I am currently working my way through St. John of the Cross's Dark Night of the Soul and I would recommend it to anyone and everyone. You can download or just view it for free at Christian Classics Etheral Library. This book is incredible, it describes the process of purguing our sense and spirit of the desire for self-gratification. One thing the book so succinctly describes is the imperfections of beginners in Christianity -- the ways we let pride and self-love come between us and God. When I read this, I realized it described me and pretty much everyone I know. We are so much more interested in doing for ourselves than for God.

I think this applies to almost everything we do...I'll admit it, the idea of doing it all for God's glory scares me. Sure, I can give the idea lip service, but do I really mean it? Can I do everything in my life without any intention of gaining pleasure from the action, knowing that the only pleasure lies in glorifying God? This requires radical faith. It also requires complete separation from the habit of gaining positive sensation from spiritual exercises. If I'm only doing it to feel good...well then I'm going down the wrong road. Unfortunately this is the road that many of us follow all our lives, never knowing anything greater. Eventually, the thrill begins to fade and we are left with a prospect: do we abandon faith for something more gratifying? Or do we take faith to the next level?

Well folks I have decided to resolve some tension here. My diaryland site is becoming more and more incomprehensible as time goes on, and it really is more of a personal cathartic thing than an acutal blog. Seeing that I would like to have a place to air more coherent thoughts without interrupting the flow of nonsense, I have decided to set up a blog here. If you are reading this, you probably came through the discussion blog I have going with my church. If so, here is a place I will attempt to get a little deeper into some of those things we discuss, as well as other issues. Of course I may just be deluding myself and I may be the only one who ever reads this, but then so much the better...

I do apologize for any inconveniences and I promise to get this site up and looking pretty asap. Bye.