beggar

Now I can't remember if this was Brennan Manning's interpretation of the scripture or he was quoting someone else....but I loved how he talked about the meaning of "the poor in the spirit" ...he said that this can also be interpreted as Beggars at the door of God's mercy.

I love that.

I have been chasing a career, and even been chasing "ministry" aspirations for so many years that I think on this rainy day on a friday, a 30 year old, that's not young if you're 20...and not old if you're 40....I'm just tired. And I also "know" I shouldn't do that, but I do...what up with that?!

On this rainy day in March I reflect on being a Christian, and I just get overwhelmed at all that I'm not, and it makes me think that why I'm so attracted to "the ragamuffin gospel." I obsess over my have not's and failures...i think it's one thing to go..".don't do that"...and have faith in that "Jesus loves me for who I am, not for who I'm not"...but today I find myself begging for the gift of faith to believe that...to be confident in that...

This process of making a movie about Rich is a healthily strange one. It's the movie industry, yet has nothing to do with any career aspirations i have whatsoever. I love that. And doing a movie about your hero is a bonus, but the reason he is my hero, is he's heroic where I struggle...he's strong where I'm weak...he's brave where I'm timid etc....and the healthy part of doing a movie on him...brings me back to the humble posture of a beggar...hey I am in need...and if you would just show kindness...an inkling of compassion in this area...I can get by...but if you don't I won't...that's why I'm not asking...no, I'm begging.

So I realize that these have all been a.d.d. ramblings...so let me wrap up with this...what am I begging for? a heart I once had, that now feels like a distant childhood memory...and strangely I think was...

I remember being on tour with "the color green" and we were what was named "the poor camp in ohio"...or the "dirt poor camp'...I can't remember...I only remember they had some gross bologna pizza...anyway i remember i was ranting after some show we did...and I don't really remember anything i said...I'm sure it wasn't very profound...maybe emotional...but not profound...but what I do remember is my heart...and how free and joyous it felt...I remember it was afternoon...and the sun was pouring in through this chapel through the large window spaces...and I remember the only thing i cared about was Christ. Maybe how David felt when he stripped naked and danced in the streets, or when Peter said, hang me upside down on the cross because I'm not worthy enough to hang the same way Jesus did, or maybe st. francis giving away everything to go to the middle of nowhere and build a church even though everyone thought he was crazy, or shane claiborne starting the simple way, or mark driscoll starting mars hill church, or erwin mcmanus writing a book, or Paul writing all those wonderful letters that became scripture, or billy graham preaching the gospel, or mother theresa felt when she would take the worst shoes so everyone else could have better shoes, or how moses felt when he was crossing the red see, or how the isrealites felt when the saw manna fall from heaven, or when my grandma would be in prayer at 5 in the morning in my living room growing up (and maybe even now in her lucid state), or how randy wheeler felt driving to california, or how I feel even now as I write this blog...this inkling that all that really matters is loving God, being faithful to Jesus, and loving the hell out of everybody that I come in contact with. Especially my enemies, for how could I ever learn to love my enemies, if I had none?

But the sun's not pouring through the windows today. I'm in California and experiencing a seattle rain. And I'm not the 20 year old I once was so full of zeal, I'm a 30 year old who looks and feels like he's 40 and spent a part of his life being a prodigal and part being in awe of the kabod. So I find myself begging today, begging for the sun to pour through the windows of my heart, soul, mind, and weakness. Oh lord, save me. Bring me back to that place that only cares about you, and because of that I care about sooooo much more, but with healthy eyes of surrender, peace, and joy...

Begging you Abba,

your prodigal ragamuffin-david leo

inside joke

I like inside jokes. When I’m involved.

I was “tagged” in some facebook pics from 94, I was 14 (looking at me at 14 feels like the way i was dressed was an inside joke with myself), when I was at a camp in Hillsboro, In. That sounds like a town that would be in Indiana. The camp’s name was Twin Lake. I look like a total idiot, but then again, I still do. I wonder if when I’m 80 and I look back at pictures of me when I’m 30 and think the same thing. When I’m old, gray, imobile, and wearing a diaper. Will I be cool then? Was I cool when I was 14. Am I cool now? Man, I hope not. The pressure that comes with cool, Uggh.

Funny sidenote, for the 3 people that read my blog, my friend Brinson said yesterday, “I think you’re the first friend I’ve been around that has clinical A.D.D….” I have never been diagnosed, but it don’t take much, whether it be having a beer with me or reading this blog, that it’s probably true. And why I can write a blog everyday straight for a week, than take a year off: I get distracted.

Where was I? hey, look at that bird? Where was I, oh, pictures of when I was 14. Anywho, I had this extreme rush of nostalgia when I looked at those pictures. Steve Martin, had a similar experience, in his book “Born Standing Up” he talks about years and years after his success going back to Knotts Berry Farms, where when he was 18-22 he would perfrom on the stage at the park, when he returned he looked at old pics of himself, got on stage, and felt the air of familiarity. When life and Comedy, wasn’t so serious.

What meant so much to be as a 14 year old getting picked up by the church van in beechgrove, In and driving west to hillsboro, which I think was only a 45 minute drive, but at the time felt like a trip across the country, like I was going to a far off magical land. Home life wasn’t always the most fun for me, with the exception of surprise hang out times with my cousins, an occasional birthday, and Christmas, I guess…but for me the highlight of my year was always: Camp. Man, even now a rush of nostalgia runs through me as I remember, a life for me, even for a brief week ever summer (from 7-18) that wasn’t so serious. It was loving, safe, fun, and camp flings weren’t bad either:-)Classic. (warning inside joke: no purple)

I think there is something deeper that has given me the sugar rush of nostalgia. There was something lovely, and deeply moving and meaninful about my 14 year old heart. When I was innocent (not really, but as the old expression goes), when i wasn’t chasing a career (which is the grossest thing currenlty about me), when I simply cared about loving Jesus, people, and frankly just being a kid. I had so much fun at camp. I loved every minute of it. the van ride, eating at Mcdonalds (breakfast) on the way there, finding out which cabin I was in, who was my counselor (this was either good or bad…was he the strict one or the funny one) Once I had the funny one and he gave me his hat, I wore that thing for years. Wow, I haven’t thought about that in 15 years…I loved the games, the friends, the inside jokes, the candy, I loved going to chapel, I (no remember this was a baptist camp in the 90′s) I…me…david leo schultz…even loved dressing up for chapel…not that i had nice clothes…but we had to wear pants to chapel…i think my last few years we were allowed to wear jeans…but no shorts! Where in the bible were shorts unholy…ahhhh religion…you sneaky little bastard….anyway, but I did love it, I loved devotions. This is where I think my heart, and who the hidden, and true david was born, in the still quiet moments of individual devotion time at camp. The simplistic time of reading my bible, and underlining anything that stuck out, and praying bold childlike prayers of wanting Jesus to be my everything, not because my parents were christians, not because i needed rellgion, but because I genuinely believed, somehow even as a 7 year old, then 8, then, 18, then 25, now 30…somehow…by some miraculously genourous eye opening experience in my spirit, I know that the unconditional grace and love that somehow was the only hope I had as a 7 year old, and not much as changed, I’m 30 and still know that this is what I need. But oh where, oh where do I find it except in Jesus. Religion in and of itself, nope. Legalistic Christianity. Nope. Self. Nope. Even in harmless mondane activity of any kid, no matter how enjoyable. Nope. I’ve only found it in the my life quote by Manning “God loves you for who you are, not for who you’re not, cuz none of us are what we should be.”

Even though I tend to make life about so many things. Being funny, being competative, being argumentative, being in love, being in pusuit of my dreams and ambitions, even being “a christian”…but I’ve never found more comfort than in just being God’s, being loved by him, as I did that summers in Hillsboro Indiana at Twin Lakes Camp, as I sat Indian style, looking up at the clouds smiling and praying a childlike prayer of gratefullness for camp, for Jesus…as I imagine St. Francis did as he took a break from building the church. As I did was I was 14, as I did when I was 25, as I do now…the only difference is that the older I get the worse my Christian Resume looks, the more my failures, sins, and people I did not love well are added to my failure list…but thank God, I believe God will not look over my resume when I get to heaven…as Manning put’s it…I am convinced that on Judgement day God will ask me one and only one question…did you beleive that I loved you.

I have a slightly different picture of what will happen, almost as if it is an inside joke between me and God, and as personal and intimate, hard, and beautiful as it will be for me, is the same completely individual experience that it will be for those that Christ knows…I believe on that fateful day Jesus will see me, smile, and hug me, he will kiss me on the forhead, and through his compassion he will communicate his love as if to say, see I told ya…and through that same tenderness it will fly through the pages of my past, destroying both my collection of vices and virtues, and go, you are saved because I saved you, you are loved, because I am Love.

Oh, Lord thank you for Twin Lakes camp and having an inside Joke, called underserved loved, that I’m still trying to figure out the punchline. Amen

Thanks for reading.

Be God’s,

David

Focus

I remember talking to a Pastor in LA, and talking about feeling lost, and he gave me some advice. Advice that I still hold onto today, like a sentimental scrap piece of paper that holds both nostalgia and deep wisdom, that you treasure if don’t outright verge on worship. Not that, that’s a bad thing, as long as what you’re worship, at the center is ultimately Christ.

The advice he gave me was that when he feels lost, looking for meaning, he’ll find a way to serve, to do something for somebody else, but the example he gave put a microscope on the heart of serving someone else, directly to the heart. The simplistic example he gave was cleaning someone’s toliet with a toothbrush, and he said just focus on that, focus for a few seconds on just that one spot, that one dirty spot, and making it clean, not for yourself, but for the one who’s toliet your cleaning, and somehow this simple act of service will draw your heart to peace.

In days of both pure excitement, and hardship, I pull out this memory and remember what I feel is truly the heart Christ, loving others is the best way to love yourself, enjoy life, attain a pure joy and peace for your life.

Be God’s

David Leo Schultz

Arcade Fire in my soul

Arcade fire in my soul

My favorite Arcade Fire song is “Wake Up”.

I beyond love it. I have ever since my roommate back in 2004 or 2005 let me listen to it, in our beyond horrible apartment in Van Nuys, CA. Horribly small. Horrible. It didn’t make it more spacious when i tried to build a loft which took up half the room. How’d it go? I’m not a carpenter.

The song itself stirs my soul, which based on the progression of my blog, seems like it’s fitting for where I and life, as in my life, are at. The music itself gives this adventurous feeling to my soul that something is upon the horizon, as if a sunrise is coming upon the dark shadows in a desolate dreary valley. This is how I feel. I feel excited and hopeful.

Things aren’t easy, things matter of fact are downright painful. If my life were a movie, I’ve got some villians that are downright dispicable. I’m way to freaking sensitive. I don’t know why I’m this way. It’s embarrassing admitting it, but if you’ve known me for 5 minutes you know this to be true. I’m also a complete jerk. I’m complicated I guess. If you say something I don’t like I’m likely to shun you or punch you in the face, but I’ll feel really bad about it, I might even cry about it. Cry that I’m sinful and capable of such anger and nastiness in my soul. I wouldn’t really punch you, but there’s a few I’m thinking about punching today, if I’m quite honest. Or at least as honest that I want to be in the blogosphere. Maybe honest isn’t the word, open…open’s the word.

Anyway I guess I started writing this blog tonight is that I do feel hope, and listening to Aracade fire, even as I type these words, is reminding me of the hope that I feel. The hope that even in the dark and dreary valley, filled with villians and obstacles. I feel hope, hope for a better tomorrow, a better year than last, a better David, than even I have ever known or knew myself. Which would be a shock, because I know myself pretty well. But I really want to be shocked. I hope I’m shocked for the better, not worse. We’ll see.

I only half mean what I’m about to say, but I think I’m growing up a bit in this area of hard work, sensitivity, and villians. I’ve come to realize that villians, pain, trials, the nagging sense, born out of my discontentment, that what I have isn’t enough, the sin-even, until I die maybe 30 or 2 years from now, these things will be present in my life, but I feel I am on to something lately, maybe it’s maturity (I hope not, that’s not a very fun word, I’ve never liked it) let’s call it a better handle on things, lets call it strength…I feel as though I am getting stronger in handling things. I don’t have to feel like crap, if I am choosing to do things the right, wise, or holy way. The pain will be there, the villians will be lurking in the shadows, like a wolf in sheeps clothing, the discontentment, even my own sin–but day by day, step by step I sense that I am growing in HIS strength, and I hope to grow stronger, braver, more dare I say mature. Nope. I still don’t like that word.

In any case, I really hope to be brave enough to let go of certain friends, and certain friends that claim to be friends, but don’t see that they don’t want me to succeed, they want to use me. I know I’ve done that to people. Oooh, I’m gross, but it’s true. Sadly. In any case I really hope to be more, better, sronger, I pray for God’s enabling grace to get me through the seasons ahead, they are busy, and distracting, I hope with whatever work Jesus/the Father/The Holy Spirt, or however the hell that whole Trinity thing works that while I due my duty and work hard, that Jesus would set my heart free from the yoke of want, or at the very least he would baptize by current wants, dreams, and desires, that they would die and ressurect into a holy set of desires, dreams, and wants that only really care about what only really matters: Loving God, and my Neighbors. That’s something to hope for.

Be Gods,

David Leo Schultz

"verge of a miracle"

The man I'm making a movie about is Rich Mullins. When he play and intro the song "verge of a miracle" he would describe it as he was this big recording artist, with this big contract, making this big record...and then he goes to play at this retreat, about a boy who was suicidal and had shot himself in the stomach 6 months before this retreat. And as he's starting to play this song he says, this is for people that shoot themselves in the stomach.

I've never shot myself in the stomach, but I feel like I have metaphorically and and spiritually. I've had no gun, and no bullet to be tempted with (although I've been no stranger to those thoughts), but I in a sense have been the gun, and have had many bullets to choose from: sin, dishonesty, tendency to wear masks, cowardiceness, people pleasing, self absorbtion, self focus, weighing too much on my vices and my virtues, worshiping my dreams versus the giver of dreams, I could go on, and I'm sure you could both for yourself, and if you knew me you could go on for hours about my metaphorical bullets. Don't forget this David, you'd say, and I'd laugh, and go "oh yeah, thanks."

But as I sit here, and see some of my friends living in the gutter failure, depression, and self absorbtion , some in the celebration of well deserved success, some drunk, some sober, some christian, some not, some happy, some pretending to be happy, and I ponder on my own history of me. Thankful a bit, not as much as I should be. Whenever I think of my own lack of greatfulness I think of brennan manning's quote "The sign of trust, is the attitude of gratefullness" (I realize i spelled greatfullness two different ways and still got it wrong...get off my back:-) ...)

Anyway as I sit her...pondering, thinking blah blah blah...I'm...well if i'm real about it, I'm sitting on my couch, after working out for the first time in months , needing a shower and writing this blog, but as I sit here I'm looking at my blinds, and watching the sorely missed sunlight peeking through the clouds, through my fence, and through my closed blinds, and it reminds me that there's hope. That I have not been forgotten, and that no matter how out of shape, or gross looking, or how big of a failure or success i think I am, and cannot hide from the humbling and dangerous love of God.

And I have a lot of hopes and dreams for the future. They are contaminated, because they involve me, and I'm contaminated because I'm not perfect. I do have a dream of absolute perfection in every area of my life, especially with completely forgetting myself and totally loving others, especially my enemies, cuz their the hardest...but I don't think perfection will come until I perfect and unconditionally fall in love with God. i know God loves me unconditionally, but I just wish I could return the favor.

Anway, I am smiling, and euphoric...maybe because I just worked out, but I don't think it's that shallow, I think it's something deeper. I think it's what Jesus is smiling about when he looks at me right now..."David is on the Verge of a Miracle"

As rich used to say when he'd sign autographys...Be God's

On the verge of a miracle,

David Leo Schultz

"Cowboy up"

A common phrase for men. I personally like when Bruce Willis said it in "Tears of the Sun", of coarse I'm a Bruce Willis nut.

I guess this is more of a follow up to my last entry, but how do I cowboy up, as a broken person. If I was just brave, and used to fear nothing, it's not as sexy. If I was just strong, and never weak, it's not as impressive. If I was whole always without redemption, where would compassion, mercy, and grace be found in my life?

Anywho, while I think that I can be a wuss, fearful, timid, sinful, a bleeding heart, a recluse, an introvert, a sensitive sissy. There's something else in me, that is an overcomer, a vengence in my heart, a passionate warrior, a force not to be reckoned with, some of it is awe inspiring, some of it is even sexy, some of it, if not most is born out of pain.

I maybe be opening up, a bit much, but since I only have 4 readers, i think it's okay. A scene in a movie that makes me cry every time I see it is "Punch Drunk Love" starring Adam Sandler and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (one of the best on the planet by the way, a flawless film director)...any who...when Adam Sandler was pushed and pushed and pushed through the redicules and taunts of his sisters, Adam grabbed a hammer and broke the sliding glass door....I'm even tearing up as I think about it.

I feel like that. Not that I'm going to grab a hammer and break a sliding glass door...or maybe i will one day...something to hope for i guess...I do have this propensity to be a door mat, and I feel it, this "don't mess with me" thing inside me...it pops up it's ugly head from time to time...and sometimes it's mean...and sometimes it's totally called for and sexy.

I remember this story I heard once...from a friend...and a Christian...and he told a story, with a surprise ending...surprise, I guess, because it came from him....or maybe the context in which he was telling the story...but anywho...he was in line at subway and this older lady was in front of him rediculing the sandwich maker about getting the wrong cookie...the older lady wouldn't let it go...she would...not....let...it....go....finally my friend got in this lady's face and called her out on being mean to the sandwich maker...and kept saying..."lady it's just a cookie"...and after he told the story he said...I don't do that enough...stand up for people...I don't do that enough...

I've never forgot that story...it's stood out in my mind...I don't do that enough...I don't do that enough for myself...I've always felt like there was a difference between humility (considering others before yourself) and being a doormat. but what more of a doormat could you been then laying down your life and letting someone murder you for the sake of another? (Jesus)

Apart of man up, that is a stirring within, is fleeing from temptation, not just sitting there, but actually escaping the clutches, and even if your not a Christian, I know temptation can sometimes feel like an exclusively christian word...what is robbing you of life? escape from that, run with a fury from that, and run to what gives you life, true life, life that isn't mascaraded my momentary pleasure or temporary joy, but a truly fulfilling life...

I think of the image in "Twister" when the tornado chasers tied themselves to a pole when the twister destroyed the barn and they're holding on with all they got. Run yes, but if there is no escape, hold on to what is imoveable for dear life...hold on tight...and for those that dare trust in Jesus, I think you'll find He'll hold on tight, if you let him...

Right now in most areas of my life, I feel like I've got one more round, I'm beat up, brusied, and in some half coma from the last 8 years of my life...I'm bleeding, tired, worn out, and with all the angst, anger, desire not to give up, hating to loose, vengence, hunger, wanting one more round, don't wanna let the bad guys win, something to prove, fighting the good fight, I wanna get up, man up, yell out a bruce willis quip and fight, not give up, all the while God's power is made perfect in my weakness, so whether or not I have strength or am ready, it is time to man up, get up and keep heading towards the light at the end of a dark, and frightening tunnel...

Be Gods,

David Leo Schultz

where did I go?

When I think of the Bible and remember how it began…it began with God declaring everything good…but when he created man and woman He said it was really good.

When I think of myself, I remember a David, a David who was carefree and honest. A David who smiled.

A David who laughed, a David who was bold, quick tempered, but not hardened.

I’m a tender hearted guy. I think some of that is a virtue, some of it is a vice. I think why I am a sensitive, tenderhearted guy. Is because within my 30 year old body, I have a 9 year old broken child within me. When I think of people that are broken themselves, in need of love, grace, healing themselves who were vessels of the pain in my life…colaborers in my brokenness, I feel both intense resentment, bitterness, and anger…and I feel mercy, pitty, love for…sometimes.

I often wonder who I’d be or where I’d be if I wasn’t broken. Not just in the christianese “broken” sense of the word broken, which at first glance could be taken as just a sinful screw up, but broken in half by life and people. Broken by the sin of others, and lack of care, lack of knowledge of how to raise a kid, lack of knowledge in how to be a friend, lack of knowledge how to not be selfish.

I’m able to feel mercy for my enemies, mascarading as friends and family, and concerned aquaintances… sometimes (not as much as I should)…but I do sometimes when I see that I’m just as broken, as the broken people who broke me.

I dream of a David, who wasn’t so broken. I wonder what my mornings would be like, how I’d eat my meals, what fun I might have?I wonder what my job would be? I wonder who’d still be friend, I wonder what new friends I’d have, or depending on my healthiness and boldness I’d have, what friends wouldn’t stick around.

I wonder and dream about a David, who’s not a people pleaser, who’s tender and mild. A David who is less selfish, and more compassionate.

I desire to be more, but in most ways I desire to be less. I desire to be like Jesus truly, and less like the broken little kid who’s about 30 years away from being a grumpy old man.

I know in some ways we are called to judge, and some ways were not. Which is a whole other topic, but I do think it is funny how I judge other people, how I judge myself, or other people judge each other…It seems like it is time and place doesn’t it. The one judging his friend, neighbor, or enemy five years earlier or later maybe was in the same boat or will be one day.

How free, and wonderful it might be in the people in our life were really understanding. There’s a few out there I’ve met. Some are Christians, even.

David, sweet David, let me pray for you. Abba, help David experience your free love. Let him know how much and how hard you run with your compassion. Grab him Abba, give him the gift of faith that has fixed eyes on You. Let him not care what anyone thinks except You. Let him not compromise or care about himself, let him be determined to live and be free to be the David you had in mind when you said, “And then I created David, and he is really good.”

Thanks for reading.

Be God’s

David Leo Schultz

Hope in a half written journal entry

I opened my journal, and it's only fair to say, that I shouldn't even call it a journal. I should call it half prayer book and half "to do list" keeper...anyway I did have a journal entry/prayer yesterday and, I guess out of my a.d.d. or busyness I didn't finish it. This strangely gave me hope, as if I went through a break up and had one more chance to get a few things off my chest...or a broken friendship having another shot a redemption, or an opportunity to apologize to an enemy. In any case, maybe it's cuz I'm 30, but I've been really wanting to get up and finish the race. "The race" being a metaphor for so many things. My pursuits, dream, life, character, walk with Christ. Specifically I've been thinking about how I've lost my confidence in comedy. There was a time, whether I was ever good or not, I'd walk on stage with out a shred of doubt in my head and heart. Call it bravery, or call it ignorance, but either way I wasn't scared. Matter of fact, there were times that I so felt the rythm of comedic timing I felt like I could control the laughter of an 800 person crowd at the palm of my hand...prideful or confident? Maybe neither. If it's pride, I'm so far removed from that feeling it's hard to feel pride about it any more. Confident, I don't know. I think it was more enjoyment and unexpected, kind of like Matt Damon talking about equations comparing it to playing the piano...and how when it came to equations he could just play...that's how I used to feel about comedy. Maybe I was really confident because I never cared. I never was trying to be funny, it was just a repetative comment that I heard over and over and over and over, till I finally believed it. Maybe this was my mistake. I believed the flattery. Either way....then the paint began to chip off the building. My life met the depths of my selfishness, immaturity, and moral depravity years ago, what feels like another world or rerun of an old movie that I played so much I wore out the vhs tape...and I not only found my comedy....my art...but I also found my whole person floating out to outerspace...and I would reach for it...and it's been a painful reach...I imagine floating in outerspace, with my life, my identity, my comedy within arms reach, but yet cannot grab it...bummer, huh? A few years after the collision of failure, that set my life in a direction of misery (at least it's felt like)...direction of misery filled with blessing, fun, and laughter too!...there's my trying not to be a debbie downer moment, or my moment of gratefulness despite my own screw ups...or recognizing that God is still good even when I act like the prodigal son...the spoiled selfish little brat I can be...anyway after a few years, I got my rythm back, I was booking movies, traveling and performing, I was "funny" again. Then..something horrible happend that didn't just strip me of confidence, it broke me. Like in half. And ever since I've been trying to crawl back to recovery, and it's a crawl. Why? Well, I'm not 20, I'm married, I've got bills and responsibilities, I don't have the time to just dive head long in to just being funny anymore. I've got things to do. Oh, I hate it. But, I am thankful I'm not 20, that I'm not single, that I have things that cost, and jobs...so it's a push pull thing:-) What does give me hope is that there's still another day, more room in that journal to find my way home to a gift that never belonged to me in the first place. Maybe I'll find my way to the 20 year old version of myself and he'll kick my ass for taking life so seriously in the places where it doesn't need to be taken seriously at all, and then after he's done kicking my ass, maybe he'll teach me a knock knock joke or two.

thanks for reading.

Be God's,

David Leo Schultz

procrasti....i'll finish spelling it later...

procrastination

I have a ton of things to do, but I really don’t want to do it, so I think I’ll write another post so I can procrastinate working on all the things I should be working on. Ok, so what should I be working on? I need to re-write this comedy I’ve been working on, and actually shelved for awhile, but a comedy writer (like a real real comedy writer) is going to take a look at it to see if he wants to help make it better, and maybe help get it made…I have an audition on friday to prepare for, I have a table read for a pilot on Saturday to prepare for, I am working on the script for a movie about Rich Mullins, and continuing research on his life, and preparing for a meeting with another screenwriter to potentially join the team on Saturday. I should clean my car, which i never do cause even though I’m married, i still drive so much it’s still a second home, all that to say i know it’ll be dirty again..that and I guess I’ve always been more comfortable in the mess than the clean…anways you see where I’m going with this…taxes, writing, rehearsing, etc…etc…or as my san diego friends taught me, which by the way is a city that loves brevity in lingo, leedle leedle…again for those of you that are lost leedle=etc…weird and unimportant I know, but leedle has inserted itself into my vocab so i guess your gonna have to deal….okay, my a.d.d. has catapulted me into the abyss, let’s see if I can float back to earth….Anyways, I’m not sure if it’s my never ending list of things to do that is bothering me, or that having a never ending list makes me feel purpose…and if that’s true…that bothers me. Rich Mullins once said, that discontentment is a slap in the face to God. I am so challenged by this. I tend to be the debbie downer, the naysayer, the pessimistic, the negative nancy, leedle, leedle…I want to be different, I want to be different at so many things. Maybe it’s cause I’m thirty, maybe it’s because I see how my laziness and maybe it’s because I fell into the trap that is so well laid before me by generations and generations of 20 somethings that declare that career is King. Career is identity. And even if it’s a moment or the next 4o years of my life that finally teaches me that all that matters truly is Jesus. Not what people think of me. Not the people that admire my accomplishments, sit in awe at my achievements, not the competetors of my career opportunities, and not the pharisees in my life, not the nay sayers of my journey, not the critics at my professional sports game that is called my life, the enemies of my tender heart, the one’s that hold the pitchforks and burning tourches as they hold up the magnifying glass to my life and only see the sin and failure and not the why’s or brokenness behind my acts of evil and grossness and immaturity. I want so much. I want all of my dreams, and yet I want none of them. You ever felt that way? I think there is a certain purity in desire, in it’s most innocent state my heart wants to accept what I’ve been given: life. No matter how long or short, it’s no mistake that I’m alive. And even if you believe that there is no fait, destiny, predestination, forsight into the fact that I was once nothing, would become something, and then one day will die and be no more on this planet…it is no mistake that right now I have an opportunity to live, to love, to be loved, to let myself live, and let myself be loved, to do my to do list filled with leedle leedle leedles…with a heart that is both restless and hungry for more and less at the same time. Maybe I should stop writing and get my list of leedles done, maybe I should throw out the list, maybe I should smile because I have a gift called life, and no matter what this is good, what I do with it might not be, that is uncertain, but what is certain is it’s staring me in the face, and the clock is ticking away day by day, and I can sit and stare at my list, throw it away, but either way I need to live, or at the very least enjoy procrastinating, and offically just call it rest…even if it is just a label to make me feel better about doing nothing. Honestly procrastination is very healthy for me, I work way to hard. My biggest fear is that one day I will be on my death bed or I’ll be sitting at my lovely wife’s death bed, and I’ll regret being so busy and not enjoying the gift that is my wife enough. Either way, I do have a prayer, a prayer of surrender about all this ramblings tonight. God/King/Father/Jesus/Holy Spirit/Lover of MY Soul/ Forgiver of my Sins/Graceful Great One/Daddy I pray, help me know I don’t have to have it all figured out on this rainy night in the city of Berkeley, CA, help me lay tenderly in your compassion. Help me fall madly in love with you, and help me fall out of love with myself (at least with the self focus that I seem to be so wrapped up in) let me work hard, because you gave me work, but let me rest and not slap you in the face with my discontentment. Save me from myself and my generation, save me from my own damaged brought on my by “20′s”, save me from feeling like to matter I must be something other than who you want me to be, or accomplish something other than just “being yours”…Heavenly Father help me not procrastinate, yet if I do procrastinate, let me procrastinate doing the things that are mere distractions and will lead me away from you, and let my a.d.d. draw my attention to the things that will bring my heart to rest in you, that my only hearts desire and cry might be for my dad, my Dad who loves me, likes me, dreams bigger dreams for me than i do, or like B. Manning says, expects more failure from me than I do, who haunts me with compassion and desires of growth, Oh Jesus, sweet Jesus, thank you for not procrastinating in loving me, like I procrastinate in loving you.

Amen.

Thanks for reading ya’ll.

Till tomorrow or a year and a half from now when i remember that i have a blog.

David Leo Schultz

For you Ben

A buddy said to me a few weeks, maybe a month, ago that if I wrote a blog, he'd read it...or maybe he said he might read it.

I brushed it off. I think when I was in college I think I thought I had something important to say, and the older I get, I don't know that I have anything to say. For me insight, is like sitting indian style at a campfire. I am mezmorized at the combustion of flames, the warmth that scortches my forehead, the ash and sparks and crackles that spit out at me...but I don't know or understand necessarily what fire is, how fire works, but I am thankful for fire, I need fire, and I can't think of my life without fire and what that has provided to my life and the civilization in which I find myself, and what specifically a campfire has meant to my life...the nostalgia of summer camp...church camp...great talks...prayer...communion with God...and contemplation. I only know what fire is to me, for better or worse. I am a mere spectator to fire. That's how I feel about my perspective about life, nothing more. So if I do continue this blog...(no guarantees since i discovered that apparently i did start a blog once almost a year and a half ago...and forgot about it)...than I can offer nothing more than my persepective, my thoughts, and my "insights"...but something in me does want to do this...and my buddy ben mentioning this...started a fire in my mind, heart, and soul to do this. Maybe it's cuz I'm a verbal processor and this will help me in my journey to live, journey to experience, journey to live with my eyes open versus closed, journey to wake up versus be asleep, journey to live versus just survive...either way I'll do it from time to time...check in...disagree...write me off as a Jesus freak, a nobody, a half hearted artist wannabe, a struggling actor, a hypocrite, a dreamer, a wishful thinker, a sinner, a saint, an idiot, a jerk, too mean and too sensitive, a bad speller, a writer?...more like a rambler...but one description that has haunted me almost every day that I've been alive is that I'm loved by God, not a nice love, not a sunday school love, but a angry love...a love that kicks down the door...knocks out the bad guy...kisses the girl...smokes a cigarette type of love...a bad ass love that see's through masks, doesn't give answers as much as faith type of love...but gives an embrace that even my pecimisim and self absorbtion and doubts can't ignore...as Brennan Manning once said (and I might get this paraphrase wrong) if you don't know God's name as compassion you might not know him.

I have inner faith friends and family that are every religion you can think of from Pagans, to wiccans, to buddists, to mormons, to religious christians to authentic christians. And I love them all, dearly and truly. I don't agree. A stinging truth that I must say in love is that I do believe Jesus is the one and only way, and I believe we all have faith, and as much faith as it takes me to say that Jesus is the only way, might be the same faith that an Athesist perspective would say there is no God. Either way, I hope, no matter where you can come from, that for a brief few minutes you could find a home for 5 or ten minutes or so as you read this blog...It won't always be comfortable, maybe it will down right piss you off at times...but maybe just maybe no matter your belief system, that you could find an inkling of encouragment, and inkling of compassion, and sensing of truth that goes beyond my rambling words...or if nothing else maybe you could just sit indian style and view the reckless fire that is stirring within my heart and mind for a few minutes, than get up and move on and wonder what all that was about.

Thanks for reading.

Be God's,

David Leo Schultz

p.s. i know the spelling and grammar is bad, but frankly i don't have that much time to write, so enjoy the raw and the humbling messiness of my writing.