Ramblings by RexManning
here are some loosely connected ramblings by RexManning. maybe you'll identify with this or parts of this, or maybe you'll wonder "what are talking about?" If you find yourself in the latter you are blessed.
Three years ago I moved. I was in a place doing lots of things where I was and it was in these things that I found my identity. I came to not like that about me. Now I’m in a place where I do much less. I wish I could say that I feel better but I really don’t. I wish I could report that I found myself in the transition or the going through changes or just in god but I haven’t discovered me in any of it.
I wonder if 'it' (our sence of self or maybe worth) is somehow connected to our actions (for which some say we are judged upon … whether by god or man), or is it about just being? I’ve heard it said by Buddhist and Christian alike that we need to find ourselves not in our doing but in our being. If that is so then what are we to do? Are we just passing time from conception to the grave?
If we are just passing time does any of this matter - the processes and experiences that form us? Even so, how much of our character is made up of what we precieve to be right or wrong in our actions or opinions. (This is where I get tangled up.) Wasn’t the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil something that was never meant for man/woman?
I find no worth in and of myself, yet I crave the attention and affirmation of others.
and still I lift my eyes up to the heavens. Where does my help come from? Does my worth come from the maker of heaven and earth? When I consider these things I wonder who am I that you are mindful of me?
If you think I have had some idea that resembles truth near the end when I start to talk about god, I fear you may have missed my concern in all of this. It is much easier to say than to rearrange my mind to settle on any answer here. Maybe there is no answer – just ideas. I’ll end it here so that there will be room for discussion.
posted by parkside padre at 2:41 PM
8 Comments:
hmmm... hard stuff. Do we want change? I get very mad at my selfishness whenever I am depressed. The whole basis of my desire to know my identity and worth is selfish rejection of God. I sit and mope because I don't think my life is worth anything because of my silly, stupid reasons.
All the while God is waiting, begging me to let Him into my life. God, like a father, wants to spend time with his children, but we are too busy finding ourselves. Every time I find myself isolated, it takes God's spirit tearing out the sin that entagles me, and for some odd reason He doesn't do it until I am so sick of my sin that I would rather die than go on living in it.
9:50 AM
Do you really think it is such a bad thing to be defined by what we do, to find our identity
3:44 PM
Sorry I accidentily posted and I didn't mean to. What I am wondering is this, if God is the one who gives us the passions we have, the skills we have, and the drive to pursue these passions with the skills is it such a bad thing then to be defined by what we do? I am honestly asking this as a question and not necessarily a rheotorical one. I can understand that there must be a balance and that one could easily get lost in the things you do. However if you are pursuing these things not just for the sake of the love of these things but for the sake of glorifying God in them, is that bad?
6:37 PM
being and doing. tough question. its hard to truly seperate the two...
for me, am i a pastor because i pastor or because this is who God has made me (whether or not i have the title). i'd say both.
but the danger is when i find my identity in what i do.
do i define myself by what i do? that can be scary cause what if i fail in some way (in preaching, or counseling or leading).
i am a person first, then a pastor--so what defines my person?
my identity needs to be rooted in who i am... which comes down to who i am in relation to--God, my family, my wife and daughter, my friends. fundamentally, i am a loved child of God. beyond that, i am a son, a husband, a dad, a friend. these relationships form my identity.
and out of that flows what i do. because i am a loved child of God i do certain things. (and not the other way around). because i am Janet's husband, and because i am Olivia's dad, i do certain things. (not the other way around). i don't gain my identity because of what i do--i'm not a loved child of God because i obey him. i obey God because i'm his loved child.
i don't think we need to see our being and doing as mutually exclusive. our doing is to flow out of our being. when we get this flipped around, things go arry. finding out who we are doesn't take a trip to Europe to discover. its all about who's we are...
i heard someone say recently, that we need to embrace the fact that we are "human-beings", not "human-doings". not that we are supposed to hold up in a corner and do nothing, but we are to stop defining ourselves by our doing.. to learn to be content in being, and let our doing flow out of that.
scott
9:24 AM
rex...
you said that by the end of your time in Edmonton, you were doing so much and defined by your doing, and you didn't like yourself. how did it all start? do you think that when you started doing those things, it was a bad thing? or just that it became a bad thing? do you look back on the whole with regret, or just where it ended up? and if it started well (as in your doing flowed out of your being), then what changed?
scott
10:03 AM
a-ha! I never said edmonton! but that is right.
I don't regret any of the things I did. It wasn't the things that I did that I hated or even myself for doing them (they were good things). It's just that I found in myself the unhealthy trait of getting my value/worth from them (the things I was involved in).
All of these things were super important to me. They were a part of sharing with others the things that inspire me.
When the medium becomes more important than the message, you gotta check yourself before you wreck yourself! It's an ego thing I guess.
I thought it healthy and good when the medium was stripped away and I still wanted to share the things that inspire.
I'm feeling a lot more positive today (as opposed to when I first posted).but finding self-worth is difficult when you realize that the worth that god ascribes me is the only worth that really matters, yet as a man I crave affirmation from others.
12:15 PM
been there.
10:13 AM
isn't rex manning the sayy 'george michael'-type love-machine / song writer from Empire Records? Glad to see he's a christian now... maybe he can come sing at our church :)
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a23/stampera/rex.jpg
9:57 AM
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