be a God if these things happen. What I know from my experience of the God who became incarnate in Christ Jesus is this, there is a God and this God weeps along with us in these times of sorrow.

Friday fun

             

This may be the greatest cartoon ever.

New Aaron Munro Tune!

I just uploaded my song "Be An Angel" onto purevolume. I've also enabled my song "Inside My Chest" for free download. Check it out people

{{Deconstructive Thought Post}}

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