A Temporary Thing
Being married to Luria was all I ever wanted in life. It was the thing I prayed for in bed when I was nine-years-old. I wanted to be married to a beautiful, smart, sweet girl. I’m not sure what I believe about God anymore, but Luria turned out to be an answered prayer. I loved her, love her and will always love her.
I worked on things to fit what she said where her dreams. Modeling didn’t work because that business is just weird. She groked it and that business doesn’t like girl who grok it. We then started writing a book. Harry Potter was taking off and we started writing a book set in New Orleans with a flood threat that skidded to a halt with Katrina. My next thing was podcasting inspired by Dawn and Drew. The Crappy Christian Show quickly evolved from Luria and me getting drunk and talking into a mic into a ministry type thing to share the idea that God may love gay people just as they are, without any expectation they change. I didn’t want to be in ministry and Luria certainly didn’t.
Steve Jobs announced the first iPod that played video and I worked to make that iPod play GeekBrief.TV. That worked well. We started making money. Mevio was a great partner. Luria wanted more, and people in her life convinced her she was the character I wrote every day. Her belief that she was Cali Lewis grew into an argument that led her to leave our marriage.
I still want to be writing tech news as Cali Lewis and producing GeekBrief.TV. I don’t get that as an option, and I’ve come close to launching alternative visions. I almost released a gadget show yesterday.
Here’s the deal though … I don’t want to work on a next thing that is anything but temporary. My heart can’t currently believe in long term. I want to work, but I’m not ready to say, “This is the thing that replaces Cali Lewis and GeekBrief.TV for me.” Even my dreams for Bacon.TV in partnership with Wright Brand Bacon isn’t that powerful!
The Mayans predicted the world ends at the end of 2012. Obviously, that’s silly just like when that preacher dude did it twice in 2011. But you know what? So what! What will happen if I live this year like it’s not only my last year, but yours? That’s what I’m going to do.
Tomorrow I launch a temporary thing I can believe in and I think it will inspire you to do something better than you planned to do in 2012. It isn’t serious because I’m not ready to be serious. It’s just about fun.
I’ve lost my life goal of being married to a beautiful, smart, and kind girl. I’m not making that kind of goal again. To make it through. I want to live as though it’s not only my last year but yours too.
Read MoreI Love the Internet and Want to Hug the Internet
This video was my favorite Internet happening of 2011. I’ve been reading my friend’s status updates on Facebook and it makes me feel, about the Internet, the way Debbie feels about cats. I want to hug you all with rainbows in baskets!
My shero Dawn Miceli posted this and I concur…
Dear 2011,
I’m not even sure how to say this, its been so hard for so long. I don’t want to be with you anymore, there I said it. It just hasn’t been working out and I feel like I just need to get away from you. I am sure there were some good times but all I can remember right now are all the bad times, the horrible memories. You were a pretty shitty year and I am glad we are breaking up. I want to find a better year, one that will be fun and filled with good times. You just weren’t that year, it wasn’t in your nature and I know now no one could change you. Don’t text or call please, its better we never see each other again. I’m just gonna walk away and pretend this has been just one bad nightmare.
My 2012 resolution is to live this year with the idea that the Mayans were right about it being our last one. 2011 sucked for me. It was the worst year of my life. It’s uphill from here and it’s going to be fun … and there will be BACON!
Read MoreExistential Crisis # 732
One day, I hope I can stop having deep, depressive episodes where I wonder what the purpose of life is or should be. My current existential crisis follows a year of spiritual searching, finding, wandering, frequently getting lost, and sometimes being found.
I have faith in God, but it’s only occasionally stronger than my doubts about Him or Her. The thing I believe in more than anything else is belief. Believing seems to work for me even when I’m unsure about the truth of what I believe. Believing makes me feel better than cynicism and doubt.
I’m not a fan of fundamentalists, but as I’ve very seriously considered ending my life lately, I’ve been introduced to a different kind of fundamentalist. Shane Claiborne fundamentally believes that Jesus meant it when He said, “Sell all you have and give to the poor.” Shane grew up a blessed, American kid, but in college, he started taking Jesus seriously and living like Jesus said to live. That isn’t what Christians do. Christians worship God and work on prosperity. Jesus said to give away everything and work on helping the poor and the outcasts.
I’m not there yet. I want to be there. Having so much taken from me in the last year has made me open to the idea of being there. I used to only sleep in certain kinds of beds in certain kinds of places with LOTS of air conditioning. Now I’ll sleep on the floor. I don’t care about stuff the way I used to care.
One of the reasons I haven’t started a new show to replace GeekBrief.TV is that every time I sit down to look at gadget news, I think about how shallow it is. There are so many people hurting more than I’m hurting. Gay teenagers are killing themselves because the Church gives aid and comfort to bullies.
I’m not saying I won’t do a gadget show or an entertainment show. If I can create properties that generate the kind of revenue we did with GeekBrief.TV and give that away, it might be far better than if I just give away what I have to help people in the short-term.
I go back and forth from being angry at Luria for taking my business away from me to thinking it’s one of the best things that’s ever happened in my life.
I don’t know how it’s all going to work out for me, or even if it will. I have very little motivation to live for myself right now. I’m motivated to live for the people in my life who love me, but not for myself. If I can figure out a way to really help hurting people and spend my life doing that … I want to do that!
I get really upset with Christians who tell me, if I kill myself, I’ll go to “hell.” I really don’t think those people are friends with God. God knows I’m in hell right now. I believe He wants me to do something with my life that matters and that helps people, but the idea that God is love transcends all that judgement crap religious people throw around so they feel saved and superior.
The song in my head right now is so sweet and simple,
“Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus
Just to take Him at His Word
Just to rest upon His promise
Just to know, thus saith the Lord.”
I’m not going to be where Shane Claiborne is any time soon, but I am going to aim in that direction. The rest I’ll have to figure out along the way.
Buy Shane’s book, The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical.
Ministry or Media
When I was twelve, I built a replica of the Jim and Tammy PTL set out of lego. I sponge painted the walls of the outdoor patio area to look like stone. I made cameras. There was actual lighting. I even made dresses for Tammy Faye and the PTL singers. I LOVED Jim and Tammy. I’m pretty sure I always will, even as Jim wants to sell me some Glenn Beck supplies. Tammy may have worn some heavy makeup, but she wasn’t fake. She loved people just like they are and Jim and Tammy ended every show saying, “God loves you. He really, really does.”
Before we started GeekBrief.TV, Luria and I did an audio show called The Crappy Christian Show. It was intended to be silly and funny and we were trying to be like Dawn and Drew. The show had an underlying message, though, that kept cutting through the silliness. We said, “If good Christians hate gay people, we must be crappy Christians.” We really believed a Crappy Christian is the best kind you can be. When we started that show, our goal was to be like Dawn and Drew and to quit our day jobs to podcast full time. The Crappy Christian Show quickly transitioned into something deeper that looked a whole lot more like ministry than show business. We had about 3000 downloads per episode and 80% of the audience was made up of gay Christians. I wasn’t ready to be in any kind of ministry, but I had a heart for the gay community that I didn’t understand. I believed back then, and believe it even more strongly now that God loves GLBT people just as they are and doesn’t expect them to change.
Over the last five years I’ve had conversations with hundreds of gay men and women. Their stories are all so similar. So many of them grew up in church loving God and feeling a same-sex attraction. They begged God to change them, to take it away. It scared them. They didn’t want to be different. They didn’t want to be gay. No matter how much they begged. No matter how much they pleaded. No matter how much they quoted scripture, went to counseling and got prayed over, God didn’t change them. So many of them were kicked out of churches and told to return only if they repented. Some of them felt rejected by God, but so many of them still felt God’s love and acceptance in spite of what they were getting from people who say they loved God fulltime. When these men and women got to be around 40-years-old (some sooner), they started to be really okay with the fact that God doesn’t seem to have any interest in turning them straight.
One of my biggest struggles over the past few months has been over the same thing I struggled with when we were doing The Crappy Christian Show. I don’t think the church has done a good job loving people just as they are. We’ve been so worried about hating the “sin” that we claim to love while holding our noses. If the love is genuine, it certainly isn’t being perceived by GLBT folks who long for God’s presence. I could be completely wrong about what I believe, but I sincerely believe we need to only love people and let God deal with whatever He chooses to deal with. I’ve had chains of sin and bondage just fall off this year. I didn’t struggle. I didn’t fight to be free. I just focused on what is true and pure and holy and God did the work. I don’t believe that God wants to turn gay people straight, but if He does, He can’t do it when we are pushing people away.
I know that I’ve so frequently gotten God wrong and not shown His amazing love and grace. My heart’s cry is for me to never let my stuff interrupt God’s grace and love. That isn’t the righteousness of God. That’s self-righteousness and I want every bit of that out of my life. Jesus said we have to die to ourselves. I embrace that with everything in me and with every step, the amazing grace of God overwhelms my mind, will and emotions and fills my spirit with love that can’t be defeated.
I want to continue to make a difference in what new media is and is supposed to be, but a lot of days that hardly matters to me. If you want to see me filled with passion, talk to be about Jesus loving gay people. Every time I hear about another gay kid killing himself, I know deep down my life is meant to be about not letting that happen anymore. My friends tell me there is a balance between the two. Maybe so, but it’s been the thing I’ve struggled with for five years and I haven’t stopped yet! I believe in a God who loves us with extravagant grace, and I think He wants His people to always love, no matter how hard it is. I have huge new media dreams, but I also know I have a huge calling to challenge the church on the gay issue. I just can’t help doing it no matter how freaking hard I try!
I really believe that’s a big part of why I’m divorced. Jesus condemned divorce. He never condemned gay people. The church has massive grace for divorced people. It’s time that the church starts to have massive grace for GLBT people too.
At my church we sing a song called God Be Praised (I don’t think my church would support my postion on gay rights, but I love the people there just as they are, even if they aren’t ready to be as accepting as I am). The words bring me to tears every time we sing it:
You saved my life from death
When I was all defeated
You spoke Your promises
And brought life to my weakness
Came as a conquering King
And You warred for my freedom
My soul can’t help but sing
Hallelujah
You opened up my eyes
For the first time I saw You
Your love commanding life
And deserving devotion
You told me who I am
Now in faith I believe it
My soul can’t help but sing
Hallelujah
You’ve made a place for me
Silenced all my accusers
Leading me forth with peace
Filled with joy I will follow
Your cross demands my life
Now Your grace is my anthem
My soul can’t help but sing
Hallelujah
Hallelujah, we’re redeemed and made free
By the blood of the Lamb We have won
Hallelujah, we will sing victory
Jesus conquered the grave
God be praised
I’m very glad God hasn’t required me to be a good Christian. He seems to like using me as a crappy one!
Read MoreDivorce, Healing and Feeling Alone
In life we try to have empathy for people when they go through hard times. In my life, if I heard about someone loosing a loved one to cancer, I felt bad for them. I hated it for them, but ultimately I feel like I cannot begin to even get close to understanding what they were going through.
In the last year, two men in new media announced their marriages were ending. I’ve admired the work of both men and the marriages of both men. When they each announced their divorces, I was deeply saddened for days. I didn’t understand the sadness. I know them both a little bit on a professional level, but not very well on a personal level so the depth of my sadness was unusual. Looking back, I think I probably had a sense that my marriage wasn’t making it either.
There is no way I could have ever guessed how painful the divorce process is. Friends help in amazing ways, but unless they’ve experienced the emotional trauma of divorce they can only help so much. They try their hardest and you’ll appreciate the effort, but I’ve found it really helpful to find people going through the same thing.
At first, I attended something called RE|ENGAGE at Watermark Church in Dallas. It’s a dynamic, ongoing Wednesday night ministry designed to strengthen and heal marriages. One of the most unique things about RE|ENGAGE is its group sessions. There are couples groups, like you’d expect, but there are also groups for spouses who are there to work on their marriage without their partner. There are men’s groups and women’s groups. There is something powerful about hearing a person you don’t know, express in words the exact feelings you’re experiencing. The realization that you’re not alone in feeling the way you do is the beginning of healing. At least it has been for me.
I still believe God wants to heal marriages, but I’ve lost faith that He’ll heal mine before divorce is final. I’m switching from RE|ENGAGE to another support system called DivorceCare. DivorceCare is something that takes place in churches all over America. It’s a support group kind of thing where you walk through the pain with other people who are experiencing it too.
I’m not really in a position to hand out advice to anyone, so this is really just about what’s working for me. Friends have been amazing. Friends have also been frustrating when they haven’t understood, but mostly they’ve been amazing. Ultimately though, it’s been very important to talk to people who personally know from experience what this is like. That’s what I encourage anyone going through this to do.
It turns out we’re never quite as unique as we think we are and that’s a very beautiful thing.
Read MoreBrian McLaren
Brian McLaren is a liberal pastor who writes books that upset conservative Christians. My Christian friends who prefer democrats tend to like Brian, and my Christian friends who prefer republicans tend to think he is a heretic.
I don’t really have an opinion about him. I’m probably more inclined to disagree with him politically, but the one thing I know is that my friends who read his books love God and do more to help the poor than the friends who call him a heretic.
Last night, I watched a video of a group of conservative theologians sitting on a stage tearing Brian’s latest book apart. They seemed to really enjoy themselves as the repeatedly called Brian out on hermeneutical errors. The smugness on that stage looked and sounded much more like the religious leaders who wanted Jesus killed and out of the way than the ones who wanted to do what He said to do.
I’m not good at the thing I think we’re called to do as Christians yet, but I’m working on it. We’re called to love and take care of hurting people. Jesus didn’t say the world would know us by our spot on theology. He said they’d know us by our love. Disagree or agree with Brian all you want, but don’t get dressed up and turn on cameras to spend an evening on a stage talking about him. I guarantee that there are people those guys on that stage could have been loving one-on-one like Jesus did, but instead they turned the gospel into sideline commentary to make themselves feel superior.
I’ve been more guilty of emphatically believing what I believe than anyone. Being right isn’t all that important. Sharing the transformative love of God matters more than politics and it matters more than hermeneutics so let’s just get over ourselves.
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