'I must be an acrobat, to talk like this and act like that...' -Actung Baby,U2
I am Jacob Bailey. I have been writing here for a while now. I am 27 years old, on the brink of moving to Spain. I love my wife and two beautiful children. Glad you stopped by - please let me know you were here by posting a comment.
leading with QUESTIONS
Saturday, February 26, 2005
with others
I have enjoyed getting to know a handful of others who are ITeams this week with me. Many of them will be leaving tomorrow. It is so encouraging to be able walk alongside such committed and dynamic young Christ followers who are thinking forward and giving their young lives to the King and his Kingdom in new ways. You're the MAN Dema! Chris Warren will be off for a year in Moscow of youth minitry with IT in July. I added him to a list of fellow bloggers out right. Here's a link to his weblog directly.
Thursday, February 24, 2005
Hello from IT Video
We uploaded a video of our family having fun the first couple of days at ITeams...
we'll be here through March 20th. You can see how cold it is for us "Pacific Northwesterners."
You can also see a little bit of our fat apartment that I am writing from write now. It's really nice!
Download it here.
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
sometimes
But for the grace of God we are crushed under the weight of his holiness. I wonder if that is true? I think it's true. It sounds good. It kind of makes sense. I know I wish it was true. I know I hope that it is true. I know that tomorrow, in order to survive, I will have to live at though it were true. It is my truth right now. It may change...it may prove to be untruth altogether, but right now it is my truth...it is helpful...that means something to me...
I am wondering about so many things, stuggling about so many ideas. I realized today that it isn't that I have lost my grid of understanding and have none. Instead I am wondering if maybe there is a new grid in place and operating but I am not fully aware of it or how it works.
I have questions about "support raising." I am uncomfortable with it and I am not sure exacly why. It's not that I am trying to get around the fear of talking to people about money - that isn't the big problem for me. It is more like foundationally I don't believe in it. I have through IT been given all this info about "biblical foundations for fundraising" but I don't by it. I am not even willing to consider the "evidence." Not interested. This brings up a deeper problem for me...I hesitate to say it...but I don't trust our (mine included) interpretations of scripture anymore. I am totally suspect. I openly fear that we are "reading into" the text everything we want it - everything we need it to say. And we do this, I fear, whenever we need it to do want we want it to. In my experience we do this at our convenience. It is odd. I don't think we realize how odd it is.
I confess I have lost the ability to read the scriptures. You can probably tell that that scares me a bit. All I know is that we are missing some things. Whatever happened to leaving space for the Unknown One to remain unknown - or atleast shrouded in mystery? Why can't we reinstate the necessary gaps in our understanding of God and his ways? Why are we afraid of this?
writing from ITeams HQ
hola from IT. Spending all day in classes learning about IT and their whole game for sending people out. This has been good for Tania and I, we are out of our Olympia circle and connecting with new folks. There is cool group of younger folks who are going to be serving as "interns" for IT over the next few months in different places in the world...each one going somewhere different.
I sat with a group late into last night and we had some interesting conversation. I was suprized by the some of the churchianity that bubbled to the surface...it was cool though cause I didn't blast them away with some of the crap and questions that been going through my heart and head lately...I was quiet for a bit then had a chance to offer up a couple of questions that I was wrestling with...it was like testing out new shoes. And the shoes fit...its like I have had them in the box for a long time and just now I am getting the chnce to try them out a bit...I am happy though.
I know who I am and where I am (not where I am going really)...but I feel safe in this place of extreme uncertainity and clouded vision. Safely placed there...like I am supposed to be there...
Anyway this whole excercise of being at mission organization and doing training has been good because it gives me a chance to think and feel the rub of things I just don't go for anymore...and other things I see the need more than ever... blah blah blah...
Friday, February 18, 2005
in transitions
Tania and I arrived here at IT headquarters today...it was like a strange dream like one of those where you know what's going on but something is just strange and you can't figure it out. Anyway...I realize we are in the middle (or starting point?) of a huge transition...arriving here to Chicago was really getting the chapter started...I mean really getting into what's next for us...
I know we are supposed to be here, it just feels strange...not that I thought it would feel a certain way or another...just that is does feel odd. I guess we have been doing life in a place, a certain way for a while now, and we are just used to it like that...I don't know...but I can feel things changing so fast now...I think I am prepared for what's next...I mean I want it more that ever...I wouldn't know where I would be without this huge next step...I would have nowhere to go...and nothing to really do...or would I?
Anyhow...my sick girl is sitting on my lap trying to get a little lovin as I try and articlulate subliminal feelings deep deep down somewhere in my mind/heart....so I will quit for now...I just had to say something
I feel weird...things are slipping around...not sure who I am sometimes..or what I really am about...wishing I did though...that's ok. I will still get sleep tonight. Moving on...to what.s next...
Thursday, February 17, 2005
"you're on the road but you've got no destination...
You're in the mud
In the maze of her imagination
You love this town
Even if that doesn't ring true
You've been all over
And it's been all over you
It's a beautiful dayts a beautiful day"
as we move toward Spain you can track with us here: the road to Santiago
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
looking back again...
I've been thinking today about my faith journey...partly because I have to (for IT - it's part of the training piece coming up Friday) and partly cause I am just curious. These thoughts led be to explore my own blog a little bit a look and reflect. I went back to August 2003.
That was pretty awesome...becaue it is all there. I remember when I wrote this or that...when I felt this or that and quickly uploaded it on blogger...this has really been a great way for me to keep moving...to keep things moving along...and to remember that movement is good. Alot has changed since 2003. Faith and practice for me, continues to evolve out of control sometimes...what I think I know escapes me, how I think I should live today changes tomorrow...but all in all I see movement...a journey somewhere...and that's a refreshing thought - alot like maybe God is being faithful...
What am I thinking about today beyond all that I just put down...
I guess I am just grateful for my life, my family, my kids, my wife, my extended family, some great friends, the fact that I enjoy the rich treasures of the U.S. and I was handed them without a choice, that fact life means something to me and I am not on antidepressants, the fact that life is going somewhere and will continue to do so, the fact that I don't regret too much, the fact that sun shines today on my back and gently warms it. It all feels like God somehow...
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
faith journey
where bright streams once flowed unending
now only a dusty dry stones remain.
It's a place you don't dare stay or you might die
it's movement that matters sometimes more
than substance or concrete forms in which you find yourself.
My life is not static or stable but this is my faith journey.
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
u2's last stop may be our's too!
scott's quick action has got us tracking with the August 14 / Lisbon, Portugal * show. That's right we are throwing a hail mary to try and land tickets for the final show of the Vertigo tour. I would appreciate your sincere prayers about this, intercede for me as we try and get close to u2 in 2005 (or at least cross your fingers).
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
I'm ready for the laughing gas I'm ready for what's next
I may be down, but I am not out.
11:01am Saturday me and Jord were online competing for general admission access to U2 at Key Arena in Seattle, April 24. We saw two tickets (upper tier) but didn't get them because we needed 4. We tried again. Timed out. Tried again. Timed out. 7X later we were in the car to tickmaster at the local Fred Meyer. Line of 25. All on the phone with significant others at home online trying again. And again. No luck. By 11:30am the old show (and now new added show April 25th) we sold out. No dice. D***!
Today...10:30am. Vertigo site. European tour schedule. Yes. August. 3 Spain shows and one Lisbon show. Email Scott. Make plans. Save money now. I still may have a chance to get in on the vertigo tour. Thank God.
Thursday, February 03, 2005
larry king
if you haven't read the CNN transcripts of Larry King's show with Brian McClaren and others then you can do it here. McClaren's voice of compassion and wisdom, the moves out of the dichotmistic past is refreshing. Dwight writes kind words about him here and A. Jones writes about him here. The LaHayes' responses seem so freakin odd to me. What are they thinking? These conclusions can only be held on to and promoted in a shallow protected world...somewhere in the Christian culture ghetto that they have even helped create...I cringe for Christ when I see them mainsteam saying what they are saying...I cringe for the world and the way that their excluding and triumphant words push people into deeper darkness and darker thought about Jesus - the church - and anything associated with Christianity...
again the voice of McLaren is almost a life boat.
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
on this side
i think maybe that on this side of post-modernity (post-post moderninty, emerging something or other, next, what-ever-you-want-to-call-it-make-up-your-own-words-if-you-like land) the landscape i one of cynicism and deconstructiong but also deep optimism, but not joy.
i wonder if maybe when EmergentMan (symbolic figure representing the Jesus' bride today or tomorrow) emerges completely he/she will be smiling? because I wonder if he or she will recover the joy of knowing God again through Jesus? Will this will be the sign that a new day has been fully birthed?
