Outcast

   I have written about the “they”, but it is the “They”, which have created the mold, that says that I should have a “real job,” I should have a “real boyfriend,” I should have a mold to which I need to fit into, but I have never been that. I have never fit into any mold, be that of the one which secular world says I should be in, but also the one which the other extreme says I should be in that extreme is moderate or ultra-conservative Christian movement says I should be in. I call myself a Christian because I believe what the bible says is true, that there is only one way to heaven and that is through justification by Christ sacrifice on the cross for my sin, I cover my head as a reminder that I always need to be in prayer, I have study out why I believe we should love all and not judge, since Christ did not judge, but love the sinner, which is everyone born of men and that there is only one way to heaven and that is through Jesus. I have different views on modesty, that it should be for God’s glory and not for mans. It is these view, which in some form or another have been apart of me since I was in high school and it is these views that have made me an outcast.

I have never had a problem calling myself an outcast, since that was what I was taught all Christians are, in some since of the word; which is very true, but for me it have also been the outcast in those same circles. First because I was home school in a time when was still on the out skirts of culture, in the early nineties. Second because in the same home school culture I was a Goth, who did not take anything at face value. Thirdly because I would not stay quiet, and force myself in a mold that other saw as good.

I was only in first grade, when I was struggling to sit still and keep up with the rest of my class. My teacher Mrs. Berloo (most like butchering her name) told my parents that I should be put one drugs, since she saw me as someone with ADD at the age of seven. I was pulled out of school, not long after. This was not the only reason, with rumors going around that school principle was possibly a sexual predator. I completely understand why they did what they did, and do not blame them one bit for what they did.  What they did not know at that time, they were creating an outcast.

I was home-schooled from the middle of first grade till when my junior year when I dropped out of high school. My family was not part of ATI or Quiverfull movement, I only have three biological siblings. I wore shorts and went swimming in the company of boys, and I ate non organic food. I had a fairly normal upbringing, but for the fact that I was home-schooled and my family was evangelical Christians.  I played soccer, did ballet, theater, choir and did Awana at my local church. I have always been a bit of a “geek” which I came by honestly, since my father was a was a nuclear engineer in the navy and then later became a computer programmer, and had read more science fiction and fantasy than most, and introduced me and my siblings to it. I have always loved darker movies, even as a kid, I loved the original fairy tales and not the Disney versions, much darker versions that I saw in the Grimm's Fairy Tale Classics.  Something that my mother thought was too dark for a child. In many ways I did lead a shelter life, my mother never wanted to celebrate Halloween, I did not go trick or treating until I was twenty-seven and my college age girlfriends wanted to.  So my enjoyment of gothic culture was a surprise to many and something many denied by some even to this day. I can’t pinpoint when I knew I was a Goth only it happened some point in high school, when found out that nail polish came in black, and my mom let me wear eyeliner. I then I found gothic art work and lace, I was gone. I started to wear mostly black, and reading up on vampire lore, and watching Buffy and Angel, and Spike became my favorite character.

                There was a boy who was the oldest son of a Quiverfull family, the oldest of twelve the last time I heard he was. I liked him and I think he liked me too, now that I looked back, but I was the church bad girl, because I wore black and liked eyeliner, and was an unintentional tease. That would never do for his family. He stopped coming to youth group and then at summer camp he would not even talk to me. I now see it had to do with my love of black, and art; by his family beliefs, I was a rebel a bad girl, who might lead their son a stray.      

My mother could see I was heading this way and started forcing me to not where my fingerless gloves out and thinking that I was going to end up having sex outside of marriage all because I liked black. I was the unintentional tease, the flirt because I wanted to talk with boys and draw the male form well. I became the black sheep in my church, which was filled with homeschooling families or formally homeschooling families. I became the rebel because, I thought human form was beautiful (particularly the male form) I thought for myself and did not take everything I was taught at face value, but I would study it out in the bible. I was the outsider, since I was black rose in a sea of white. My mother said it was the other way around, but I felt that she was wrong. What they saw as evil being Gothic, I saw as not being afraid of the dark places and someone being willing to go there.

                What was funny; I was also a Sunday school teacher, youth event planner, VBS coordinator, Christmas Program Director/ Writer, for this same church this was all in high school and my freshman year of college, but what hurt was knowing that pastor’s wife was gossiping behind my back and my youth group was as well, the only ones who were not, was my close circle of three girlfriends.   I was an outcast in the center of everything. I never did anything, but got dubbed the weird girl. My late mother would never call me a Goth, since that in her mind it meant evil and satanic worshipers, and that was not her baby girl, never understanding what this artistic movement really was.  My black humor, campy-ness was just her little girls flare, never proof of her being a Goth. That I saw the beauty in all of God’s creation, and if you believe God created everything that means he created the darker side of life, which means man made it ugly, not God since he said all his creation was good and his light is shining out of me.

                I went off to a small unaccredited Bible college and found people like me, fellow Christian Goths and finally started feeling comfortable in my own skin, people who loved black, leather and vampires, but also loved the Lord. I dye my hair black for the first time, which freaked my mother out, but I was able to be me, and that meant I could show my faith more. The leadership of that school saw, what my mother saw in Gothic, but to them it meant we could not be in the ministry. I and all but one of my circle was kicked out, because we thought outside the box. I now know it was one of the best things ever happened to me, but at that time I was heartbroken.  I moved back home and then left my family’s church and found one that took me in for, who I was a Christian Goth. The circle that got kicked out, two of us are still in ministry and the others still believers.

                I still call myself a Goth and most of my writing and artwork have darker undertones. I still wear black nail polish.

I am still called myself an outcast, because I do not believe, the normal popular Christian views, such as why should a woman dress modestly, not because it is protect our brother in Christ, but because that makes boys not real men, why do I say that, because a boy plays the blame game, but a man takes responsibility for their actions. I believe that lust is like any other type of temptation, which the bible says that they Lord will not tempt you beyond what you can bare, so teaching a young man to move past temptation and give it to the Lord and see a woman for the creation God made her to be. I believe a woman should dress modestly for the glory of God, and so she can be herself. I cover my head, and not out of submission to my husband (since there is no husband, yet), but because I want have physical reminder that I am to have attitude of prayer, and should always be talking to God. It is view like these that have made me an outcast, and that is fine with me. I do not fit into a mold that people in my life have said I should be in, even if they have never said it to my face. There are people in my life, who say that I should be married, should have what they call a real job or have gotten a real degree (that the ten years that it took to get a BA in English from a school that ranked as one the best schools in the south and was over hundred years old was pointless) I will stand my ground and get a master in it. I should be married or have had a “real boyfriend” which just insulted the men, who loved me and made the woman I am today, even if we never dated. I still believe sex is meant for marriage and I am still waiting (if not sitting still and living my life.) I am a outcast, and that is fine by God and me. 

For other Christian Goths out there here is the best sit on the internet for you.

http://www.christiangoth.com/

Here is a great introduction into what Goth is for those who don't really know what it is, though this is not a christian video, does tell you what Goth really is

This is the song which inspired this blog:

bustygirlcomics.com

It is true and since if you believe God made me in His image and calls me beautiful just as I am, why are you saying I should be sorry for something He gave me. I am not sorry, for my brothers in Christ want shame women for having baby feeding mechanism on their chests, and you are turned on by that and you are saying I'm the one with problem, they don't turn me on they feed babies.

Today I am 30...

What I thought my life would be like when I turned 30! At ten I thought it was so far away and so old, one step away from the grave, but I thought I would had have gone to college doing what I hadn’t a clue, but more over that I would be married, with children and still living in California. My 10^th birthday was a day that I still can remember I had a slumber party “my first slumber party” with my closest friends, Sarah Martin, Martha and Beca Johnson (Who my mom drove almost an hour to go and pick up since their families van had broken down or something) I had other girls there to which I don’t remember, but it was that night I got my American Doll “Addy” and we watched the Polar Bear King and had pizza. I never thought I would leave my home where I could smell the salt in the air since my family lived not but thirty miles from the ocean, a place where I could pick apples right off the tree, and stay friends with Sarah, Martha and Beca for the rest of my life, but I hate to say it, but I have not spoken or written to them in over fifteen years.

 My 20^th birthday I really don’t even remember what happen since I was so caught up with taking care of my Grandma, that year just flew by, I do know that my best friend and sister from another mother Dana Garten then Chipchase was there and Sarah Courter then Lucas, and my older sister and Bethany Urbanek also then Chipchase, and very likely my cousin Stephanie Chandler then Griggs and my friend Ellie Nasrallah then DeVille, rounding out the Sisterhood. We most likely watched A Knights Tale, and ate Mexican chocolate cake that I made and had a sleep over and that is what we called a wild night. I knew that I would be done with college at that time by the time I was twenty- five and married to a pastor with kids by the time I was twenty-nine and living close to my friends whom we would live in the same neighborhood and our kids would be best friends, and that Dana, Sarah and I would have taken our road trip up the Pacific coast by that time and that is what I thought my life would be, I thought I would grow old with all of the sisterhood, but as to be expected the Lord had other plans for me.

I am now I am 30 and I don’t have almost anything I thought I should have by this time. I don’t have husband, I don’t have kids, and I don’t live in the same state, let alone the same town as my best friends. I also don’t have things that I thought would still be here, like my Mom. At the same time I have things that I never thought I have, fifteen years in the ministry, a BA in English (let alone working on Masters in English), the gift a of a gypsy spirit which the Lord gave me and has lead me all around this country to live in six different states, two all by myself and given the chance to move back to a place I call home (New Mexico) after fifteen years away from it. I don’t have the life that I still dream of and know that the Lord is going to give to me, of that husband, with my big brood that I know is just waiting to come down and meet me some day. I don’t know if Lord will bring those people into my life in the next ten years, but I know that is in his plan. I have learned that you have to take the good with the bad, and not fight the Lord on his plan for you.

Conversations I wish I could have...

    Conversations I wish I could have. There are a few people in my life who I know are searching for the great something in their lives. One who we shall call “Sam” is looking for the inspiration again, the other who we shall call “Dean” is looking for the perfect thing that will make him happy. I am always afraid of coming off too preachy and that would turn them away so I will write what I want to say to them.

     Sam is looking for the next masterpiece to create; keeps asking himself, when will the great inspiration come. I want to tell him that it can only come when you let go of yourself and let God. That if you let the love of God, who sent his son down to Earth to take your sin, that icky thing which we are all born with that only his Son, Jesus can take away. When we proclaims him as Lord and accept him into our heart. That when you do that the peace that you have been searching for will come, but until that point it will be a fate of longing to be with Jesus and not being to make that leap to him and true inspiration.

    Dean has known about Jesus at one point in his life and grew up knowing him skin deep as his tattoo on his arm, and has since gone looking for perfection of real love, but failing. Dean looked for it in himself, by perfecting his body and making it an art form, by giving up his studies and going after his love for film in all its forms, but never looking up always looking around him at people, at himself, at women, but not at Jesus. I just want to tell Dean to look up and let Jesus love with his love, because only then can you really know his true love and how much he loves you. To give up the things of this world and let him into your life, that it is not about the religion you grew up with, which yes is only skin deep as your tattoo, but it is a about the relationship of a father, which will never leave you, who will carry you through the good, the bad, the ugly times and never let you take a step on your own again if you just let go of your own search for happiness and search for him and he will give Joy. Joy is not just happiness, (happiness is a man created, feeling, that is meant to be a poor substitute for true Joy) it is an inner glow of the Holy Spirit, which can only lift you up.

   Since it would be too hard for me to talk to you, so I write to you. I know that many people I know would fall into this category of Sam or Dean and I know that every believer has known people like this, so we pray for time and courage to say look and see what Jesus has done for me.

I am still single.

I will be thirty in the next six months, and only just finished my BA in the last six months. I have been told by my own father that he thinks his biological children are socially immature since we all have never really dated and not married.

I don’t think I am socially immature in many ways: First, I am not with Mr. Wrong, and yes, there have been Mr. Wrongs and many of their names have begun with the letter “J” (don’t ask why? I don’t know.) Second, I have not back down from my standers or changed myself to fit society norms.  Third, I don’t go through men like hair gel.

I know with my generation that dating has become less formal, which is probably not the best thing, but it is the case. If we were like past generations I would have probably already gone to my first date, had my first kiss and my first break up; but it’s not we are much more casual about relationships, even in the conservative evangelical culture of the church that I have grown up in. I have “hung out” with guys I have known in the last years, and shared googly eyes with them, but at the end of the day nothing happens and then they move on with some ells, then I am alone again. This has been the pattern of my life in my twenties and might have started with my first “J” who broke my heart at age eighteen. I met him in the green room of my theater group, he had even asked me out, but I had work, so it fell through. Then he moved out of state and I felt heartbreak for the first time, because I loved him, like you, love a bad wine that has turned to vinegar, it started sweet but was sour soon. Then at age twenty- two I met my second “J”, who was the best looking guy at school and we were close. Then he started dating, some ells, so I moved on again, but not much heart break. I did love him, but what I thought was a fine wine, was a cheap bottle that tastes good, but only because you have never had a fine wine before. Then came my last “J” at age twenty-six, I fought this one tooth and nail: one, because my roommate liked him too, two I thought he was too young for me and three, I did not want to get hurt again; but he pulled me in. He became one my best friends and I had him wrap around my little finger and I honestly do believe he felt the same way in some way, but soon summer came and like many things it killed what could be. I have had Mr. Wrong (aka Mr. “J”) in my life and there have even been more than them, whose names did not start with a “J”, but I have sometimes been the only one in love and yes it sucks.

I have standers, yes the world is going to end a woman with standers, who is not going to budge on them. I as my blog title says I am Christian and Jesus is my life, He not just a part of it. That means I know where I stand, and what is important to me. If that makes me a stick in the mud, that’s fine by me. I have a backbone so sue me. I have seen more than one girl, settle on Mr. Okay and that turns in to break ups and heart breaks. Now know that my standers don’t mean you need be, drop dead give me a bucket and let me drool hot, that does not matter to me that much, but your attitude does how you treat others and is Jesus your life too. That is what I look for in a man.

I am looking for the diamond not a piece of coal which can become one some day.  I don’t go through guys like, I go through hair gel, many guys is not better than just one. I have only had a handful of “relationships” that have really mattered in my life, and those guys actually mean something the last two of those “J”s are still my friends to this day, even if they are not people I talk to every day. If a person picks up a lot of coal looking for a diamond they only going to end up dirty. I am not saying that you need to perfectly clean and pure. No, because as a human being, who was born with Sin, you can’t be without Jesus. We were told to love like Jesus loved, which means unconditional, if your hands are black from coal dust, it’s okay, Jesus loves you and Mr. Right/Miss Right will too.    

       Objectification: means treating a person as a thing, without regard to their dignity. I have written blogs on the topic the darker side of modesty before and how it has affected my life in the past.  I have come to the viewpoint that many of people within the Christian community, have taken the idea of modesty and turned into a version objectication, and saying that if a woman dress a certain way she is good, and if she dress at the end of the spectrum she is bad. Nothing, on the fact we all born sinners, and that is the heart is what is truly evil and everyone is born with Sin, or that we are each going to be accountable for our own sin. That a man who lust after a woman will held accountable for that sin, not woman in the “short skirt”, whom the man’s eye beheld. That's the yin and yang of the modesty culture is the rape culture, to say if a woman is raped when dress in a provocative way, that she is a at fault for that, it’s the same argument that modesty culture uses to say that a woman is responsible if a man lust after her. NO! Only one person is responsible for their sin, and that is person sinning.

          There is a viral video going around Facebook (which I will link below) Virtue Makes You Beautiful, with a group of school boys and Alex Boye. Who are singing about modesty, okay, annoying beyond belief (a “parody” of a One Direction song) and breaking more copyright laws than I can count! The idea in and of itself, is not a bad one; only they say that “they need my modesty” and that if I could see what they could see, then I would understand I am beautiful. Okay, nothing of the fact that I am created in the image of God and on that point alone I should be called beautiful period. Nothing on the fact, they need to take responsibility for their own actions and learn that sex is not in of itself a bad thing, what makes it a bad thing is, Man twisted version of it. God version which says that it is meant for marriage, is beautiful and that all of God’s creation in any type of covering is beautiful, because God made it. My cry today, is for young men out there that if you look at young women out there as something God created therefor they beautiful, and that woman could be the girl dressed in a long denim skirt with no makeup in your youth group or the hooker you just passed on the street, who is just as beautiful and as much value to God as the girl you are sitting next to in the denim skirt, because God made her, and she does not need to change, who she is to come to Christ. Christ ate dinner with women like her, not just with girls in long denim skirts, and people, who followed the Law, but with those who need him most.

Who said you have to go to church every time the doors are open? I am writing this blog in response to a Facebook post from a youth pastor, I went college with, put up on his page. The gist of the post was he hoped that Basketball Leagues would change their schedules so the youth could be at church on Wednesday nights. Now step one before people start ranting at me, I have nothing against people going to church, I am a born again Christian and believe going to renew a one spirit and have fellowship with other believers is a very good thing. My problem comes when traditions take precedents over doctrine, such as the “tradition” some denominations place on a person being at the church every time the doors and the shame put on others who choose to rest on one Sunday, that for many Wednesday night is family night, or not get themselves killed because when there is six inches of snow on the ground and it is not safe to drive. It never says anywhere in the Bible that you must show up for every church event on the calendar; because, oh wait it did not exist when church started. (If it does in Fourth Timothy < note there is no Fourth Timothy>) 

I went to a Christian College, which I loved, but every school has ups and downs, and mine came in forms of bible studies, Christian college student unions and gossip. On my Alma Mater campus, there is a big hill and at the top is the Christian College student union building, which for many was the center of their college life, not in of itself a bad thing. I could count about the number of times I went up that hill in my three years there on my fingers, if not one hand. I got a lot a of a shame, because I wanted to do my homework, or just enjoy the quiet of my dorm or watch tv with no one in the TV room.  The real reason I did not want to be there was  because that was where the worst gossips on that pristine campus like to hang out there.  That was something I did not want associated with, since because I was always taught if it was not necessary, true, kind or loving don’t say it, nor am I a master at this by any means? NO, but I do try to, do this and this was not practiced by many at the top of this hill and they were called the leadership on that campus, which was just sad. I have known girls who got kicked out of their own rooms because their roommate was having bible study and their roommate who did the kicking was consider one of the most "respected" girls on my campus.

Now back to my original point, Jesus never said that you have to go to church to worship or fellowship with Him or fellow believers there, but that's where one or more are gathered there He will be also, or be still and know I am God. To think that only place a person can learn about Jesus is in church is just a flat out lie or that unforgivable sin  is not go church on Wednesday night, is just horrible out and out lie. What you, who have said things like this are just, pushing legalism on the rest of the church and since the Youth Pastor, who inspired my blog, we went to the same Church my senior year ( an amazing Church) that I only once went to Sunday School (not even on Easter Sunday), I never went to Sunday night service,  I never  went to Wednesday night prayer service and still grew while I was there. What I am saying is that legalism does not belong anywhere near the church. We are to seek Him out and being a family is more important than, giving a good face at Church or to reach those who really need the Lord, because the world is lost and they not coming to Wednesday night services they are going to their kid basketball games.