Too Much Glee

There was once a man who loved a beautiful woman but thought himself too ugly to win her.  The man went to a mask maker to ask for a mask to hide his ugliness.  After transforming his appearance, the man won the heart of the woman, and they were married and living happily when the man, not wanting to continue in his deception, decided to have the mask removed.  When he returned home, his wife did not react at all to the appearance of his face.  He looked in the mirror and discovered that he had become handsome.  He returned to the mask maker to ask what happened.  The mask maker explained, “You have changed.  You loved a beautiful person.  You have become beautiful too.  You have become beautiful through loving her.  You become like the face of the one whom you love.” - Paraphrased from Improvisation: The Drama of Christian Ethics by Samuel Wells

My friend Clara wrote a lovely poem about her desire to share her joys with her little girl. The poem is here. I highly recommend reading it.  In fact, if you don't have very much time, just stop reading now and go read her poem.

Her words caused me to stop and think about the things I fell in love with as a kid and how I want to share them with little Amos.  However, as Samuel Wells' story illustrates, we become like the face of the one we love, and unfortunately all too often, I mostly focus on playing games on my iPhone and watching episodes of Glee on tv.  There is room in my life for games and Glee, but I want the way I spend my days to reflect the things I love and want to teach Amos to love too.

I'm finding this blog to be cathartic in a way.  In the last four years, I have taken in a lot of information in the form of theology, ethics, biblical studies, etc.  As I look at the books on my bookshelf, words and phrases spring to mind. These 4x6, half inch rectangles have changed my life. They have changed the way I understand the world. I especially fell in love with the rich history of the church.

I don't have any plans to start Amos in on a heavy dose of theology, but I do want to convey to him a passion for learning and doing something with what you learn.  Even if I'm only writing for my mom and my friend Tracy (Hey, Mom!  Hey, Tracy!), I spend a lot of time thinking about what I will be writing here, and I want that thought to be directed towards things that I love, towards the words and ideas that have shaped me in the past few years and that I want to continue to shape me in the years to come.

So expect a lot more theological writing here!  Because I want what I look like to be a lot more in that general direction and lot less in the direction of a certain musical teen drama on Fox.

Amos loves Squishy Turtle and Friends