Working the Angles

I'm not particularly passionate about politics. I don't trust them. However, I do believe in responsible citizenship as an important part of faith in Christ ("give to Caesar...") So with all the hubbub around the presidential election (which bubbled up over two years ago!), I decided to do some research and invited Facebook friends to offer some view points.

One friend pointed me to another discussion already shared. I found it some of the talk to be a wonderfully succinct distinction between Republican and Democratic motives. It helped me clarify some of the broad brushstrokes of the two primary parties. With permission, I've included it here:

"It’s ultimately a difference of world view. The reason Republicans and Democrats have such a hard time talking to each other is they have such different narratives about what’s important and how the world should work – and both world views are pretty self-consistent once you’re inside them. It’s just like a devout person and an atheist trying to have a conversation about religion – far from being able to convince the other of the truth of one’s viewpoint, they quickly find it almost impossible to even understand what each other are saying because their world views are just built on entirely different foundations.

The Republican narrative is of the independent and self-supporting individual with traditional old-fashioned values. If you buy into this narrative then you resist government regulation of industry because it restricts the entrepreneurs & markets which make our economy go and diminishes the freedom and ability of individuals to achieve that independent and self-supporting American dream. You’re not particularly worried about the effect of industry on the environment or society because mostly the free market will devise good solutions anyway before there’s too much of a problem, and you resist taxation – especially of businesses and their owners – because it fuels the government regulation (tampering with market forces) of which you disapprove because it slows our economy and job-creation and obstructs the free markets which could actually solve our problems better than big government, and tends to fund a culture of dependence which is at odds with your self-supporting values. You worry that the decay of traditional values as the basis for our society would in time erode and destroy it, and are therefore more than happy to turn to religious values as a blueprint for shoring up our civil society. Finally from the independent & self-supporting narrative comes your foreign policy of aggressively knocking down threats from the outside world – and resisting an unrestricted flow of immigrants who would in essence steal the advantages of our society from us without earning their place in it and by not sharing our traditional American values might undermine them.

The Democratic narrative is of members of the community supporting each other, and the idea that ultimately the community must come first before any particular individual. From this ultimate value springs your tolerance for government regulation because it prevents entrepreneurs and industries from getting out of hand, making profits for individuals at the community’s expense, especially by passing along hidden environmental or social costs to the community at large while pocketing a short term gain. You’re willing to be taxed because this is “paying your share” of the community upkeep, and think the wealthier and more successful members of the community (in particular rich business owners) should be paying a proportionately larger share – and the slower growth of business and markets which inevitably results you see as more than made up for by the social benefits. Out of your narrative of community also comes a sense of indignation when one segment of the community profits at the expense of another or sets itself up as dominant over another: this leads both to your championing of minority causes large and small and your resistance to one society group’s “traditional values” (even if it is the majority group) being elevated over another’s. Traditional values often sound arbitrary and non-rational, and should be allowed gradually to erode and be replaced by the wisdom of the community – through science and research when possible. Possibly you also perceive yourself as a member of one or more disadvantaged or minority groups, whether racial, religious, gender, or otherwise, which leads you both to be more willing to discard some or many traditional American values (since they aren’t yours), and to identify with the struggles of other similarly disadvantaged groups.

The narrative of the community also extends to foreign policy, where you see it as most important to make friends in the world community (even sometimes at the expense of our short term interests). And you see potential immigrants as fellow members of the world community who deserve a chance to succeed as much as we do and who would contribute productively to our society if only given that chance.

Try to put yourself inside of either world view and you’ll find it pretty self consistent. And both of the ultimate foundations (valuing the individual and valuing the community) are attractive ideals which have been with us for a long time. The rest of the political scene is just an ongoing power struggle between those two camps – in particular the propaganda battle to attract the “swing voters”, the ones who are either sufficiently torn between the two world views (e.g. the atheist wealthy business owner, the devout environmentalist) to be influenced or haven’t thought enough about their world views to have picked a side and can perhaps be swayed by slogans, feel-good appeals, etc." ~ Brian Reynolds of Baltimore

The Best Policy

“Your second year is harder than your first.”

This is what a close friend said to my wife and I when he and his wife asked how married life was going. I was not at all irritated for what might seem like a harsh or jaded forecast. He did not say it as one who pretended to know everything about marriage. He simply spoke as one who had walked the trail a while and who loved us enough to speak the truth. In fact, I loved my friend more for saying it.

Honesty is a rare commodity. Or perhaps it is not so much rare as it is neglected. Unspoken truths can pile up like dusty boxes, cluttering our hearts.

Mostly, helpful honesty goes unspoken because “I don’t want to hurt their feelings.” It is very easy to confuse “I’m hurting them” with the more accurate notion, “The truth can hurt”. But that’s just the thing: the truth is true no matter how we feel telling it. The hurt of honesty can be the antiseptic sting of cleaning a wound. If you see your sister harming herself because she has not weighed the consequences of her actions or because she simply is unaware of how her actions are hurting others, shouldn’t something be said regardless of her reaction? If it were you, wouldn’t you want to know?

People are afraid of honesty’s sting, however, because it can most certainly become a weapon when not employed in a spirit of love or in concern for another’s welfare. I knew one person who refused to restrain his harmful opinions about others with the throw-away phrase, “Well, I’m just being honest.” Actually, he was being opinionated, unkind, and rude. It was not spoken to offer to help but harm. But at the same time, no one called him on it.

When one is on the receiving end of honesty (even the constructive kind), often one immediately feels attacked. A common, knee-jerk reaction to honesty is to defend oneself. Criticism threatens something important to us and we naturally rush to shield it from harm. Honesty moves directly toward our emotional treasures and we are left little time to react. Instinct usually takes over and we simply brace for impact. So again, we are afraid to deal in it.

And yet, honesty can be a tool of profound freedom. Honesty sheds light and opens the shutters into one's heart. It reveals things hidden from view. The absence of honesty is obscurity. Dishonesty breeds obscurity in that it blurs or distorts the truth. Our perception of a given subject is shaped by how honest or dishonest we are about the matter. Unhappiness in marriage persists because of a lack of honest communication that confesses hurt and a refusal to receive news of harm we have caused. Without that honesty, things fester, become infected until the sinew and tissue are damaged of one's marriage feels beyond repair. Nothing left to do but amputate. Honesty has the power to wipe away obscurity; to clean out the infection. And with that better information gained from improved vision, we are more prepared to weather the difficulties.

Of course, the effectiveness of honesty is directly proportionally to one’s willingness to receive it. As I said before, the instinctive reaction to honesty is defense. However, when we trust someone enough to know that their assessment is not meant in cruelty but shared in a spirit of love and concern, we can slow down enough to receive their thoughts as a gift. If you had something hanging from your nose or you were experiencing a revealing wardrobe malfunction that you had yet to notice, would you not want your friend to be direct enough to (privately) draw your attention to the oversight? Or would you get offended that they noticed what was glaringly obvious to everyone else in the room?

Perhaps the most difficult honesty to handle is being honest with oneself; to be willing to look in the mirror and accept what is there, both the well-groomed parts and the hidden warts and defects we hide from the world. As Christians, this is a fundamental practice (we call it "reflection"), not only for our brothers and sisters in the faith, but for our own spiritual well-being as well. We must be willing to be honest enough with our short-comings to acknowledge our deepest need for Jesus. Until we are, why bother with Jesus at all?

It is no throw-away title when Jesus calls himself “the Way, the Truth and the Life.” Jesus’ life is punctuated by moments of blunt, yet life giving honesty. He is not afraid to tell the Pharisees how their legalistic religiosity has imprisoned the lives of the people in spiritual check-lists and not freed them to live with God (Matthew 23:1-7). The admonition to “take the log out of your own eye” is done so that “you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.” (Matt. 7:3) We are Jesus to one another when we tell the truth in love.

Any life-giving freedom born from honesty is a testimony to Jesus, Himself, and the freedom He longs to give from all the forms of sin and death. Jesus defeats anything that imprisons. He removes any obscurity or dishonesty that seeks to undo. “For freedom Christ has set us free,” says Paul. Once we can become more comfortable with being honest with ourselves, we can accept Jesus’ honest criticism of the things we continue to do that keep us away from knowing Him more. Because Jesus wants to give us freedom, He points His finger at the things we need to change (not necessarily a change from bad to good, but also good to better!). Jesus’ brand of honesty is never about harming, but pruning the dead places to make room for more life and growth. And once we’ve learned how from Jesus’ gracious hand, we’ll find the courage and freedom to share the gift of constructive honesty with those around us.

I’m glad our friend loved us enough to speak the truth about marriage. And I know that, whatever trials may away us, we are more prepared for our second year of marriage because of it.

I am often amused at the ways followers of Jesus try to “Christianize” some of the most absurd things. I once owned a small tin of “Testamints”: powerful tiny breath mints with a Bible verse on the wrapper. T-shirts and refrigerator magnets are popular places to present passages of Scripture. One of my favorites is the “Buddy Christ”: a Jesus action-figure who has a big smile on his face and is giving you the thumbs-up.

But what are we saying about the Gospel when we equate Jesus with toys? Can the story of God, Creator of the entire universe, manifest in Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world, be contained on the side of a box of breath mints or a fish on the back of a car? While such instances make me smile, it also makes me concerned to have the hope of the world reduced to bite-sized form.

I don’t think such things are necessarily evil (I own a t-shirt that says “Jesus is my Homeboy”!) The modern tendency in our busy lives is to rush through the Jesus-thing. The assumption is that slapping the name of Jesus on something, like a bumper sticker, automatically makes it something that is worth God’s time or gives Him glory. Busy-ness rears its ugly head, prayers get rushed, sick and lonely people go unvisited, all the while trusting He’ll be the kind of parent that will gush with pride no matter what shoddy work we thrust His way.

C.S. Lewis is attributed as once saying that the world doesn’t need more Christian writers, but more good writers that are Christian. I do believe Jesus gratefully receives any sincere offering we humbly lay before Him. There’s no chart that says your gift must be “this” good (which is good news since the world wants nothing more than to compare how “good” you are to others). But should His graciousness excuse us from giving Christ our absolute best? Shouldn’t Jesus be our first commitment instead of receiving only the leftovers of our time and energy? Doesn’t this mean that we can glorify God when we teach, repair, cook, farm, help customers, stock shelves, write sermons, drive trucks to the very best of your abilities?

I was in the marching band in high school. Whenever we performed our entire show from start to finish (at practice, a football game, competition, etc.), the director held a stopwatch. If he liked what he saw and heard, he’d run the stopwatch. As soon as something was done incorrectly, he would stop it, starting it again when the show was good. So at the end of the show, he would tell us how much time we had accumulated. We might win trophies in our competition or not, but the only score we really cared about was whether we’d all performed well enough to receive a higher time. We weren’t concerned with how we matched up to the other bands (at least, not much) but with beating ourselves. As Christian, shouldn’t we too be striving to present a better offering to our God; the very best we have?

The writer in Hebrews got this notion when he challenged his readers: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.” Jesus demonstrates a life in which He gave everything to do the will of His Father, the best he could. We certainly don’t have to be Jesus. But if he gave everything to love and save us, shouldn’t we try as hard we can too?

One Last Night

Every Wednesday morning, about a dozen men gather around a table to eat a substantial breakfast and bow their heads together. Laughter and fellowship is had over the food. Then more serious conversations arises concerning names: the names of people suffering from stage 3 cancer, the debilitating effects of MS, or coping as best they can with the death of their mother. There's never a shortage of names. Usually there are more than the previous week. Every Wednesday, they talk about death and the people who daily stare it in the face. And together, they humbly listen for God in each other's prayers, for comfort, guidance and hope.

It's hard to stand up from such a table and not have some day-dream about your own untimely demise. You wonder how you would react if a lingering headache turned into the blindsiding pronouncement that you have a brain tumor. Or if an upset stomach turned into an unexpected heart attack. So many of the names we pray for are curled up in bed with time-bombs, waiting for the morning when their legs refuse to slide out of bed.

Mostly, we healthy folk take for granted the days we are able to grumble at the alarm clock, then bathe, feed and go to the bathroom without assistance from someone else. But I wonder what we would do if we knew death was around the corner, perhaps even tomorrow. What would we do with our last hours? Try to do dinner with those we love most and put into words years of unspoken affection and gratitude? Attempt to accomplish those goals we kept putting off because we were just "too busy"?

Jesus did what He always did: love and serve those around him.

"...Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. ... during supper Jesus...got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him..." (John 13:1-5, NRSV)

There Jesus sat with a dozen men around a table. I can't imagine there wasn't laughter and fellowship over dinner. But more serious matters rose when the doomed Son of God stands to take off his robe in order to clothe himself in humility.

I've heard it said that we should live each day as if it were our last. This isn't a proposal to daily think about death but instead, to think about life and how we live each day, quieting the conversation long enough to listen for God's voice.

I always stand from the table thinking of myself. Christ's stands thinking of the others. Would it take the threat of death before we began loving and serving those around us as we always meant to do?

Or are we just too busy?

Moving Day

It was surreal watching the room dissolve around us. There we sat in my dear friend’s living room, casually chatting about ministry and the church, about our lives and relationships, as movers plucked vases from shelves and lamps from tables and walked out of the room. The careful arrangement of pictures and furniture that formed the fabric of what my friend and his wife called “home” unraveled, the movers gently pulling the dangling string. All the threads were being gathered that they would be woven into another home in another state.

Think of your own home and how it is decorated: shreds of memory behind glass frames, sofas and Laz-E-boys positioned just so, specific paint colors slapped here and curtains hung there, all to transform wood, walls and windows into something more than the timbers, metal and nails. It’s the moment that a house (a lifeless structure) turns into a home (a dwelling of living people). We carefully arrange all these things to optimize our comfort and security or rearrange them periodically to get a sense of newness. Then there are the piles of letters/laundry/tools/boxes that clutter countertops, floors and basements but we don’t mind too much because we’re used to it. It’s all part of the system. The end-result reflects our personalities and tastes: sloppy or tidy, bold solid colors or mismatched. But more importantly, it is a safe place; our place that we daydream about at work, where we feel at rest.

I think about those who are suffering from the floods in the Midwest, or wildfires in California, or the big quake in China, and wonder about their homes (or what’s left of them). I wonder what they call home now or if they have any place to retreat for safety.

“Security” has become the household catchphrase in the months since 9/11 (which left many houses emptier than before). If you’ve traveled by plane in the last several months, you’ve certainly endured the tedious delay of long lines and the time it takes to swab your luggage’s zippers and test it for explosive chemicals. While I can’t imagine it doesn’t do some good, are we really more “secure” from the dozens of other threats to our lives that (unlike the photo we want to hang in the living room) we have absolutely no control over?

One of the hard realities of life on this planet is that any of our carefully arranged bits of our lives that prop us up and protect us from sadness and grief can be yanked away at any moment. Our houses and expensive stuff. Our memory, health and hobbies. Or most scary, our loved ones.

How then can we do anything else but learn how to lean solely on Jesus, the Rock, which can never be taken? Doing so means we cannot put our faith in the lives we’ve made for ourselves but for the one that Christ alone can give us. We have but to lean on Him, like a child wailing into his mother’s lap, like a soldier with a wounded leg, like weeping in a friend’s solid hug. Then we’ll find that our home is not really in anything we can touch but woven entirely in the fabric of unmovable presence of God; a home build with the wood and nails of Christ’s tree and founded on the undefeatable power of the resurrection.

“The LORD is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge,
my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.” ~Psalm 18:2

Quote of the Day

"Perhaps it is our nature to die, not our right. Maybe we have the ability, to kill, to make things dead, even ourselves, but we haven't the right. And when we exercise that ability, in the name of God (as we have done in war), or of Justice (as we have done with capital punishment), or of Choice (as we have done with abortion), we should have the good sense to recognize it for what it isn't: enlightenment, civilization, progress, mercy. Nor is it an inalienable right. It is, rather, a shame, a sadness, a peril from which no congress's legislation, no churchman's dispensation, no public opinion or conventional wisdom can ever deliver us. For if we live in a world where birth is suspect, where the value of life is relative, and death is welcomed and well-regarded, we live in a world vastly more shameful, abundantly sadder, and ever more perilous than all the primitive generations of our species before us who were sufficiently civilized to fill with wonder at the birth of new life, dance with the living, and weep for the dead."

~Thomas Lynch, "The Undertaking: Life Studies from the Dismal Trade"

Broken Mountains and Bows

“Change is the one thing in life that is certain…” – Anonymous

Ask this of one of the dozens of families from the Midwest who’ve lost everything in one of the many tornadoes in the last weeks, or one of the 5 million Chinese people left homeless by the earthquake, whether or not this statement is true, and you will probably get a disillusioned nod.

There is real security in a predictable life. It’s never the things you plan for that shrinks your savings account but the water heater going out during your shower, the unavoidable car crash, the emergency surgery, that comes from left field and catches you and your wallet off-guard. Divorce would certainly happen less if people didn’t change as they grow up.

But it always happens: change. Reality on our globe never sits still. Things that were there one moment are gone the next; jobs, health, love and loved ones. The landscape is always…changing.

And yet our instinct clinches down on these fleeting anchors anyway, desperately looking for purchase and security. Because anchors can hold us fast in life-threatening storms. But then when the anchor breaks away, we flail in the tempest, on the verge of drowning. Certainties are ripped away, leaving us soaked and lost.

But our God doesn’t play by those rules.

“God is our refuge and strength,
an ever present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea…”

Unaffected by our storms, both great and small, our God is unchanging in His utter dependability.

“The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.”

The reality of God’s power and love (greater than our broken earthly one) always wins in the end. The Psalmists are so good at reminding us that we can face any tragedy of human life (full of the kinds of grief and loss that words cannot capture) only if we let God be the Stronghold that He is. If we would simply

“Be still and know that He is God…

“Be still and know that He is…

Be still and know…

Be still…

Be

From Psalm 46

Help us, Isaiah....

Hope is a frightening thing.

It opens the door to the things we want most. It pulls back the bits of carefully-placed armor that shields our deepest and most sacred longings and exposes them to injury.

Skepticism is a far more practical approach to life:
Fewer disappointments and shattered dreams to clean up. It keeps you in touch with the needs of survival and reality. It's an all-around safer way to live.

I know kung-fu....

Not really. But as I watched the students under the jovial yet watchful eye of their Sifu (Master), I wanted to learn.

But the fact is, I know kung-fu about as well as I can identify the actual animal used in sweet-and-sour pork. However, I'm counting on the unique advantage that comes with ignorance: a blank slate. An empty cup.

"Hungry, I come to you for I know you satisfy
I am empty, but I know your love does not run dry.
So I wait for you. So I wait for you..."

... says the worship song. An honest psalm of despair and trust (interesting, how one often precedes the other).

Modern faith convinces on fixing ourselves. Who needs God when your hope is in human ability. Legend has it, that Ben Franklin, enlightened and lettered statesman/scientist of his Revolutionary day, attempted to mend his own character flaws by dedicating each week to repairing one of his broken virtues. He would perfect one and move on to another, only to find that after a short time, he needed to revisit the first one again. Certainly no surprise there for anyone who has sought to live a "good life".

And yet, God seems more interested in our availability than our abilities; a humble willingness as opposed to prideful prowess.

For you have no delight in sacrifice;
if I were to give a burnt offering, you would not be pleased.
The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
~ Psalm 51:16-17

Vroom! Vroom!

I don’t understand. People laugh when I tell them that motorcycling is a religious experience.

Spring brings with it an abundance of new life. From the view atop Bent Mountain, looking down into the Roanoke Valley, I’m filled with wonder watching fingers of lime green creep up the slopes day by day. Before you know it, they’ll be overrun. Flowers are already defying last week’s frost and the sunshine thaws the earth from its wintery freeze. And the motorcycles begin waking up from their long hibernation.

Many people do not understand why some of their fellow mortals would dare such a reckless hobby. One thing they teach you in the “New Rider Training” program is that there are two elements to riding that sets it apart from driving: balance and protection. In a car, the seat cradles your entire frame, like a giant’s hand, suspended between four wheels that keep you stable on terra firma. On the motorcycle, you are responsible for remaining oriented right-side up to gravity, whether in motion, braking or standing at a stop light. In a car, you are surrounded by layers of steel and metal. On the bike, you are entirely responsible for whatever flesh you choose to expose to the elements and (if the worse should happen), the pavement.

Needless to say, there’s extra work involved piloting a motorcycle. It requires at least five additional minutes of preparation to put on all the armor of leather gloves, reinforced jacket and donning the brain bucket (doubly so when you have glasses) and then to do a once over to make sure lights and brakes in working order. Then once you pull out, staying upright means vigilantly watching for gravel, oil slicks and road-kill to spring up around a corner, negotiating turns at the proper lean angle, and staying balanced as you stop. This is to say nothing about negotiating the other drivers who aren’t accustom to looking for you or the drivers that are practically sitting on the seat behind you that don’t realize a motorcycle requires about half the distances as a car to come to a halt. (Believe me: for those who laugh when someone says motorcycling is a religious experience, this can do wonders for your prayer life!) Why risk it? It never escapes me every time I saddle up, if things goes south, I’m going to be the one to pay for it, regardless of who is at fault.

Because there is nothing else like it in the world: that’s why. I’ve never considered myself a thrill-junky. But I have yet to experience anything remotely akin to the rush of scenery all-around, the “groove” of a sweeping mountain curve, the exhilaration of the metal hooves pounding you forward just beneath your seat. Roller-coasters and convertibles do all the work for you. But in the extreme concentration of it and exposure to the beauty of the natural elements, you are so deeply connected to the machine that’s launching you along that when you pull in to the safety of your driveway (having defied the statistics and conquered gravity), you do so with a gigantic grin on your face.

So you’ll probably laugh again when I say that the Christian faith is so very much like riding a motorcycle. It is a dangerous, misunderstood trust in Christ that leaves others scratching their heads as to why you bother with such archaic superstitions or unscientific beliefs.

“For the message about the cross
is foolishness to those who are perishing,
but to us who are being saved
it is the power of God.” ~ 1 Corinthians 1:18

It is a way of living life that requires different external apparel and a certain balance with the truth so as to negotiate dangers along the way.

“Therefore take up the whole armor of God,
so that you may be able to withstand on that evil day,
and having done everything, to stand firm.” ~ Ephesians 6:13

And there is no greater joy than joining with Christ in His glorious work of bringing us home.

“Though you have not seen him, you love him;
and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him
and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy,
for you are receiving the goal of your faith,
the salvation of your souls.” ~ 1 Peter 4:13

Religious experience, indeed!

Is it well with my soul?

Lately, I've noticed more and more how often the word "well" gets used in daily conversations. It subconsciously affixes itself to the beginning of most of our sentences.

How was work today, dear?
Well, it was hectic..

Why is it that this word becomes the automatic prelude to any idea or response? If we replayed an audio recording of our day and tallied all the "wells" that sneaked past our teeth, my guess is that we'd be surprised. When you stop and think about the word (the times it is used consciously), it generally denotes a level of contentment or satisfaction with an event, project or one's state of being.

How did the business meeting go today, dear?
It went surprisingly well!

And yet, "well" can attach itself to the beginning of almost any variety of phrase, whether in answer to a question or to continue a conversation; whether it is good news or bad.

What is the prognosis, doctor?
Well, it doesn't look good...

I add it on all the time, whether I'm telling a funny story or talking about cancer. And I do it without thinking. Does tacking on the word give an additional second and a half to formulate what one is going to say next? That makes sense to me.

But why the word "well"? Why not "See" or "Lookie here" or just take a breath? This four-letter word can be a harbinger of dismal news as much as it can characterize peace, almost as if it is actually pointing toward the noun-ish definition instead:

-n.- a pit or hole sunk into the earth to reach a supply of water.

It's ironic that many people might be using this particular image to subconsiously characterize their own life or circumstances rather than convey a sense of peace. Or maybe we grasp at this word, because we'd like some well-ness to affix itself to our circumstances; to let the prelude to our day be to some peace to reach for out the bottom of the pit.

Then again, maybe it is in the darkest pit of death that the waters of baptism spring cool and deep.

Quote of the Day

"I am concerned with a certain way of looking at life that was created in me by the fairy tales, but has since been ratified by the mere facts." G.K. Chesterton


Me too.

A Lonely Desk and Small Hopes

The photo wasn't where I'd left it.

It was a picture of myself and two good friends that I do not get to see often enough. He, a professional, licensed, and rather skilled Christian psychologist. She, beautiful and extremely gifted with young children with a quick wit that lays quietly and then pounces out of the brush like a patient lioness springs after her prey. The psychologist and I are in ties and dress shirts; she in a stunning evening gown as we playfully hold her horizontal across our arms, all of us smiling for the camera. It's a fun memory of a friend's wedding. I'd left the photo in my desk drawer intentionally so I would bump into it often in my hunt for pencils or ibuprofen. But now, it was lying on top of the desk.

Someone else had moved it, just as they'd discarded the tall, slender lamp that usually stood sentry on the end of my desk onto the floor, oddly underneath it, looking like a wounded soldier lying on the field in too much pain to move. Those same hands that displaced these fixtures yanked the neatly tucked bottles of communion wine from cozy sleeves in their box, disemboweled several filing cabinets, helped themselves to some lemon pound cake in the refrigerator and whose sticky fingers are perhaps typing across my laptop keyboard as I peck away on this unfamiliar one.

"I'm sorry you had a rough day," several people shared. I was grateful for their loving and genuine concern. But "rough" wasn't the word I would have used. While certainly I wasn't happy that someone (or "ones") chose to take from me the peaceful morning routine of reading, communiques and sermon preparation I was looking forward to (to play CSI with police investigators, complete with dusting and pictures) or that they thoughtlessly imposed the inconvenience of calling repairmen to restore the broken window in the fellowship hall and filing insurance claims (ironically, the agent had just been robbed too), I wouldn't say I felt "rough" or harried or panicked. I didn't even feel stressed-out about it (although I was certainly tired at the end of the day). I was even a little curious why I didn't feel "violated" or "unsafe" as many testimonies after a theft confess.

As I sat in my chair, picturing some flannel-and-jean clad young men anxiously rifling through my space, heard their dull-witted delight at finding the stash of wine, mused on why they moved the baptismal font off the chancel to the front doors of the sanctuary, imagined them sprinting down the hall of the church with their loot, I found myself feeling sadness; sadness for the small hope that looks forward to nothing bigger than $30 in cash, a tablecloth full of wine bottles and a laptop after the prime of its life. If indeed, the glory of God is a life well-lived (as Irenaeus said), I grieve their loss that comes with such little gains.

I don't miss the laptop. But I do miss everything it represented: connectivity to friends and years of meaningful correspondence, its long memory of class notes and papers, sermons and Sunday school lessons; how it was a launch pad for new words and ideas and a vehicle for entertainment through games and movies. Of course pastors and friends have been functioning well for centuries without them. Nothing replaces face-to-face or even voice-to-voice, not even (most especially!) e-mail. But perhaps for my generation, there is some shadow of community; some small awareness that through these plastic boxes, at the other end of thousands of miles of fiber optic cable, are real breathing human beings that mean something to

Post-Script: I discovered a dear friend's church also fell prey to hungry hands. His reflection offers profound illumination into our church's activity. Check it out here.

Picture Albums and Home Videos: Anecdotes of a Forgotten Past

I'm in a paradox about that oft-used/oft-abused instrument of preachers, the anecdote. I confess publicly now my own over-trained cynicism that comes second nature as I sit on the other side of someone else's pulpit some Sunday I'm out of my own. And I cannot help but start taking notes about how they do things, their method and technique (i.e., manuscript or free form, narrative or 3 point style, etc). And one thing I always seem sure to note is if they fall prey to the great cover-up: telling some story or anecdote or joke at the beginning in an effort to "break the ice" or "warm up the crowd". In other words, to entertain.

Sadly I fail to remember where I heard this (which is appropriate to where this blog seems to be taking me) but I've heard it said that often preachers look for a quip or clever yarn to open up sermons as a way to hide their own insecurity; to please the crowd before prophesying; to win them to your side before you bend them over and tell them what they don't want to hear. So in my over-educated, well-oiled superiority complex, I give the preacher a demerit and am then on the lookout for other indications of their short-comings (which, any good psychologist would probably tell you has far more to do with my own insecurities and short-comings than anything else). Nevertheless, the anecdote in this context becomes the sugar coating on a bad-tasting Gospel. It seems to me the Gospel deserves to be taken more seriously than a punchline or bad medicine; and is certain bigger than the kind of joke that is only laughed at to make the teller feel okay with themselves.

But this is a paradox because Jesus himself is an amazing Storyteller. He weaves images with words to give us a tapestry of the Kingdom. The most memorable, engaging sermons I've heard are often full of stories and personal testimony that reveal the Kingdom in the syntax of real-life. This accounts (sometimes humorous, sometimes grave) offer a tangible memory of the Gospel for a parishioner to take home and play with for a while.

I am rather humbled by all I've experienced by God's grace in my short life; travel, relationships, musical performances, unique experiences, etc. I love living this life God has so carefully set-up around us. And yet whenever I rummage through my memories for an illustration that I hope will not entertain or cover-up but give hand-holds to the Gospel, I have trouble making the connections. I've driven long miles, hiked through mountains and deserts and highlands, flown over oceans and timezones, but I cannot find an illustration to illuminate the journey of the friends to Emmaus (Luke 24).

My wife will grow frustrated with me from time to time (hehe, look at this, an anecdote) when she asks, "Don't you remember when ..." followed by a memory of something she or I said and despite my conscientious effort to [i]not[/i] be like those insensitive, dull-witted cavemen portrayed in TV sitcoms, I'll give her the stereotypical, "Um..." and wince. Recently, after repeating this scene, I realized that I don't remember conversations much, but impressions. In other words, I think I remember in photographs, not in video.

Perhaps a psychologist could better explain what that's about. Or maybe it is simply a sign that I'm not a very practiced observer of life but instead, I spend my energy thinking about how I feel about life (i.e., spend more time thinking about how [i]I[i/] look at life instead of just looking at life!). It's as if Monet paints my memories: as if the images are cast behind a sheet of water; a still picture that shimmers with movement. If my life were a book, it would probably be one of those coffee table books, and have more pictures than words. While I appreciate how God is created me, it would be nice to have eyes to view the world and not orbit around my own perspective; to start with the world and see where I fit, instead of starting with self and moving out.

Maybe to actually be less self-aware and just more aware is the faithful task for preachers.

Quote of the Day

"The human mind is never more resourceful than when it is involved in self-justification," author Jean Garton has written.

I don't know who Jean Garton is, but they certainly have a point.

Casting Magic

"For the sake, as he sees it, of the ones he preaches to, the preacher is apt to preach the Gospel with the high magic taken out, the deep mystery reduced to a manageable size...The wild and joyful promise of the Gospel is reduced to promises more easily kept. The peace that passeth all understanding is reduced to peace that anybody can understand. The faith that can move mountains and raise the dead becomes faith that can help make life bearable until death ends it. Eternal life becomes a metaphor for the way the good a man does lives after him. "Blessed is he who takes no offense at me" (Matt. 11:6), Jesus says, and the preacher is apt to seek to remove the offense by removing from the Gospel all that he believes we find offensive. You cannot blame him because up to a point, of course, he is right. With part of ourselves we are offended as he thinks by what is too much for us to believe. We weren't born yesterday. We are from Missouri.

"But we are also from somewhere else. We are from Oz, from Looking-Glass Land, from Narnia, and from Middle Earth. If with part of ourselves we are men and women of the world and share the sad unbeliefs of the world, with a deeper part still, the part where our best dreams come from, it is as if we were indeed born yesterday, or almost yesterday, because we are also all of us children still. No matter how forgotten and neglected, there is a child in all of us who is not just willing to believe in the possibility that maybe fairy tales are true after all but who is to some degree in touch with that truth."

~ from Frederick Buechner, "Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale"


Over lunch one day, a professor-pastor-friend in college told me that for him, whenever he would visit someone in the hospital, that he felt he should remove his shoes at the door because he was about to tread on holy ground.

Another professor, this one in seminary, once told my class that the most dangerous thing that any pastor can do is forget that they handle holy things.

And by holy, I mean magical. Call it an over-active imagination or a divorce from reality, I believe in magic. Not the cantrips we hear about in Harry Potter, that unlocks doors and makes things float. Not modern Wiccan rituals or decapatated chickens or devil worship. Real magic. What Aslan calls, after his miraculous resurrection, "The deeper magic."
What the church calls Easter.

I grew up losing myself in stories about fierce, awe-inspiring dragons, powerful and dangerous wizards and valiant, iron-clad knights. And I cannot help but believe that these journeys into another world were a vital part of the formation of my faith, perhaps as much as any other event that led me to Christ: the freedom to believe in magic; the ability to envision a world where extraordinary things can happen that make a lasting, life-giving difference for everyone. More importantly, the ability to see (on my good days) that world in this one.

I think Buechner is quite right to see the Gospel as a fairy tale. Not an entertaining story that's mostly for children and earns millions for movie-makers. The tales that actually talk back to our reality, peeling back the mundane to reveal the magic that's been there all along; the magic we're often too busy to notice.

The magic of the Gospel and its Easter-Christ, that proves He can bring resurrection to the most unlikely places and people.

But we're scientists and enlightened minds. We want hard proof before we give up our precious time and energy following leprechauns and Holy Grails. We'll take cold hard facts over warm bread and ruddy wine any day.

Because that's what we can control: our facts. Magic is beyond our control; of another world that we haven't spent enough time in to feel comfortable there. But that's just the point: faith in Christ is all about living into another world; or rather, the true world; where the grass is so real, it can cut your feet (as it does in C.S. Lewis' heaven in his account 'The Great Divorce.') .

"My kingdom is not of this world..." Jesus tells Pilate. The crowd chants for their agenda (the assassination of a God-Son they cannot contain). Weary Pilate just wants a little peace and quiet for a change, and a little truth. But even in Jesus' beaten body, magic is already at work that is going to mystically sweep away all of sin (the sin of the crowd that wants him dead, of the betrayer, of the denier, of the bystander-friend who wants to do something but is paralyzed by fear) and open the wardrobe to a magic kingdom, where peace is had, where companions and neighbors find endless joy in serving one another, where evil is easy to spot and where the King is trustworthy, compassionate and just and brings order.

And every Sunday, the preacher dances between lunacy and comfort; between the fairy tale that men and women (who "share the sad beliefs of this world") have forgotten but come every Sunday to hear and at the same time, speaking encouragement to those same tired souls. And all the while, this preacher himself fights to remember that he too is a child and that the bread and wine and Storybook and hospital rooms right there in his hands are magical; visible signs of the holy fairy tale that have punched through the veil; that has more to with the real way of things than reality itself.

The Pursuit

Philip Yancy begins his book on prayer by comparing the frustratingly different experiences of prayer between our fore-bearers of faith and us today. He quotes several legends (Martin Luther, Jonathan Edwards, etc.) talking about their many hours spent each day in blissful communion with God. When interviewing people today, a vast majority of responses reflect a sadly familiar tune: that while prayer is regarded as vitally important, most people found they spent only 5-7 minutes a day at it, and that, most people did not feel closer to the living God by doing so.

Someone asked me a while back for advice for some scripture passages that they might read with their spouse at night in order to draw closer to God in their marriage and also to one another. This person confessed their previous efforts left them wanting for something more and frustratingly not closer to one another.

As a younger man, I would use quiet mornings to read Scripture and journal about what I would find there. For months, this was a rich exercise. I would rise from the table, feeling like my day had perspective; as if I'd oriented myself to the map and was now ready to begin exploring. Lately, having lost that particular discipline, I feel hungry inside.

Hunger is not a bad thing in itself, really (at least, living in a culture where food is not so difficult to come by). A stomach's growl is our body's very normal way of letting us know it needs more fuel. But certainly, hunger is meant to be paid attention to and reveals an immediate need that requires attention sooner rather than later.

What are we hungering for, then? When our attempts to approach God in prayer, or to know God more through studying Scripture, end with only more longing, what are we missing?

Have we become so existential that only what we experience in the here-and-now has value to us? Maybe we've lost our ability to look at the horizon, to see where our praying and Scripture reading playing into the larger picture of who God is and where our lives fit into the cosmos; the old forest vs. trees problem. Maybe we've lost appreciation for the things that only come with time and perseverance.

"And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance, and perseverance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us." ~ Romans 5:3-5

Or maybe we are too busy to think about "big things." It's become a litany of the modern day, when someone asks, "How's it going?" quite often, "busy" is one of the words that leaps to our tongues. And if we're not saying it, we're probably feeling it as this polite intrusion is keeping us from getting things done. Maybe we're just too distracted, our brains too cluttered with boxes of obligations to make space for big ideas or a bigger God. And if so, maybe we're so adept at squeezing God into our schedules that the moment we allow more space for it, we're scared at just how much space God can fill; so much bigger than any of the other boxes we shuffled around; definitely much bigger than we could lift or fit neatly into a space some where.

We can be such emotional pack-rats, grabbing hold to everything that seems to have meaning and cramming it into our attics, even though we'll forget it is there after a while, like dusty boxes full of things we'll never use but that takes up space nonetheless.

JP Moreland articulated once that although we have more stuff, more security, more food than any culture in existence has ever had, we are less happy than we've ever been. He argues that it is because in the last 3-4 decades, humanity (Western Civilization specifically) has sought to be happy instead of seeking "a life of virtue." The distinction is that we've equated virtues with ice cream: that we use the same word for foods we like and for what Christ did on the cross (i.e., "I love ice cream" and "God so loved the world...") He says that for centuries, through many cultures, people have pursued a life of virtue over one bent on being happy, and have found a level of contentment, even in the midst of adversity, that seems illusive to many today.

Is that the problem? Are we so bent on being happy, entertained and dazzled, in other words, self-absorbed, that we've forgotten what it is to be part of something bigger than ourselves? Is our stagnation with prayer and Scripture a result of trying to make our own universe, where we shuffle and arrange things around us, keeping the things that give us a moment of pleasure closer and pushing back the uncomfortable baggage we'd really rather not bring to the light of day. Doing that instead of finding the steady joy that comes when we live, not for ourselves, but for something bigger?

People are hungry for answers to questions about God, about why bad things happen, about why they are miserable, or at least, unaccountably discontent. And for some reason, we've all decided we won't be happy until there are answers that will attend to us, like butlers, and bring order to things for us. And until then, we all seem content with misery instead of the agonizing task of crucifying our self-orbiting universe and entrusting ourselves to something bigger; of surrendering our control (which is a pleasant-enough myth) to the One who is life and peace Himself.

It seems to me that seeking peace instead of happiness is more than just avoiding materialism. It's more than rearranging furniture but more like tearing out walls and remodeling altogether. Not just re-ordering but a complete reshaping. Of course, demolition is both messy and dangerous work.

In a recent Nooma video, Rob Bell talks about how often we think of God as being the One who sits way off in the distance up there, and every now and again drops down to visit, to help "blessed" people find parking spaces and bargains at the mall. In the quest to discover what God is like, he offers that perhaps God is more like a song that plays everywhere and in every person; that knowing God is not a matter of knowing the song but being in tune. I bit down on another hook when I listened to him talk about this, tears threatening to break over the wall of my eyelids. It seems to me that being in tune has less to do with understanding musical theory and more about having the courage to play.

Maybe if we all just played more, we wouldn't fret so much about "experiencing God" or finding answers.

Smoldering

"So you open the Good Book
you thumb to the common lection
and you sit down to read
your expectations minimal - what with your busy week
a few half baked prayers for illumination
waft to heaven like smoke from a smoldered fire."

~ excerpt from a Sermon by the Rev. Ralph
"Preaching - Impossible, Indispensable"

The excerpt is from a sermon that had preachers lined up in its sights. But I found its words penetrated deeper than my own practice of sermon writing.

I can't get this image out of my head. And I'm learning to pay attention when that happens. Just like I'm learning to pay attention to unexpected tears. Frederick Buechner talked about those tears that ambush us, unbidden, entirely un-manufactured or conjured. The moments when a word or image snags us to a jarring halt, like how fish must feel when the irresistible morsel suddenly becomes a lethal hook, and life turns upside down as it's yanked out of the normal world and into something that steals its breath away.

The thing about the images that leap into our hands, flailing like a trout, or the tears that crash like waves upon our cheeks, is that they penetrate with surgical precision deep into our lives, to the stuff in our souls that lives underground; our secret-est hopes and most essential needs that we mostly don't have words to articulate or even know about ourselves. But suddenly, a word or a hope that is uttered by another becomes that shaft of light into the bottom of the well, our eyes (so accustom to darkness) stung and dazzled when our expectations are sliced cleanly in two.

"...everything exposed by the light becomes visible,
for everything that becomes visible is light.
Therefore it says,

"Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you."
~Ephesians 5:13-14

"Wake me up inside, Wake me up inside
Call my name and save me from the dark.
Bid my blood to run, before I come undone,
Save me from the nothing I've become."
~'Bring Me to Life' Evanescence

So what is smoldering deep down that such an image would tear me asunder? I don't despair becoming "nothing" (as the lyrics state). But the melodic rock music that cries out with such psalmic vigor stirs something deep in me as well; the longing for more; a faith deeply in tune with the fiercely joyful melody of the Spirit; a life electrified into action, playfully daring for the sake of the Song. So the fear is not in being "nothing", but "nothing much."

I've been told that Augustine says (somewhere) that hungering after God is itself a gift. Whoever might have said it, there is truth there that I feel in my bones. It's like the way that faith in Christ is also a gift, the way that Christ is both High Priest and Flawless Lamb.

"So, surrender the hunger to say you must know.
Have the courage to say, 'I believe.'
And the power of paradox opens your eye
and blinds those who say they can see."
~'God's Own Fool' Michael Card

I hope I'm aware enough of my generation's (and my personal) longing for existential truth: to actually experience the praise and joy of God as a thrilling rush of gratitude (did King David not dance like a wild man?). But where is the peace in pursuing it? Or more importantly, where does it become not about me? Is being known enough? Shouldn't it be? What is the place where the surreal shoulders-up against our "real"?

O God, you are my God, I seek you,
my soul thirsts for you;
my flesh faints for you,
as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,
beholding your power and glory.

Because your steadfast love is better than life,
my lips will praise you.
~Psalm 63:1-3

If the psalmists, both in Scripture and today, can long for this, can't we dare to engage the dangerous business of hope for it too?

Sky Fishing

In a novel by the penetrating Christian author and Pulitzer Prize Runner-up, Frederick Buechner, a character is flying a kite. When asked what he was doing, he responded that he was fishing in the sky. The person pressed the issue by asking what he was fishing for. And the reply was that he supposed he was fishing for God.

Keeping relationship with the living Creator of the Universe can be an inconsistent enterprise at best. You go out some days and the effort is exciting as the wind pulls the lines taut and takes us for a thrilling ride. Other days, you stand in the still field, your kite grounded by the constant press of gravity. You can run as fast as you can, feet pounding the turf, trying hard to generate lift by your own steam. And the kite mimics signs of flight from the effort. But the moment you stop, flutters uselessly to the ground. And still other days, the pouring rain keeps you from going outside at all.

And my guess is that if we’re really honest about it, there are probably more windless and rainy days than days soaring in the sun that we long for. Days like today when the innocence of a quiet town is shattered by the swings of a brutal crime. Days when the pillar of a community or church suddenly falls to the ground, never to rise again. Days when children, who have no business dying, die anyway. And we’re left, holding our kite, wondering and waiting for something to lift us up; trying as hard as we can to make it fly or waiting for a breath of wind to remind that there actually were days of wind.

In both Greek and Hebrew (the original languages of the Bible), the word for spirit (pneuma and ru-ach) is literally defined “wind.” And it occurs to me that the truer faith is not one that has God or the Bible or life or pain or politics figured out (all of them impossibilities), but the one that stands patiently and faithfully in the field, waiting through the uncertainty and doubt for the wind, certain of only one thing: that one day, the wind will blow.

“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.” ~Romans 8:26

The Climb

"When the preacher climbs up into his pulpit, switches on the lectern light and spreads out his note cards like a poker hand, maybe even the vacationing sophomore who is there only because somebody dragged him there pricks up his ears for a second or two along with the rest of them because they believe that the man who is standing up there in a black gown with the smear of styptic pencil on his chin has something they do not have or at least not in the same way he has it because he is a professional. He professes and stands for in public what they with varying degrees of conviction or the lack of it subscribe to mainly in private. He has been to a seminary and studied all that one studies in a seminary. He has a degree to show for it, and beyond the degree he has his ordination and the extraordinary title of reverend, which no matter how well they know him on the golf course or the cocktail-party circuit sets him apart as one to be revered not because of anything he knows or anything he is in himself but because, as an ambassador is revered for the government he represents, he is to be revered for representing Christ."
~ Frederick Buechner "Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale"

I will be traveling on an airplane twice in the next month. That means I will be faced with the unavoidable dilemma that accompanies any such travel: the question about what I do for a living.

It's a mystifying experience. It seems my very countenance has this transformative effect on my fellow travelers, for the moment I share my profession, their demeanor, their posture, their very vocabulary becomes much tidier.

Of course, this isn't reserved to the airplane but also to family dinners, where all those loving eyes turn to "the professional" to give us a "real" prayer.

While my ego sits-up and wags its tail when such attention is lavished on me, honestly it can be a bit bewildering. Of course I'm happy to pray. I love talking to God. But I feel far more compelled, both in seat 13A and my place at the dinner table to say, "No, you don't understand, I'm really just like you. I am a believer on the same quest after God, some days headed in the right direction, some days too tired to move."

But being the medicine man does not afford such liberties. Your headdress and garb set you apart. Not your skin and bones. Not your searching mind or longing heart or little faith. The black fabric and slips of paper behind glass on the wall. They set you aside as "different."

Don't get me wrong: it is a tremendous and deeply humbling honor to be called to this occupation. It is the hardest job one could ever love. But it seems that such an "ambassadorship" can afford the minister certain privileges that he is certain is more due to the quiet yet faithful members who wait anxiously for a Word from God. But the greater worry is that the occupation, the black cloth and the slips of paper, afford freely available permission to "leave it to the professional" (because in our over-worked society, we do not have time but to leave it them).

"A professional Christian." Paul says, "Of this gospel I have become a servant according to the gift of God's grace that was given me by the working of his power. Although I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given to me... " (Eph. 3:7-8). He too was seminary trained and yet gives all credit, not to his grade-point average but to the gift of God's grace. A gift that is made available to all.

My itchiness about being asked "what do you do for a living?" or to pray at family meals is never about having to say the right words on the spot but that others would miss the opportunity to meet with God too; to practice what is more often "subscribed to in private" and left to the ones society calls "professionals." A title most ministers I know would never ascribe to themselves.

And yet, Sunday after Sunday, I take the three steps that places me within view of everyone, I open a Book with trembling fingers that everyone there owns, and attempt to speak the truth of a God who is bigger than any human language nor can be contained by a slip of paper behind glass. The pulpit at the Columbia Seminary chapel holds a placard which quotes the gospel of John, "Sir, we would see Jesus", an injunction to the preacher of the sheer magnitude of what most congregations want in no longer than 15 minutes.

The only thing left is to do what every other baptized believer can do: trust in the grace of God to use the gifts placed inside to open a window to true reality, not because of being a professional, but because God's grace is sufficient.