Week 17/18: Some Day, Somebody Will Care
and that somebody will be you
Someday somebody will care—and that somebody will be you.
I wrote that at 21, thinking of me at 17, hoping the work I hadn’t done yet would be worth it. I started writing poetry at 16, a cryptic language for my future self to decipher. Over the next decade, my life shattered across the world—from San Francisco to New York, Edinburgh to the Philippines—until someone helped me piece it all back together.
I haven’t written a newsletter in a while because New York was a crucible, as it always is. It’s one of the hardest places to exist in, and even more so expensive, but yet it refines one and gives a them a grit, tenacity, and wherewithal to resiliently go forth and suck a little less.
I got sick during my stay there, and had to perform anyways, because when you don’t know if anyone’s gonna show up, the one thing you can count on, is you showing up. It was rainy and windy and I was in bed all day, and yet I trudged forward through the mean weather with my co-producer Sean.
I got on stage around 1050 PM and performed my testimony, despite feeling as if I would fall asleep at any moment. It was our first show that only included non-believers, and I didn’t feel like I was connecting. Of course, I could make the excuse that I was sick and tired, but intimacy is not dependent on good feeling.
I knew there was a deeper place to go with the story I was telling and that I was missing the mark. And so I rewrote the show, which usually happens when the story isn’t compelling, and when it ceases to be true. While the story I was telling may have been true within the walls of the church, the question I was no answering was something deeper than, “Why Jesus?”
It became, “Why keep telling jokes at all?”
Our show is called, “Faith in the Hope of the Absurd,” which is a reference to Kierkegaard and the idea that infinite resignation moves into the realm of the absurd, which defies logic. Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice the miracle that Lord provided is only made more profound/ ironic when coupled with the fact that “Isaac” means “laughter”.
Here I was, ready to sacrifice the thing most dear to my heart, stand-up comedy.
And I was ready, because I had left it time and time again, and honestly, had no idea how to continue moving forward and having faith in the hope of the absurd.
Sean and I also bonded over our shared readership of “The Cost of Discipleship” by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, which posits, “obey and faith will follow”. And so I continued to obey the call of the Lord, which meant rewriting the show despite my tired sickness, and telling the truth of why I keep going back to stand-up comedy.
I talked about the years of comparing myself to others which culminated into the idolization of my peers, behemoths created by a mind searching for connection, waiting to be torn down by the God who loves me more than I can ever love myself. I talked about the tragic death of someone I looked up to, put on a pedestal, only to see them torn down, leaving me in the wake to continue forward without a competitor to copy moves from.
I’ll never be able to compete with the man I thought was the funniest, the friend I thought was coolest, or the mentor I was thought was smartest, because we we’re all on the same team. I was just too busy comparing myself to notice.
Someday somebody will care—and that somebody is Jesus. You’ll never love yourself as much as He does. You don’t have to.
PPDK is going through a massive rebrand. The main rebrand is that I’m the brand, or at least, the one who needs to carry the torch until we become a collective. I’m continuing the rest of the tour alone, and I’m returning back to UCLA tomorrow, in order to present a 10 year retrospective on a deep and abiding question, “Why keep telling jokes at all?”
Let all of my story be used for His Glory/ Let all of my Pain be used for His Purpose/ Let all of my Name be bringing Him Fame/ Let all of my Work be Turned into Worship
Servants of God must stand so much alone that they never know they are alone. In the first phase of Christian life, disheartenments come. People who are bright lights for us flicker out; those who stand with us pass away. We have to get used to this—so used to it that no matter what happens, we never feel we are standing alone.
“Everyone deserted me… But the Lord stood at my side” (2 Timothy 4:16–17). We must build our faith on the light that never fails, not on the light that fades. When “great” men and women go, we are sad— until we see that they were meant to go, and that the only thing that remains is looking on the face of God for ourselves.
Oswald Chambers, “My Utmost”
Next up: UCLA, Orlando, Winnipeg, Florida.
I also have lots of live shows and rebranding coming up.
Find out more here, and see some of our past work:
Follow me on all social media: @ppdkproductions
I’ve been hashing a lot of new concepts and brainstorming with the team about how to move forward.
If you want to support the tour, consider making a one time contribution here:
buymeacoffee.com/ppdkproductions
You can also make a recurring donation by subscribing to PPDK Productions, which you’re currently reading. We’re telling stories about how to live a life well-lived.
Here are four Google Docs containing four full length scripts to shows I've performed:
1) My Hilarious Testimony - https://docs.google.com/.../1FnlQpTnDLsFxL43nVaip.../edit...
2) Nathan Mosher is Injured - https://docs.google.com/.../1b6xnYulzWMESLXI8VCfq.../edit...
3) "Who Would You Be if You Weren't Afraid of Suffering?" - Ep. 1 of Nathanael Philip Mosher Has Friends - https://docs.google.com/.../1fxF4C5K7XjvWMOoreYFg.../edit...
4) "What is Fun To You?" - Ep. 2 of Nathanael Philip Mosher Has Friends - https://docs.google.com/.../1rC8DiWiZREIoViBawmtk.../edit...
Sincerely Yours,
Nathanael Philip Abad Mosher
AKA The Paraprosdokianist
"Paraprosdokian + journalist" = "Paraprosdokianist" Or: one who pens journalistic columns of paraprosdokians. Paraprosdokian: Greek for "against expectation" a rhetorical device in which the second part of the phrase makes you re-evaluate the meaning of the first, otherwise known as a one-liner or turn of phrase, joke, lyric, proverb, parable, quote, wise saying, or piece of life itself summarized in the shortest unit of story resulting in: one's expectations being upheld, subverted, affording one a renewed perspective and sense of compassion.
We want your story. Please connect with us. If you want to see a collection of stories we’ve told, go to our website: ppdkproductions.com