The Power of Grapes
I wish focus wasn't such a fleeting thing. If I added up the time I spend being distracted every day I would probably discover that I have another two or three hours that I could use for something constructive. But my mind wanders. I start thinking about weekend plans. I get sucked into sports talk on the radio or television. I get up from the computer to get a handful of grapes. There are countless things that steal our focus.
Last week while my mind was off on a tangent, I realized that people who condemn homosexuality probably consider our lives as GLBT folks to be one big distraction. Since they don't consider homosexuality to be a natural thing they must think of us as wanderers who have strayed from some sort of perfect heterosexual path and have become so distracted by homosexuality that we just give up and decide to immerse ourselves in it. They seem to expect that we could snap back the moment we applied a bit of focus on something more proper. But they underestimate the power of truth. We're not gay because we wandered to this point. We're gay because we have become open to expressing the truth about ourselves. And many of us who are gay Christians have discovered that God is intricately woven into that process. The judgment that follows us on the journey is the distraction.
As I was driving home from work one day last week something was bothering me so I started to pray, and after a minute or so I had become completely focused on God and engrossed in our conversation. Just as I was beginning to really feel the power of the moment, another car raced up from the side and then darted in front of me (without a blinker of course) and slowed down to turn shortly thereafter. I was forced to slow down as well. That was enough to launch me right out of my moment of prayerful bliss and into thoughts of frustration. I thought about how insignificant I must be in the grand scheme of things for this guy (and a thousand others before him) to pay me such showy disregard. It wasn't until two or three traffic signals later that I realized I had been in mid-prayer when I first became distracted, and I had to rewind and apologize to God. Then I got upset with myself for losing focus, and that became a distraction in itself.
We'll always have attention-stealers in our lives, especially as gay Christians. We might be having a great day and then we flip on the radio and hear someone say homosexuals are going to hell. This is distracting, no matter how far beyond it we happen to be. I got an email today from a nineteen year-old girl whose mother is having trouble accepting the fact that her daughter is a lesbian and prefers that she remain closeted and fighting it because, in her words, "if you have already done it for eighteen plus years you can continue." That's quite a distraction. But distractions are not truth. If we keep our focus on God and we remain intent on nurturing that relationship, we won't be in danger of internalizing the condemnation that seems to follow us. And in turn it will lose power over us. It's not easy, but it is possible. And God can work with the possibilities.
Distractions can be healthy as long as we consider them to be a way to relax our tightly wound minds, and as long as we allow these distractions to help us grow. In other words, it's time for some grapes.
Last week while my mind was off on a tangent, I realized that people who condemn homosexuality probably consider our lives as GLBT folks to be one big distraction. Since they don't consider homosexuality to be a natural thing they must think of us as wanderers who have strayed from some sort of perfect heterosexual path and have become so distracted by homosexuality that we just give up and decide to immerse ourselves in it. They seem to expect that we could snap back the moment we applied a bit of focus on something more proper. But they underestimate the power of truth. We're not gay because we wandered to this point. We're gay because we have become open to expressing the truth about ourselves. And many of us who are gay Christians have discovered that God is intricately woven into that process. The judgment that follows us on the journey is the distraction.
As I was driving home from work one day last week something was bothering me so I started to pray, and after a minute or so I had become completely focused on God and engrossed in our conversation. Just as I was beginning to really feel the power of the moment, another car raced up from the side and then darted in front of me (without a blinker of course) and slowed down to turn shortly thereafter. I was forced to slow down as well. That was enough to launch me right out of my moment of prayerful bliss and into thoughts of frustration. I thought about how insignificant I must be in the grand scheme of things for this guy (and a thousand others before him) to pay me such showy disregard. It wasn't until two or three traffic signals later that I realized I had been in mid-prayer when I first became distracted, and I had to rewind and apologize to God. Then I got upset with myself for losing focus, and that became a distraction in itself.
We'll always have attention-stealers in our lives, especially as gay Christians. We might be having a great day and then we flip on the radio and hear someone say homosexuals are going to hell. This is distracting, no matter how far beyond it we happen to be. I got an email today from a nineteen year-old girl whose mother is having trouble accepting the fact that her daughter is a lesbian and prefers that she remain closeted and fighting it because, in her words, "if you have already done it for eighteen plus years you can continue." That's quite a distraction. But distractions are not truth. If we keep our focus on God and we remain intent on nurturing that relationship, we won't be in danger of internalizing the condemnation that seems to follow us. And in turn it will lose power over us. It's not easy, but it is possible. And God can work with the possibilities.
Distractions can be healthy as long as we consider them to be a way to relax our tightly wound minds, and as long as we allow these distractions to help us grow. In other words, it's time for some grapes.
posted by Jen Austin at 5:56 PM
2 Comments:
Interesting blog.
I know I am guilty of distracting myself. Sometimes it's distracting myself from the chaos of work and life with meditation and prayer. But other times I distract myself with negative habits such as too much tv watching (this is esecially true when it's football and hockey season).
I love reading your blog it's so interesting and entertaining. Yeah, my mother thinks it's a choice and that I can reamain in the closet and all this other stuff, I love her but she just doesn't understand. Have a good dayyyy Thanks!
Katie
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