ECCLESIASTES 3:4 SEASON. CHAPTER 5

Bored In The USA-Father John Misty; I Will Not Sleep Here-Merchandise

I process stuff slowly.  I’m also in denial about that I have a problem living in denial.  I previously shared about praying for the sick in the aisles of King Soopers.  This made me normalize my feelings and thoughts.  To me it was a sign that I was in the right and would be proved right.   I put on a cheerful face the best I could when I could and spoke positive about my future.  Then the emotions I had suppressed started to crop up more and more.  I could start off cheerful but something would remind me of my past failures and decimate my demeanor.  I wrestled if I had made the right choice giving up the thing that gave my life purpose and if I would ever have it again.  I got lost inside my head by taking bunny trails into what people had to have meant when they said what they said.  When one does that, they are susceptible to coming to irrational conclusions.  I had 3 months of my new life under my belt, to me it was realistic to think that in 3 months things would start moving with forward momentum.  The year was coming to an end, and I was saying a bitter goodbye to a year that had scorned me.  The next year would validate me and my decisions.  I was allowed to listen to music on my old school iPod when it was 3am all the way to 6am so I wouldn’t have to hear the absolute garbage they played over the speakers at the grocery store.  Some of the songs I have been sharing about are songs I listened to those early mornings.  The song ‘Bored In The USA’ by Father John Misty stands out as a mood piece for me in this particular time I’m describing.  Self righteousness is a form of righteousness I guess.

I told anyone that would give me a second that I was only doing this temporarily because I was starting a church somewhere in California soon.  As farfetched as at seemed I really believed my family and I were headed that way.  It is important to have hope even if it is misplaced.  You might read that and think otherwise, let me try to convince you.  Hopelessness is extremely dangerous.  In Psalm 27:13 it says ‘I would have despaired unless I had believed I would see Your goodness in the land of the living.’  Despair happens when there is the absence of anything to look forward to.  My hope of starting a church was misplaced, but it was still hope.  That’s why when you hear Christians talk about our only hope being Jesus they aren’t deceiving you.

New Years Eve came and I got even more contemplative.  As I analyzed the meaningful songs of my transition year I could identify two songs that would be forevermore my 2016 themes.  One of those I will share about another time, but here I will highlight ‘I Will Not Sleep Here’ by Merchandise.  Merchandise is my favorite band from the last 10 years and has meant a great deal to me.  The way I felt about the Foo Fighters when I was in high school is the way I’ve felt about Merchandise as an adult.  Their album ‘A Corpse Wired For Sound’ was released the same week I left my church and helped dull the pain for a bit.  I listened to it quite a bit in the last few months of 2016.  Every time I hear that song it brings me back to a collection of  vague memories varying the spectrum of human emotion.  Time was beginning to gnaw at my hope.  I was losing momentum for future ministry.  I was plagued with thoughts of being marooned on the desert island that was part time grocery store shelf stocker.  Yet my wife and kids brought me greater joy than they ever had.  I was growing in love for people in a way I previously hadn’t been able to.  If you the reader will listen to my favorite song of 2016 I believe you will emotively understand how I was feeling.  If you’ve been following my story maybe you think I repeat myself quite a bit.  You are not wrong.  This season felt repetitive and dull most of the time.  I had to hang in there to see redemption, if you are following along it looks like you’ll have to hang in there too.