Suddenly, I'm not half the man I used to be.

So Erika gave me a book as a belated Christmas present last month called Surfaces and Essences, and I haven't yet read more than a couple pages of the preface (which is pretty intimidating, by the way!), but I've gathered from that skimming and from conversations about the book with Mr. B and Mr. L that it heavily considers analogies.

I love analogies. I'm trying to incorporate them more into my daily speech. But I also note that songs and books and movies and people have been analogous of each other, which is an idea that my friend Vicki has written about! Here I'll discuss two such analogous songs and how they both are analogous to Christ and the Christian's life, or at least the way that they're analogous to my life. And from there, dear reader, you can take my life as an analogy of your own and learn from me, for in the end we're not that different.

"Yesterday," (The Beatles)

Yesterday all my troubles seemed so far away!
Now it looks as though they're here to stay;
Oh, I believe in yesterday...

Suddenly, I'm not half the man I used to be:
There's a shadow hanging over me:
Oh, yesterday came suddenly.
Why she had to go I don't know; she wouldn't say.
I said something wrong; now I long for yesterday.

Yesterday love was such an easy game to play.
Now I need a place to hide away;
Oh, I believe in yesterday...

Here the singer has harmed a woman: he admits that he must have "said something wrong" that made her go away, and that now he "long[s] for yesterday." This guilt weighs on him like a shadowy cloud hanging over him, like a thundercloud that crept up overnight. His loss comes upon him "suddenly" and the narrative gives us a glimpse of his failure: he was playing a game of love that blew up in his face today and shames him into hiding, looking wistfully backwards at yesterday. He is a cheating man, and "suddenly" he realizes how much love has exacted from him: a Shylockian pound of flesh.

"Suddenly" (perf. by Hugh Jackman, Les Miserables [2012])

Suddenly I see! Suddenly it starts! 
Can two anxious hearts beat as one?
Yesterday I was alone; today you walk beside me...
Something still unclear, something not yet here has begun.

Suddenly the world seems a different place,
somehow full of grace and delight!
How was I to know that so much hope was held inside me?
What has passed is gone; now we journey on through the night.
How was I to know at last that happiness can come so fast?
Trusting me the way you do; I'm so afraid of failing you!
Just a child who cannot know that danger follows where'er I go;
There are shadows everywhere and memories I cannot share.

Nevermore alone, nevermore apart,
you have warmed my heart like the sun.
You have brought the gift of life and love so long denied me...
Suddenly I see what I could not see: something suddenly has begun!

The word "suddenly" is repeated over and over again in this NEW Les Mis song, lending itself to the title. But it only triggered this sudden epiphany when I heard the Beatles' "Yesterday" when Paul McCartney suddenly picks up the tempo of the strings and the timbres of his voice when he enters the short bridge with that one word: "Suddenly!" And the reason that I remembered this song so well from the Les Mis film is because these NEW dialogue lines resonated so clearly with me and my mother's role in life:

VALJEAN: Where I go, you will be.
COSETTE: Will you be like a Papa to me?
VALJEAN: Yes, Cosette! This is true! I'll be father and mother to you!

Having been raised lived in a one-parent home for the majority of my life, I've seen and witnessed just how desperate and wary a question Cosette asks her immediate savior. But God is able to do more than we ask or think or reasonably expect: He raises the church to be a mother and promises Himself as the great Father to the fatherless. (Furthermore, he gave my grandparents to me as surrogates, so you needn't despair for me, O reader.) In this, the Les Mis "Suddenly" portrays a more true and lovely depiction of love and self-sacrifice.

Ah, self-sacrifice. This is the second analogy I draw from these songs, and they both say the same message, but only one is salvific. Paul McCartney croons "Suddenly I'm not half the man I used to be," but his love song has no resurrection. His love's story is dead and gone, and he longs for yesterday before his love died. On the other hand, Hugh Jackman sweetly asks God, "Suddenly it starts: can two anxious hearts beat as one?" His love song isn't even romantic, yet still all love requires sacrifice: truly Jean ValJean died the day he adopted Cosette as his very own daughter. But because his is a true love in that it is a hopeful and enduring love (a la 1 Corinthians 13), it has a resurrection and a new life that opens with Jean ValJean's defrosting heart. He's not half the man he used to be, but he's a better man for the division since the new life is better.

1. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markdroberts/2012/12/29/the-les-miserables-movie-suddenly-theres-a-new-song-spoiler-alert/

2. http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/lesmiserablescast/suddenly.html

3. http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/beatles/yesterday.html

It's just a fucking cupcake.

So I've been wrestling with the (conflicting?) ideas of patronage and capitalism.

On the one hand, we use our money and feed our souls with what we love because of the ideas behind it. When I am married, any food my wife will make will be the best food I could've eaten, because she is making it with the lovely work of her fingers. We consume that which we would support.

On the other hand, we use our money to buy what is good for us. What we want. What we need. Ideologies aside, Chik-Fil-A makes a good chicken sandwich. Starbucks makes (passably) good coffee. Am I turned on or off by their respective Christian or pro-homosexual agendas and heritage? My stomach and palate sure aren't (That's actually a lie: my tastes are unbiased in terms of quality because I have chronic sinus allergies...). So, we consume that which we would taste.

Sidenote: But is not the body more than its desires, and the stomach for more than food? We are not just consumers, but we are also creators after the model of our creative Heavenly Father.

So what should we do when the two come head to head? What of the atheist who develops a hankering for good quality (look at me, being cute, talking like I know what good quality food is...) fried chicken sandwiches? Does he eschew Chik-Fil-A because he hates Christianity? Would he buy a lesser product in order to perpetuate a different philosophy? Would he pay more money or eat lesser quantities of food in order to perpetuate a different philosophy?

What of the Christian who hates chicken sandwiches, yet would support the Christian values and hiring processes of businesses such as Chik-Fil-A? 

This is madness. Or is this just food sacrificed to idols? 

(The context: the Muslim Student Union was passing out free cupcakes on campus today. I felt no guilt for taking one and devouring it BEFORE my own lunch in all its rainbow sprinkled and chocolate glory. Also, last week or the week before, a Christian club called Navigators was offering free hot chocolate and tea on a particularly cold morning.)

Who would accuse me of sinning by eating the Muslims' offered cupcake? Certainly my own soul points to Christ, who is a heaven of heavens to me complete with all the joys of endlessly flowing milk and honey, and wipes its lips and says "I have done nothing wrong." But I do understand and sympathize with the weaker brothers, and would happily agree to eat different and non-offensive things in their presence. My impoverished tongue would know no difference, anyways. 

At the end of the day, it's just a fucking cupcake. 

I need to study maps.

Long story short, I need to study maps.

I need to study maps because I am good at giving directions, but I have no knowledge of geography beyond my own experience using landmarks.

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.

So, with the word of God, how can I give directions if I don't know the map? Shall I only derive instruction for others based on my experience of living the Christian life alone, or shall I glean from the wisdom of Scripture and of those who have gone before me? How can I love without knowledge? And how can I trust the promises of God if I don't know that the promisor is faithful?

It's an active stubbornness and arrogance to refuse (or not take advantage of!) the loving advice of elders, and I need to repent of this in more areas than my geographical disorientation, which .... probably? doesn't have anything to do with my Asian-ness, pun notwithstanding.