I finally figured it out.

So at a restaurant sometime in the winter, I was asked it I knew God. "How can you possible know God?" is what I wondered. So in response I talked more than I ever talked in my whole life in one sitting about my life in general. But this knowing God thing puzzled me. Knowing God? Perhaps there is a book on the subject. (There is). But what I was after was a lot of Bible reading and reading books by people who had read the Bible and said what it was about. Which is what most Christians do anyway; it's too hard to figure out this on your own. But lately I have been reading "Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings, and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary." And somewhere it clicked that knowing God was about having an encounter with Him. An intimate spiritual experience. The only one that I've had so far is one in which God spoke to me while I was in the most secualar of places; a north end call center. He said two words to me "I'm Here." As I write this I realise that God is everywhere. With me now, as I write this in a messy, disorganized "hole in the ground." that I call my apartment. It's something that I'm still trying to comprehend. But I don't know if I can.

Life has calmed down. It is interesting how God speaks to you. I was thinking about this whole getting to know God and how if you are a Christian you are supposed to be in a "personal relationship with Jesus." As I thought about that, I thought of all the things that I would do if I Jesus was physically here and what I would do with him. I thought of all the music we would listen to and the movies we would watch. Then I thought of how he would eat with sinners so I imagined him and I having dinner and he would bring over some homeless people and prostitutes from 20th street. I thought of how we would go to Edmonton to see my sister, and he would not want to go to West Edmonton Mall because that was a symbol of Society's greed and commercialism. He probably would not like the lifestyles of the Western world how we have so much wealth and what not. Even I have a lot of money compared to most people in the world and yet I am categorised as living below the poverty line.

But it led me to think of other places to go to church in case Hope Fellowship never considers me "mennonite" enough or I give into temptation and really screw up and they kick me out like R. and R. . I have been thinking about going to the Bridge on 20th. I think there is a real need there in the inner city. Now I'm gonna go and call my sister.

Lately I have been struggling with things. I went to church today and did not get the "shower of annointing" that I usually get when I go to church. Mostly I just stood there and was sort of out of it. But I've just been struggling. It's been a tough few weeks. Seeing Craig the guy from Adecco whose name I can't remember get made fun of and was tough. Mostly I just stood there, tried not to get involved. And this whole knowing God stuff is impossible. God is impossible to know because He is so vast and there is so much information about Him. The Bible is a bad place to get to know God because on one hand it is "love thy neighbor" on the other it is "hate homosexuals." It is "love never fails" and "women are to be submissive to their husbands." Also church is a bad place to get to know God because it's sort of like bait and switch. Just believe in Jesus and then you will be saved, oh and read your bible everyday you lazy sinner. Look at this verse, you are going to hell. Then you meet people who say things that make no sense whatsoever, like "under authority," "the World," "knowing God", Biblebabble I call it. Also these people want to burn war movies and fast forward through mild sex scenes in comedy movies. So the words of the American poet Speech run through my head now and again. "Why does it have to be so damn tough." Which has just been answered by the great Canadian poet Bruce Cockburn;

"Nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight/gotta kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight."