"Too Country. What's that?"

"Is it like too republican or too democrat? Is it too far to the left, or too far to the right? Too straight down the middle? Too black? Too white?"

I have found through my 21+ years of life that the best place for me to just sit and think are laying in bed, in the shower, and while cutting grass. Oddly enough, none of those involve sitting, but you catch my drift. This time, it was in the shower, and I was thinking about people.

One thing that draws me to being a priest is that I get to be around people. I get to be apart of communities both large and small. I get to laugh with them, cry with them. Have a shoulder for them when they need it, whether it be to cry on or hold them up after one of my killer jokes. Why being a priest is the best way for me to do this I have not been able to put in words yet, and may may not know my whole answer to that yet.

I believe in the shower this morning my brain got into a fight with itself. The two parts going at it were as follows:
1) One part of my brain understands concrete things. It is the one that knows every question has an answer, even if it takes years to find it. This part understands calculus, physics, and why water swirls the way is does when it goes down a drain. It would be a decent engineer
2) The other part of my brain is ok knowing that a lot of questions don't have answers. At least not answers that can be given in short answer form. This part knows God. It understands spontaneous actions, the bible, and the importance of both answered and unanswered prayers.

I got to thinking about people, particularly about bad things that people do. It then drifted towards how it must feel to be a parent of someone who does these things. To know that part of your dna is in someone that blew up a building, or hijacked a plane, or went on a killing spree. I know I would feel terrible if it were my child that did something of the sort. I decided this could also work for other things too, like Frankenstein or black licorice.

Here's where it gets interesting

Then I started thinking about how God created us, and in his image none the less. And God is supposedly infallible and all good. But if all that is true, then how did The Fall happen. Why, for the most part, have humans been in a downward spiral since the beginning. How could so many bad things come from something so good, so pure. I guess the saying's true- "The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry."

I guess that saying could be true, but then again I'm not talking about men, or even mice, for that matter. I'm talking about an all-powerful being, one that we as humans don't understand. The best way I could think to explain something like this is one
I read in a book called "The Andelite Chronicles." It's a prequel to the Animorph series. Imagine you exist on a piece of paper, and the only move on a 2D plane. Then someone comes along from above you. You would have little concept of what is happening of how that person came to be. I imagine that is how God is. He is somewhere where we as human being can barely grasp.

So how can bad things be created by good ideas. Who knows? But God is certainly not to blame. We may have opened several doors leading to bad things, but He is always there, calling us back, and waiting for us with unconditional love which we as humans may not be able to know the full depth of until we see Him again.

"Is honest and truth just not in demand? Too Country? I don't understand."