UnderOath

Quote

Oct 11, 2006 - we hurt the ones we love the most. - Timmy

Hello from Australia! I just wanted to drop you guys a line and let you all know we're still alive and well half way across the world. We've been on tour for about 5 days now and so far it has been one of the best tours we've ever done. All of the bands are amazing people, and the shows have been insane. It usually takes a few weeks for a tour to get into it's full swing, but by day three it felt like we've been on tour for months together. There's so much to talk about and such a small little entry to fit it all in. When we were in New Zealand, our friend Rowan took us to what him and his friends called "the cove". It was a small inlet on the side of a mountain with cliffs that led right into the Pacific. We had an amazing day of meat pies, cliff jumping, hot tubbing and a family dinner to top it all off. It was a definite top 3 best days of tour ever. The show in Auckland was amazing. We've never been to New Zealand or Australia, so to see the reactions we've been getting and the support you guys have been giving us has been amazing. Australia has been an amazing time as well. Our friends Thursday are on the Australian leg of the tour and they will be missed when it is over. They are some of the best dudes ever. Geoff will be singing with us during one song the rest of the way through Australia. It's been a great honor to have a dude that we've loved and respected for so long as a musician and a person to be on stage with our little band halfway across the world. I never would have thought we would ever be over here under such wonderful conditions. I have been reading a book by Donald Miller lately called To Own A Dragon. It is about people growing up with out fathers and the effects it has on kids psychologically and how that can skew a child's world view and view of God as not just a creator but a father. Although I have never not had a dad around for the most part, something he touched on has truly impacted me. He speaks of his lack of a father in life translating over to his view of Christ. Because his father was never around it was hard to imagine some big invisible "dad" being any different, until he realized that God is so much bigger than all of our worldly versions of love. He spoke of a child being born, and a man touching and kissing a woman, a father loving his son..and so on and so forth not being direct representations of Christ's love for us but rather a small glimpse at something far greater. This has hit me from two different angles...one being that we as christians need to stop looking at other people, our parents and girlfriends/boyfriends to fill the gap in our hearts for a love that we are not capable of manifesting as humans. We must grasp that the hell that we are put through by our loved ones isn't a representation of God at all, but rather a flawed conditional love that is self serving at times. When we see and embrace this truth it will allow us to forgive one another and more importantly, forgive God for things we've held against him in which he had no part of. God loves us unconditionally and perfectly...we must not forget that. Secondly, the fact that we know that that the way we are loving and treating (or mistreating) people in our lives is inadvertently reflecting Christ's love for each of us. We are the closest thing our girls, kids, parents and friends have to seeing the true selfless love that is spoken about in the bible manifested in a tangible form, and that is a huge responsibility. Most of the people I meet that are bitter at Christ or the church aren't bitter at the belief of a creator that loves us and looks out for us, but the direct connection between the creator and the asshole christians that have beaten them down all of their life. WE are christ to so many people,and although we will never be able to truly represent that love we must acknowledge that this responsibility is ours to constantly strive for until we depart from this life. I've hurt so many of the people that I love the most as of late, and in turn probably put up some unneeded mountains in their relationship with Christ. I don't ever want to do that again. If we could learn this simple truth we would see a revolutionary love and sense of community within the church, and beyond it, that we have never seen before....why are we still killing each other then?

Divine_Intervention:

Yeah...Tim is the extream Christain. He is like the type of relgious person that would take the bible word for word, I think. Nothing aganst that but it can cause problems with taking in the world as it is. Spencer was doing something that he didnt believe in so he started hating him. I think the rest of the guys were mad at him because it is some that they are just aganst doing, but not because it says you shouldnt do it in the bible...idk but thats my thoughts about it