The Matchbook Diaries
This is the explanation in great detail of why I created this website, why beauty matters so much to me, as well as one way to get to your own beauty. These diaries articulate spiritual redemption as I understand the process.
These diaries articulate redemption as I have experienced it in my life. My passion for beauty and my need to express the specific beauty that I value is a product of my God-given nature and the events that shaped my life. Mine is a story of Christianity, abuse, and redemption.
With a bad story, the temptation is to draw attention to it in a bid for help, justification, sympathy, or just any kind of attention. People exist who, no matter where they are, just can’t wait to work the conversation around to their own history, and then to discuss intimate CONTINUE >
One facet of the multidimensional pain carried around by any victim is the humiliating injustice of paying for what was done to you whilst the predator mocks you, repeats the crime, lives in luxurious insobriety, or, worst of all, has forgotten all about you. No matter what, they don’t give CONTINUE >
Emotional pain is an excellent motivator. It can make a woman stick a needle of street drugs into her vein for the first time. Pain can make her overeat until she is 100 pounds over her ideal weight; it can make her marry, and stay married, to someone CONTINUE >
Either faith is big enough to accommodate problems like mine or God’s not real. Faith can’t be precious, polite, or dainty. Faith is not an accessory nor is it a hobby. Either it’s everything or don’t waste your time. If God is, then there should be a way to use CONTINUE >
Look at how God handles choice.
So, picture this….. you’re God the Creator. You, in immaculate joy, spin off life in infinite variety (plants, animals, every organic thing) and then, ultimately, audaciously, you make two mirror images of yourself. Now there are two versions of you that exist apart from you, CONTINUE >
The streets of heaven are purported to be paved with gold, which speaks to the nonvalue of gold in a selfless economy. The streets of this place are paved with God’s children, which speaks to the prevalence of evil in the world.
The soul requires meaningful work and satisfying rest. Meaningful CONTINUE >
Self-defense doesn’t actually add to my value. Insisting that someone yield to me on the sidewalk, or whilst driving, or in a queue, these offensive moves do not actually accumulate the feeling of value I mean for them to purchase for me. Victims are very vulnerable to this mistaken form CONTINUE >