Blogarhithmic Expressions

Ordinary Time

2012-02-13T09:17:00.000-08:00

The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. So they quarreled with Moses and said, "Give us water to drink." Moses replied, "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the LORD to the test?" But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?" Then Moses cried out to the LORD, "What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me." The LORD answered Moses, "Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink." So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. – Exodus 17:1-6

How could people like the Israelites fall prey to ordinary concerns like being thirsty? They have seen God’s power displayed in Egypt – boils, frogs, gnats, the angel of death. They have left their bondage and headed to a Promised Land, only to be pursued to shores … where they saw the sea open for them to pass and then close on their enemies. They have come to a place, called Marah, where the water was too bitter to drink; there they saw Moses – at God’s direction – throw an ordinary piece of wood into the water, and miraculously the water became sweet and drinkable. Then, they saw God provide quail and manna for their daily food.

The Hebrews have short memories. They grumbled about their taskmasters in Egypt, and God delivered them. They grumbled when they reached the shores of the Red Sea, and God delivered them. They grumbled from thirst in Marah and from hunger in the Desert. Their past deliverances were not enough to convince them that the current drudgery would not do them in. Their present struggle, their ordinary life as wanderers through wilderness guided by God’s promise, seemed overwhelming. I do not mean to suggest that this is a minor problem – scholars agree that there may have been more than two million Israelites in the desert, so food and water were a real issue. But, the Hebrews’ experience has been that God is more overwhelming. Yet, they grumble.

Now, they thirst again. The recent events at Marah – the last time they were thirsty – apparently mean nothing to these people. They have come to a campground that does not have a nearby spring, and they once again sink to the lowest common denominator. Their life becomes about the most ordinary, the most mundane: They are thirsty. "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?" This time, there is not wood to throw in the bitter pool; instead, there is the staff of Moses to strike an ordinary rock. And the water pours out. An extraordinary God works to solve an ordinary problem.

You may not be familiar with the traditional church calendar, but many churches, including mine, follow it, even if we do not use all the terminology. The time between Epiphany and Ash Wednesday, and again between Pentecost and Advent, has a particular name in the traditions of the church. Do you know what it is? It is Ordinary Time.

You can see why we Protestants don’t use that term much. What could be more boring than “Ordinary Time?” What could possibly be less important, less sexy, less enthralling then forty-two weeks of “Ordinary Time?”

The famous French monk Brother Lawrence embraced his ordinary times. His work “The Practice of the Presence of God” grows out of years of working in a monastery kitchen until he was finally promoted all the way up to fixing sandals. The ordinary became, for Brother Lawrence, the time and place best to meet God. He wrote:
The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer. In the noise and clutter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the Blessed Supper.

I have written before (here and here) about how we experience the ordinary. We can see it as the “dog days” or perceive it as the silence of God. The doldrums strike and the temptation is to say, “I am thirsty. Why didn’t you just leave me back in Egypt?”

It is an entirely natural phenomenon. Perhaps the church fathers knew what they were doing when they built some Ordinary Time into the calendar.

So, then, how should we approach Ordinary Time? If the dog days are to be expected … if the silence of God is not a reason to pull the alarm … if the doldrums are natural, then how should we live our lives?

The scripture with which I started this blog is the story of Meribah, of the place where God made water come from the rock. I cannot think of a better illustration of our struggles with Ordinary Time than a people wandering in wilderness who are thirsty. They grumble. They forget what God has done. These chosen people have had a front row seat for God’s recent history, from plagues to Passover to the parting of the sea; but it all seems to have vanished from their collective memory. All they know is that their lives in slavery look a lot better in glorified retrospect than this current situation appears going forward.

And that brings me back to the question: How should we live our lives in Ordinary Time?

One of the really interesting reads of the last few years is The Shack. I remember first hearing about this novel in which God says this:
Many folks try to grasp some sense of who I am by taking the best version of themselves, projecting that to the nth degree, factoring in all the goodness they can perceive, which often isn't much, and then call that 'God'. And while it may seem like a noble effort, the truth is that it falls pitifully short of who I really am. I'm not merely the best version of you that you can think of. I am far more than that, above and beyond all that you can ask or think.

That is critical to our understanding of what a daily relationship with God provides us. Paul tells us God can do more than we can imagine. The presence of Jesus transforms the ordinary to the extraordinary. He is what we need. God tells us to take the rod He has given us and strike the rock. And behold, water comes out.

I was teaching a Sunday School lesson on the great 35th chapter of Isaiah, where the prophet interrupts his oracles of doom and exile to talk about the joyous expectations of the redeemed. Isaiah tells us that the children of God will have a new sense of the glory of God as though the desert were blooming. He tells us that the coming of the Lord brings strength to our feeble knees. Then follows the image of healing, of blind eyes seeing and mute tongues singing.

As I taught, one of the women in my class made a brilliant observation – this scripture is about transformation. It is not just that God helps us along a little bit but rather that God changes us, that what was once a desert is now a garden, that what was once feeble is now mighty, what was once lame is now nimble. She said this, “This is all about something new, where it was not there before.”

That is exactly right. It is what new mercies every morning are all about. I want you to see to how Isaiah puts it:
The desert and the parched land will be glad; the wilderness will rejoice and blossom. Like the crocus, it will burst into bloom; it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy. The glory of Lebanon will be given to it, the splendor of Carmel and Sharon; they will see the glory of the LORD, the splendor of our God. Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way; say to those with fearful hearts, "Be strong, do not fear; your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you." Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then will the lame leap like a deer and the mute tongue shout for joy. Water will gush forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. - Isaiah 35:1-6

You may know the following words of Fanny J. Crosby form the 19th century hymn or the 21st century Chris Tomlin version:
All the way my savior leads me, what have I to ask beside? Can I doubt his tender mercy, who through life has been my guide? … Though my weary steps may falter, and my soul athirst may be, gushing from the rock before me, lo a spring of joy I see.

It is the story of Meribah, of streams in the desert, of water from the rock. It does not just trickle, it gushes. What was not there before is there now. The ordinary has become extraordinary. We are transformed.

Saul

2012-02-08T12:28:00.000-08:00

There is a relatively contemporary piece of choral literature called "Saul," by Norwegian composer Egil Hovland. The text, delivered both by narration and by singing, is taken from the eighth and ninth chapters of the Book of Acts. The story is of pre-conversion Saul, who, after witnessing the murder of Stephen, began "breathing threats and murder against the diciples of the Lord." It follows Saul's story through his persecution of the church up until his fateful meeting with Jesus on the Damascus Road. The piece ends with Jesus's question: "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?"

Our choir director asked me to help the choir understand the context of this piece. When he asked, I eagerly grabbed the folio, anticipating the chance to draw something of great inspiration.

Some of you will remember a radio spot that Paul Harvey presented for years called “The Rest of the Story.” Typically, he would tell an interesting tale about someone, and then, in a grand climax, would reveal the name of the famous person he was describing, finishing by saying, “and now you know the rest of the story.”

This piece, "Saul," is backwards. We already know the rest of the story. We know Paul, writer of thirteen epistles now canonized in our New Testament, leader of three famous missionary journeys, preacher on the Acropolis, the main developer of Christian theology and its principal proselytizer, and ranked by at least some pop authors and pseudo-historians as more influential than even Jesus Christ. But this piece is not concerned with that.

We already know the rest of the story. The Damascus Road story. Whether your pop music tastes run toward “I Saw the Light” or “Blinded by the Light,” you know it. On the way to Damascus, the young Pharisee Saul is confronted with a light, out of which Jesus Himself speaks and changes his name to Paul. Facing accusations and testifying in his own behalf, Paul tells the story himself, concluding, “I was not disobedient to the vision from heaven. First to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and to the Gentiles also, I preached that they should repent and turn to God.” But this piece is not concerned with that.

Yes, I was hoping to find great inspiration. But this piece is not, at first glance, concerned with that either; however, it is profound.

The climactic finish of the song presents the echoing question, the actual words of Christ to Saul on the Damascus Road – “Why are you persecuting me?”

It is a haunting reminder of the question that God asks us all. Before we come to throne of grace, we come to the bench of conviction. Over and over again, we see versions of the same question asked: Adam, where are you? Eve, who told you that you were naked? Cain, where is your brother? Sarah, why did you laugh? Job, where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Elijah, why are you hiding here? Moses, what do you have in your hand? Isaiah, whom shall I send, and who will go for me? Son of man, can these bones live? Peter, why did you doubt? Pharisees, why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? Church at Thyatira, why do you tolerate the woman Jezebel? Disciples, why are you talking about having no bread – do you still not understand? Blind man, what do you want me to do for you?

Saul, why are you persecuting me? Why?

That is the obvious textual analysis of the piece, but this piece is something else. Taking its text directly from scripture, this work is the story of villainy.

We don’t think of Paul as a villain, but we must think of Saul that way. Saul was not merely a half-innocent bystander at the stoning of Deacon Stephen, although that is how scripture introduces him to us. No, Saul was the leader of the attempted destruction of Christianity itself. Ever the good Pharisee, Saul masterminded the task forces of storm troopers whose aim was nothing short of rooting out the nascent church. Going from house to house, Saul dragged women as well men to prison solely for being a follower of the Way. The Bible describes him as “murderous.” Contemporary church historians have called him a terrorist.

And now you know the rest of the story.

As I say, that is not particularly inspirational, so long as you don’t let it get personal. But when it gets personal, there is something to speak to all of us, for there is nothing that any of us knows so well as our own villainy.

“The Diary of Anne Frank” is a great play, but the young heroine is wrong when she says she still believes that people are good at heart. Because (at the risk of being too personal)… we are not good. We have gone astray like untamed, stupid sheep. We are, all of us, villains. To spend four or five minutes, as this piece does, focusing on pre-conversion Saul is inspirational if you know your New Testament. If someone like Saul can turn into someone like Paul, what can God have in store for us? If this villain can become the apostle to the Gentiles, the planter of myriad churches, and the one who penned “Rejoice in the Lord always. … And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” – yes, even the writer of those words - then there is hope for villains everywhere, for Iago and Sauron, for Shere Khan and Long John Silver, for Moriarty and Grendel’s mother, for Mr. Hyde and the talented Mr. Ripley and the Joker, for Voldemort and Cruella de Vil, for Amin and Pol Pot, for whichever current political candidate you have written off as untenable, for your boss who does not understand and your neighbor who won’t return your hydraulic log splitter, for the play director who refused to cast you child, for the abusive husband and the unloving wife, for you, and for you, and for you, and for me.

And that, thank God, is the rest of the story.

Hospital Church

2012-01-14T21:52:00.000-08:00

It is a wonderful metaphor - the church as hospital.

Jesus used it, or a version of it, Himself when He responded to those who criticized Him for dining with tax collecters and other "sinners." He said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick."

This image is popular in today's church. We preach inclusiveness, welcome, open doors. One of my former churches invested a lot in the slogan "Come as you are." It is a critical message to get the word out that our churches are open to all folks and that nobody has to "clean up their act" before they can come into the sanctuary. Jesus stands with open arms, much as a waiting doctor.

There is a poem that is hot on YouTube and Facebook right now called "Jesus>Religion." Like many commentators I have seen, I like a lot of it and am put off by part of it, primarily by the use of the word "religion" as a synonym for false religion, hypocrisy, and abuse. Of course Jesus is against those things, and of course those things exist; but to assert or imply that all religion is false and abusive and/or that all churches are pharisaical and hypocritical is, despite the (well-meaning) stated intent of the poet, the height of judgmentalism. All religion is not the same, and all churches are not the same. Even churches with some of the problems isolated by the poet are largely good, doing great work, and trying hard to follow Jesus.

While I do not often quote many reformed theologians in this blog, Kevin DeYoung's analysis of the poem (which includes a link to the poem, in case you want to watch the video) is very well-taken, and I recommend it to you. You can find it here.

I want to focus on just one little part of what DeYoung says: the part about hospital church. The poet, Jefferson Bethke, has a line that says this: "Because if grace is water, then the church should be an ocean. It’s not a museum for good people, it’s a hospital for the broken." Pastor DeYoung comments on this line: "[W]e have to remember that the purpose of a hospital is to help sick people get better. I’m sure Bethke would agree with that. But there is no indication in this poem that the grace that forgives is also the grace that transforms."

I think DeYoung is right on, and I think his point is one where many churches fall down. "Come as you are" is the invitation, but if it not coupled with "but don't leave the same way," then the church is not doing its job. Jesus explained the doctor metaphor by immediately shifting to more familiar church words: "I have not come to call the righeous, but sinners." He surely came to sinners not so they could continue the same but instead so they would "go their way and sin no more."

Grace accepts and forgives, but as DeYoung so astutely puts it, grace also transforms. Those who have truly been with Jesus are different, immediately.

Skeptical Thomas said that he would not believe that Christ had risen unless Jesus would agree to jump through some hoops, to allow Thomas to touch the nail holes and put his hand into the wounded side. When Thomas soon saw Jesus, Jesus even offered to let Thomas do that, but those silly rules and cynical requirements melted. The gospel says nothing about Thomas' actually touching Jesus; being in His presence was enough. He saw Jesus, and he responded with those words of the healed: "My Lord and My God."

Jacob became Israel and walked differently. Saul became Paul and lived differently. Grace came to them as they were but did not leave them that way.

Sandy Patty and Larnelle Harris sang, "I've just seen Jesus, and I'll never be the same again."

Church can and must be a hospital, a place where sick people get better. We are all sick, and we all need to get better, for we all fall short of the glory of God.

Let's welcome everyone. Let's open our doors as wide as possible. Let's buy some more billboards that say "Come as you are." But for God's sake, let's let Doctor Jesus work on those who take us up on the invitation. Let's be the nurses and the orderlies and the technicians. Let's help people change, get better, be healed, be transformed.

Let's expect the gospel to be true.

Seasons of My Life

2012-01-01T16:10:00.000-08:00

Perhaps it is the new year, or perhaps it is this morning's sermon topic. Either way, I am struck by how my life has gone through three distinct seasons, each of between 12 and 13 years in length, and how I am now in the midst of Season #4.

The first season, Feb 1965 - Aug 1977: Birth through the end of sixth grade. Nine houses, five towns (two of them twice), seven schools. For an only child, Season #1 was built on finding myself without the aid of long-term friends. I don't regret much of it, but it clearly was unique.

The second season, August 1977 - July 1990: Seventh grade through law school. One house in Nashville; two dorm rooms, two apartments, and one house in Waco; one diploma and two degrees. The years of my education and forging my Christian identity and early discipleship. The years of learning who and what I am. The years of developing friendships and love.

The third season, August 1990 - June 2003: The first job. Marriage. Three kids. One apartment. Building one house. Becoming who I am as a lawyer, Sunday School teacher, deacon, man. Seeing how adulthood springs, how some dreams die, how others are born. Deeper friendships. Stronger discipleship.

The fourth season, July 2003 - ???: The second job. New house, new town, new church. Raising my kids in a new place - they do not consider Tennessee to be home. Now starting them off in college. Seeing more dreams die. Feeling the effects of age. Writing. Finding more security in who I am. Wondering if that is all there is. Honing my discipleship. Cherishing friendships made in the first three seasons. Finding new friendships much harder to make.

I know this season will end. If my life continues in the pattern in which I have so far found myself, I can look for Season 4 to end in the summer of 2016 or so, about the time my youngest child graduates from high school. Will that be time for another move? Will this season last longer than the others? Will the next season call for me to stay in the same place?

For everything, there is a season. So far, these have been my seasons.

Missing Christmas - What Are We Waiting For?

2011-12-22T15:05:00.000-08:00

Like many churches, my church is just about to finish a four+ week time of celebrating Advent, a time often described as one of waiting. There have been times this year when that waiting theme has puzzled me.

I recognize the importance of remembering and reliving the waiting that the people of Israel did for the coming Messiah. The meaning of "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel" is of critical importance in understanding God's plan. For a people whose faith centered around prophecy and the promises yet to come, the idea of waiting with expectancy is a vital lesson.

The problem is this - I don't have to wait. Christ has come, both in the bodily sense of His incarnation at Christmas and in the spiritual sense of His having come to live in my life. I can "wait" in a historical re-creation kind of way and ponder what it would have been like to have to wait for the Messiah, but I need not actually wait.

This thought about Advent waiting has led me to think that those who are still waiting for Christmas may well have have missed it. In discussing Missing Christmas, I do not mean Skipping Christmas, like the hero of Grisham's novel of that same name who desperately wants to avoid wrapping one more gift and decorating his house one more year. I can understand being fed up with the commercialization and the hoop-de-do of our Christmas schedule.

No, I am talking about those who miss Christmas, who don't get it, who are still waiting because they have never understood - never received - the coming of Messiah/Christ in the first place.

If we look back on the first century folks, we often ask ourselves how and why they missed Him. After all, they were supposed to be looking for Him. They were students of prophecy and knew their scripture. They could recite Isaiah and Micah, Zechariah and Jeremiah. They knew Messiah was coming. And then He came, and they missed Him, and they kept looking.

Our common Sunday School answer is that they missed Him because they were looking for a military/political king. They wanted the victories and the white stallions and the public homage. They were not ready for a suffering servant, much less for a baby born to an unmarried virgin in a feeding trough. They were not interested in what caught the attention of shepherds, the lowest of the low.

I think that explanation is right, up to a point, but I do not believe it goes far enough. I believe they missed Christmas for the same reason many people today miss Christmas. That reason is largely political, although not in the stallions-and-banners sense. It is not that we want military victories, necessarily; but it is that we want what is immediate, what is tangible, what is seemingly most important to our survival. To first century Israel, that meant escape from the suffocating occupation of Rome. To them, then, Messiah would be recognized in the way He threw off the Caesars. To twenty-first century Americans, it means escape from unemployment and war and inequality and unendurable political discourse. It means more money and better health and more vacation time. It means the right person in office and enough food on the table for everyone.

And, of course, there is nothing wrong with any of that. As I have written numerous times, I believe that we must be about helping the poor and feeding the hungry (here and here, for example), and I maintain that we must participate in the political process (here and here, for example). I think that seeking success is a natural goal for all of us.

Jesus, though, did not and does not come primarily to meet our political aspirations. Jesus' role was and is spiritual. To the first century people He saw, He came primarily to solve their soul's overwhelming problem. He said that He came "to seek and to save that which is lost." The angel told Joseph to name Him Jesus because "He will save His people from their sins." To the twenty-first century people He now sees, Jesus comes for exactly the same reason. We have a sin problem, a soul problem, a spiritual issue that pretermits and underlies all our other ills.

There is a new popular holiday song that you have probably heard on the radio - it plays on both religious and secular stations - called "Christmas Shoes." It tells the touching story of a poor boy who wants to buy a new pair of shoes for his dying mother. He cannot afford to pay for the shoes, and the singer/narrator tells of giving the boy the money so he can buy the shoes. The singer says that in doing so, he has learned "what Christmas is all about."

Of course Jesus is concerned with the poor and the hungry, and as His people, we must be about His work, including giving shoes to kids and sick mothers who need them. But those kind of political and social issues are not the reason He came. They are not what Christmas is all about. The visitors to Jesus' birth brought gifts to Him; they did not come looking for gifts from Him. That metaphorical Little Drummer Boy, who had no gift to bring, did not come to the manger looking for a handout.

And I think that is why people miss Christmas. When a baby is born in an out of the way hamlet and does nothing to depose the emperor, sabotage the invading armies, eliminate all poverty, change the course of elections, or add to our bank accounts, we all too often miss Him. It is not that we are unconcerned with spiritual things; it is just that we are far more concerned with the political and the social and the financial. Like our predecessors twenty centuries before, we miss Messiah because we refuse to look beyond what we have decided are the pressing issues. We think we understand the world and that we know best how to solve its problems. Buying a poor boy a pair of shoes for his mother is surely a byproduct of Christ's coming, but it is not, despite the song, "what Christmas is all about." When Jesus comes with a different perspective and a radical program - faith in the living God - too many don't or can't or won't get it. And they end up missing Christmas. They come to and leave another Advent still waiting, whether they know it or not.

Jesus is not now, nor was He ever, bound by (or really concerned about) our political agenda. Jesus is not tied to what we want or expect Him to do. He comes to be God with us. He comes to shepherd His people. He comes to reign as King, not a military victor or a source of welfare, but as Lord.

Christmas is about a Savior. You have been waiting a long time. Don't miss Him.

The Rhetorical Divide: Lawyers and Love

2011-11-20T20:16:00.000-08:00

This week, I was privileged to be asked to speak to the Dallas chapter of the Christian Legal Society. This blog is the text of my speech.

In First Thessalonians 4, Paul writes this: “Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. And in fact, you do love all the brothers. . . . Yet we urge you, brothers, to do so more and more.”

I want to start with something that will surprise you. I want to read to you part of a letter I wrote about a month ago that was published in The Battalion, the Texas A&M school newspaper, the week after the Aggies demolished my Baylor Bears. (At this point, I quoted from the letter to the editor that I reprinted in full here.)

I have a unique job. I am proudly a lawyer, trying cases and showing up in appellate courts. But I also wear the hat of client. With a case load of between 2500 and 3200 cases in at least 28 states, I work regularly with fifty or more outside firms. These dual roles give me a fairly unique perspective on our law practice.

I want to talk about an important topic today, a problem that I think is perhaps the most significant issue we deal with on a day to day basis, and what we lawyers can do about it … although none of us had a class dedicated to it in law school.

I want to start by talking about the substantial level of incivility and unpleasant talk, what I call the rhetorical divide, that colors – or fouls – way too many conversations that surround us. You all know what I am talking about.

It pervades our politics of course. I cannot go a week without receiving, on one hand, emails that talk about the godless, socialist, Dem-Libs and, on the other, polemics bewailing the idiocy of the backwards mouth-breathers in the flyover states. One side angrily screams “class warfare;” the other side is incensed that their opponents would dare accuse them of “class warfare.” And on it goes.

(The next three paragraphs will be familiar to you if you are loyal reader of Blogarithmic Expressions, as they are lifted from a previous blog.)

I have a friend who goes all the way back to elementary school. We were in the same church youth group. We have not seen each other since high school, but through the magic of Facebook, we are once again “friends.” She has spent her adult life in politics, now writing for news magazines that you have heard of and advising candidates of a certain political persuasion. She feels compelled to post editorials – some by her and some by others – on Facebook. I try hard not to take the bait… but one time I was weak, and I asked a question about a position she had taken. I got a response that started with “with all due respect.” You know to brace yourself when you see that, because you are about to get clobbered.

Anyway, she proceeded to write for about seven paragraphs, ending by proclaiming … I kid you not … that anyone who would ask the question I had asked was, and I quote, “proven to be not only an abject failure” but also “immoral.”

This is where our political dialog has gone. In what should have been a light-hearted exchange between two old friends, I was called both an "abject failure" and "immoral." If a semi-public forum where a politico is responding to a "friend" produces this type of name-calling and insensitive rhetoric, it is not hard to understand how bad the hard-core political debate has become. Too many of us want everyone else to shut up so that we can speak. We simply cannot tolerate opposition. We no longer try to get along in what our grandparents would have called the required fashion.

I believe that there are some obvious things to blame. Our emphasis on freedom of speech has – rightfully in my view – strengthened in recent years, and with it has come burgeoning courage to speak our minds. Understanding our rights has led people to feel free to express themselves. And I guess that is the point, but the exercise of freedom without accompanying it with some common sense is often a mistake. The deregulation of the airwaves has led to talk radio of every stripe. Married to all of that, of course, is technology and its great and terrible gift inflicted on us, the internet, which has given a microphone to everyone and access to just enough political information to make us all think we know everything. Too many think they should be on talk radio, and when they can’t get through, they take to cyberspace.

With the tenth anniversary of 9/11 a couple of months ago, we heard a lot of hand-wringing about “why can’t the nation just come together like it did a decade ago?” I understand this – after all, we were, in a way, united. Less than a year after Bush v. Gore and the circus atmosphere that surrounded the 2000 election, we shared momentous times of tears, patriotism, and resolve. What we forget is the hatred that was immediately registered towards certain Americans based on their religion. What we don’t recall is the debate that ensued about the role of God in flying those planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. While we were united under the red, white, and blue, much of our political rhetoric was divisive and cruel. And, of course, any such solidarity was short-lived. Fast forward to the emails you all remember getting about candidate Obama on one hand and candidate Palin on the other and you will readily admit that 21st century American dialog has sunk further.

The same issue has infected our practice of law. We all know what it is like to deal with lawyers whose strategy in the courtroom is trial by ad hominem: the attempt to convince the jury that either we or our clients (or both) are inherently objectionable and therefore whatever we say must be discounted. In our sound bite world, too many lawyers have bought into the idea that jurors expect Rambo litigation filtered through Howard Stern. Courts by and large exercise their discretion not to intervene with even a curative instruction, so the lawyers who practice this way feel encouraged to continue. Our temptation to fight fire with fire and turn up the sarcasm and vitriol is palpable.

The rhetorical divide also shows up, ironically and disastrously, in our religious life. My own denomination has been riddled for over thirty years with accusations, name-calling, rejection, and abandonment. I do not believe I am going out on a limb to suppose that most of you can point to the same kinds of history in your own church – whether the issues are related to gender, sexuality, abuse, biblical interpretation, social justice, or politics.

But maybe the full affront of this divide did not really come home to me until I was … wait for it … playing internet spades the other night. Let me just say, the world of internet spades is full of crude, rude, and downright mean people. I fancy myself a pretty good player, and I routinely get cussed out, called R-rated names, and generally denounced as subhuman. These comments are directly related not necessarily to how well I am playing but instead to how closely I agree with or track the pattern of the person doing the talking. I am not the only victim – even when my play is deemed up to snuff, I watch the conversation among the other players. It is demeaning and, to me, a little frightening.

Among the many benefits of my competitive debate career – learning about a vast array of topics and public speaking and organization and thinking quickly on your feet among them – the most important thing I got out of it was the recognition that there are at least two sides to every question. It was not unusual to argue against a certain case in a negative round and then turn around in the next debate and argue in favor of precisely the same policy. I do not suggest that this translates perfectly into the real world – no doubt many arguments and positions we hear and read are not well thought out and are made mainly to harass. Still, the ability to understand the thought processes and rationale of those with whom we disagree is a skill that should be displayed more often than it is. It was Aristotle who said that the mark of an educated mind is to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Please don’t think I am just throwing stones at everybody else. It is not just everybody else. I suffer from the same disease. I try not to send the snarky emails, and I assure you that I am overwhelmingly polite when I play internet spades. But I can snap at my wife and be unreasonable with my kids. Somehow, at work, when I think I am just being direct and to the point, I can come across to others as being rude. Unpleasant, even.

The First Amendment and talk radio and the internet and our inability to see both sides of the question and bad spades etiquette are all causes of this problem that you can read about in Psychology Today or hear about on the Today Show. To say that is not news.

So, after recognizing what we all see and hear, it is time to address what I think is the problem that underlies all of this, a difficulty that is far more threatening than an insufferable talk radio host or a malicious email.

The problem is this: We don’t love each other enough.

Jesus commanded us to love one another and told us that the way people would know that we are His disciples is by our love.

We don’t love each other enough. We don’t like each other. We are unwilling and apparently unable to put up with our differences. We feel compelled to correct each other. We distrust each other’s motives. If someone disagrees with us about a point of policy, we decide that their entire ism runs contrary to ours, and we then decide that they cannot be trusted.

We don’t love each other enough.

Love is not a feeling. Love is not a reaction. The love of God, fully revealed in the love of Christ, is expected of us. Christian love is modeled on the love of Christ for us. 1 John 4:8 tells us that God is agape, a term best defined in first Corinthians 13. We read that scripture and understand that love is patient, and kind; it does not envy or boast or seek its own. Love is not rude or easily angered. It is not self-seeking, and it keeps no record of wrongs. Love is a serious of choices, of actions, and of intentional concessions; but it is not a feeling.

We are not kind to each other. The exercise of patience with the opposition is a lost art. Boastfulness abounds. Seeking our own way is the new normal.

What do lawyers have to do with all of this? It is not our fault, right? We don’t cause the problems; we just zealously speak for and on behalf of the people who are fighting with each other. We do what we are told – that is the essence of representing clients, right?

Right?

We all know the command of Christ and the language of 1 Corinthians 13, but we do the lawyerly mental gymnastics that result in exceptions. The result is that we deem certain others as unworthy of our love – offensive opposing counsel, abusive judges, uncivil members of the public (whether they are serving us at the drive through window or cutting us off in traffic), ungodly co-workers, and apparently just about anyone who strongly disagrees with us.

(Again, the next four paragraphs are lifted from a previous blog of mine.)

What compels lawyers to make these exceptions? What makes us feel able - even bound - to change the rules when they apply to us? Could it be said that we are playing God? After all, that is the first and greatest temptation, found in the third chapter of Genesis: “Don’t you want to be like God?” The forbidden fruit story is about the lie that the serpent offers: if we eat the fruit, we can be like God. We lawyers are not like a four-year-old who does not know better when we are tempted to disobey; no, the temptation is all about what we do intentionally. The lie is that we can know good and evil just like God does. This is what speaks to us – the chance to make more of ourselves than is intended, than is good for us, than we can really be.

In the end, while the fruit may have been lovely to look at, its taste would not have compelled Adam and Eve to break the rules. What made the difference was that they wanted to know what God knows, to see what God sees. The temptation was to go beyond their limited human view and to become godlike.

That is, always has been, and always will be Temptation #1. We do not like natural limitation. We chafe under the idea that there is something out there that is better, stronger, faster, smarter than we are. That is why “The Six Million Dollar Man” was a hit TV show. It is why movies like “Transformers” and “Superman” and “The Incredibles” tickle our fancy – the idea that we can transform into something more godlike holds great sway. The ubiquitous nature of WWJD bracelets and bumper stickers adds to the temptation, because the truth is that we are not Jesus and cannot do what Jesus did in every situation – our call is to do what Jesus called us to do. We can almost never walk on water or raise the dead, and we don’t get to make the rules. That is the province of God.

To let go of this temptation is to accept that we are only what we are. We can achieve, we can grow, and we can learn; and indeed, we can often do what Jesus would do. Still, there is only so far we can go. That acceptance – which is ultimately the key to reliance on God – is difficult for most of us lawyers. We can’t accept that there are things we do not understand, that we cannot do. Ultimately, it plays out in our making exceptions. We play God. We choose not to love.

What are you doing to demonstrate the love of Christ in your work?

About six weeks ago, I was leading a retreat for a church in San Antonio based on Brother Lawrence’s work “The Practice of the Presence of God.” Lawrence was a famous French monk who spent his life working in the kitchen and fixing sandals. In my sermon on Sunday morning of the retreat, I quoted these words of his:

The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer. In the noise and clutter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the Blessed Supper.

Do you remember when you Christians decided to become lawyers? Do you remember the excitement about actually helping people and those long nights pondering how you could make the law work within a biblical construct? Do you remember asking yourself questions about how you could reconcile everything that you were learning in law school with what you were learning in Sunday School?

Sure you do - we all wrestled with questions in law school about how could we square our Christianity with the practice of law - how could filing a claim be consistent with forgiveness, how could cross-examination and praise flow out of the same mouth, how can we defend rapists, how can we help big corporations shamelessly pursue the almighty dollar – and we reached a place of comfort.

We learned that we can be forgiving and praising and comfortable with the choices of our profession and actually help people. We stepped up to a profession where we could be trusted. We wanted – rest assured we felt righteous about wanting – to be the one in whom the world puts its trust, because we are Christians and we can make a difference. We were ready to be Brother Lawrence in the courtroom and the board room.

What does love mean to a lawyer? Does loving require us to be weak? I don’t think any of us would describe Jesus as weak.

Does love mean we must always agree to requested extensions? I don’t think so. I don’t think love means we abandon zealous representation of our clients. I do think we will be easier to work with than lawyers who are not practicing in love, and I do believe that we will likely extend courtesies more often than others.

How can we turn the other cheek and stay in practice? Can we be aggressive while being faithful? Is it possible to disagree passionately while still loving?

I believe the way I was treated at a football game by some A&M students begins to answer some of these questions. We introduce ourselves and have a relationship before a conflict starts. We understand and address the potential for dispute before we start sniping at each other. We love each other.

I am not going to give you a laundry list of pointers on how to practice law in love today – I could no more do that than I could give you an instruction manual on how to raise your children in love or deal with your spouse in love or be loving while attending a Cowboys game. Love comes from our relationship with the One who is love. The solution comes not so much from having an instruction manual as it does from recognizing that we must love at all times, even in our workplace, even when we disagree, even in the midst of a discovery dispute.

That said, I can give you some broad ideas. I believe that there are at least three areas that we have to recognize as our domain for addressing the rhetorical divide, three places where we lawyers can love enough.

First, there is our conversation. Let me quote Robert Redford’s lawyer character from that mediocre 80s movie “Legal Eagles:” “well-chosen words are the tools of our profession.” We can – we must – take ownership of our words. Some of us have been so close to our profession for so long that we have lost sight of the power of our words. The rest of the world looks to lawyers to pick the words by which we live. We are the wordsmiths, the models, the writers. It has to start with us.

You litigators in the room – let me say that better – we litigators in the room have choices to make. Without in any way weakening our positions or diluting our rhetoric, we can radically affect the tone of our dialog with one another. Some motions simply need not be made. Many others can be made honestly and directly – and persuasively, I might add – without lowering ourselves to our baser impulses.

You non-litigators are not exempt here. You make the phone calls, and you posture, too. Perhaps more directly, you draw the lines and set the wheels in motion that can run afoul of the rule of love.

We lawyers are the users of words, the masters of the lexicon. The term “silver-tongued” does not have to be followed by the word “devil.” We ought to retake ownership of our language and our turn of phrase to start the rhetorical world spinning in a different direction.

Perhaps something as simple as being the one to seek reconciliation is the right first step. I once had an assistant who wondered why I was the one always writing the “I’m sorry we have gotten crosswise” letter or email. The answer, of course, is that being right is rarely as important as loving one another.

No, we will not change the politics and the entertainment and even the email world very quickly. But we hold the key. We are the lawyers.

Second, we need to love better in the decisions that we make, the advice we offer, and the judgment we exercise. We lawyers are the guiders of decisions. When I started my law practice in Nashville, the very wise senior partner of my firm pointed to all the books in our law library – remember the days when law firms still used books? – and said, “Lyn, anybody can learn how to look something up in a book if he knows where to look. Our job is to know where to look. Nobody can know all the law, but good lawyers know where to find it. We are hired, not for our knowledge, but for our judgment.” You can blame choices on your clients all you want to, but every one of us knows that the world looks to our judgment at crunch time. The question then becomes – for us, for the Christian lawyers – how our faith informs our judgment.

How can that matter? We have to pursue our clients’ best interests. We are not in the business of changing our clients’ minds, are we? Well, remember that I am a client as well as a lawyer. There are many times that the railroad will make a decision based, at least in part, on the advice and judgment of our outside counsel. In my mixed client/lawyer role, I often find myself suggesting that we take an appropriately aggressive course that will not do as much personal damage as an alternative. We don’t have to make the motion for sanctions at the same time we ask for evidence to be excluded. It is a choice.

Now, I am not suggesting that as Christian lawyers we should advise our clients to abandon their best interests. I am not suggesting we leave the law books behind in favor of Sunday School quarterlies. But I do challenge you, the Christian lawyers, to ask yourselves if, in the exercise of your professional judgment, you can make a difference. I ask you to measure your judgment to see if it includes justice, mercy, kindness, patience, and love.

Third, and most important, we are depositories of trust. We have a model here, since our faith is all about placing our trust in Jesus Christ. You all know that, as lawyers, we are in positions of trust. To do our job, we have to have the trust of our clients. We want it. We seek it. As Christians, we have to be worthy of that trust.

Do you deserve it?

Those of you in the room who are parents, think about what you do to make yourself worthy of the trust of your children. Imagine being less than your absolute best, most loving parent when your child is counting on you most.

I know that lawyering and parenting are different. I know that our kids are more important than our clients. But the position of trust is analogous. The law calls it a fiduciary responsibility – for you and me and all of us Christian lawyers, it means walking worthy, having the mind of Christ, loving enough, whether we feel like it or not.

We can look around this room to see lawyers who deserve to have this trust because they operate on the basis of love. Famously, lawyers like Abraham Lincoln inspired this trust because of their choices growing out of their lives of faith and love. I think of my own grandfather, C.F. Wellborn, city attorney in Gladewater, Texas, who made countless choices that many other lawyers – his own wealthier and more famous lawyer brother among them – would not have made because they were the right and loving thing to do. He probably left some dollars and some elections on the table, but when the chips were down, people trusted him first.

We don’t love each other enough.

That has to change. The rhetorical divide has to be bridged. We have to love each other more.

And I say, let the lawyers lead the way. Let’s model love. Let’s be kind. Let’s choose words that don’t injure. Let’s don’t keep a record of wrongs. Let’s start bearing all things and hoping all things and believing all things. As hard as it is for this Bear to say, let’s start emulating some young Aggies I met at Kyle Field a month or so ago.

It is cliché to say “why can’t we all get along.” And it is cliché, in 2011, to answer that question with excuses about the internet and our freedom of speech and talk radio. It is not even enough to blame it on internet spades.

Let’s start loving each other more. And let it begin with us lawyers.

The Meaning of Fifty Years

2011-10-31T09:27:00.000-07:00

Below are comments I made at the celebration of my parents' Golden Wedding Anniversary.

What does this celebration represent? What is The Meaning of Fifth Years?

According to the National Family Growth Survey and the National Center for Health Statistics, only 65% of American marriages manage to make it ten years. Census Bureau statistics show that no more than 5% of marriages in this country make it to fifty years. That makes this event we celebrate tonight a statistically significant achievement. Then, when you think about the times in which we live, and in which Mom and Dad have lived as a married couple – the sixties, the seventies, the Me decade, postmodernism, Generations X and Y and whatever we are in now, the so-called post-Christian America - you realize what American society has decided about marriage over these past fifty years. When Mom and Dad married, more than 85% of American adults were married; now, that number hovers just over 50%, and just over a quarter of American adults under the age of 30 have chosen to tie the knot. Pew Research’s latest survey shows that nearly 40% of survey respondents say that marriage is becoming obsolete.

That can make this anniversary sound pretty impressive, but we all know that statistics can lie. So let’s move beyond statistics. Basic psychology teaches us that the most common stressors we face, in marriage and in life, include money issues, health issues, deaths of loved ones, moves, job changes, and kids. This marriage has survived by my count at least twenty-four different jobs, eleven moves, cancer in each spouse, deaths of parents and siblings, the bursting of the internet stock bubble, miscarriages, church splits, and me.

As an only child, I have had a unique perspective – the best view in the house - to watch this marriage. In thinking about what I wanted to say tonight, I have decided to focus on what I have learned from watching Mom and Dad be married. There are, of course, a plethora of things I (and most of you) could say about both Mom and Dad individually. These are two of the smartest, most involved, most varied, and most dearly loved people around. They have more degrees, life experiences, and friends than anybody else I know. Each of them is a teacher, an example, a writer, a speaker, a role model, a witness, and a leader.

But I want to focus on what I have learned from the two of them together, because, after all, tonight is a celebration of what they have done together, what they have made together. If you noticed, every single picture you have seen up on this screen has included both of them. I have lots of great and funny and candid pictures of each of them, but tonight is about the two of them together.

So, what have I, the only child with the ringside seat, learned from the fifty-year-old marriage? In the best Baptist tradition, I have three points to make.

1. Having a lot in common is overrated; having the right things in common is essential.

I did not know Wayne and Faye Robbins in 1961, but here is what I know about them. One was from Covington, Tennessee, the son of a farmer, who had grown up chopping cotton until he found baseball as a way out, a way to college, a way to being something more. The other was the child of a Texas school principal who became an attorney, the valedictorian who was ABD on a doctor’s degree from Vanderbilt. One had worked on church staffs and for Baptist Student Unions, as well as for more than one denominational college; the other had been a military policeman, a radio announcer, a private detective, a high school teacher, and a professional baseball player. One had been engaged – or nearly engaged – multiple times; the other never had. One had a brother who was a nationally known preacher; the other one had a brother who was a 16-year-old kid. One was at home as a native Texan; the other was a stranger in a strange land. One was nearly eight years older than the other.

Still, and despite these myriad differences, they shared critical things – faith in Jesus Christ; an experience in the church and parachurch groups like BSU that inexorably shaped their souls, minds, and hearts; dreams about family; a love of books and movies and history; a sense of calling.

When Gena and I married, we were very, very different people. We still are. There were those – and sometimes we ourselves were in this camp – who felt we were too different from each other to make a good marriage last. It was Gena who saw the fallacy in this line of thinking long before I did, but in retrospect, Gena’s understanding of how our differences would fit together and support each other made sense to me because of the model I had seen growing up. Gena and I, like Mom and Dad, share the critical things in common, and we are well into the twenty-second year of our marriage.

What all this tells me is that having the right things in common is far more important to marriage than having a bunch of random things in common. Being quote-unquote happy with your life or with each other every second is not really the right measure. Whether or not you both enjoy the Beatles or shellfish or taking walks in the rain or the other things that internet dating services ask about (so I’m told) pale in comparison to sharing the critical directions and convictions. Mom and Dad’s fifty years have taught me that.

2. Success is measured in terms that have little to do with what you will see on the news.

Every one of you knows Mom and Dad, and I know that you would all call them successes. My 46+ years of watching them has taught me a number of things about success:
a.First, we live in this world, and pursuing things that this world says are important – things like career and education and recognition - is not bad. It is how gifted people function in the world.
b.Second, when you pursue those goals honestly, you don’t always become rich and famous. Mom and Dad are comfortable, but they are by no means wealthy. They are, both individually and together, well known in a variety of spheres, but neither approaches celebrity status.
c.Third, pursuit of those goals – career, education, recognition – has to give way to more fundamental ideals. We could spend all night listing those ideals, but I am thinking about things like seeking and then following God’s call on your life; loving your family; loving those who are not your family; serving your church, even when your church is not serving you. I am talking about being available to coach your kid’s team and direct his play, developing yourself to know right answers so that you have right answers to give when the opportunity presents itself, going to visit car wreck victims who are friends of your son a thousand miles away but whose accidents happened in your home town (that happened twice, by the way), having the ability to write newspaper articles and poems and Sunday School lessons and military biographies and devotionals and sermons and letters and internet chat posts that actually mean something.

Mom and Dad are successes not because of the house in which they live or the numbers in their bank account. They are successes not because of the number of times their names have been in the paper. They are not even successes because fifty people showed up here from eighteen different cities as far away as California and Kentucky just to congratulate them on this occasion.

No. Mom and Dad are successes for entirely different reasons. I hope you think they are successes at parenting. They certainly are successes at grandparenting. They are successes at traveling. Far more importantly, they are successes at making and keeping freinds.
Mom and Dad are successes because they have heard the divine call on their lives – both individually and as a couple, a family – and have followed it. They are successes because they have both made themselves better and smarter than either had any right to expect to be. They are successes because everyone around them looks to them for modeling and advice. They are successes because they have loved people they did not know who still needed loving and loved when they did not feel like loving and loved when they did not even understand how to love. A Golden Wedding Anniversary is not just a lifetime achievement award. In this case, it is a clear mark of success. I have learned much about success from Mom and Dad.

3. A life spent in pursuit of and celebration of a relationship with Jesus Christ is a life well-lived.

This is not news to most of you, and I don’t intend for this to turn into a sermon. I want to make this last point instead to focus on how Mom and Dad have demonstrated the interrelation between their loving marriage and their lives as two disciples.

Mom and Dad do not agree on all religious topics. That is ok. Remember my first point – it is not necessary that they have everything in common. What they do agree on is the critical nature of their understanding of God’s will for their lives. What they do agree on is that their lives and our lives should revolve around a relationship with Jesus.

Mom says that I first asked her to explain the Trinity to me when I was three years old. That may say something about me, and it may say something about how God speaks to children, but it doubtless says something about the focus of our home life as I was growing up. It was the nature of things for us to discuss complex issues, and it was the nature of things for us to discuss issues of faith; so a complex issue of faith was, of course, second nature. To say that we had religious debates is really to misunderstand the nature of this family. It took Gena a while to understand that our intense discussions, often peppered with disagreement, were not heated disputes but rather were, and still are, thoughtful and penetrating examinations of concepts of passionate importance to us. As I grew up, the most important thing for us to discuss was the spiritual issue of the moment. This was never put on, artificial, or difficult – it was simply the way things were. It still is.

Please do not understand me to be putting Mom and Dad up on some sort of religious pedestal. That is not what I am doing. I don’t believe their intense focus on the things of God is anything different from what is demanded of all of us. Perhaps Mom and Dad are better read on these issues than many, and doubtless they can both articulate these concepts better than most; but I maintain that all Christian life is, or should be, centered on the faith, its questions and issues, and the discussions that naturally flow from it. Mom and Dad demonstrate the centrality of faith that should characterize all of us. That does not mean you have to be a stick in the mud who is unable to talk about baseball or popular music or politics or “The Andy Griffith Show;” I believe our family can go toe-to-toe with anybody on any of those things. It means that life starts and ends with our relationship with God and His call on us.

One of my best friends is a pastor in San Antonio. I listen to his sermons on the internet when I cannot hear him in person, which is most of the time. A month or so ago, he preached a sermon on First Corinthians 7, the passage where Paul instructs husbands and wives how to give themselves to each other. In his sermon, Bryan talked about God’s intention for marriage: how it is good and right for us to be married to someone who is radically different from us, as men and women inherently are and as Mom and Dad – and Gena and I – are. My friend’s sermon discussed marriage as a kind of workshop for being God’s people in the world. As we learn to live with and love and forgive and make allowances for someone so different under our own roof, we practice the love of God; we then are more ready to display the love that is just as necessary with others outside our living room who are also quite different from us. My own pastor preached just last Sunday on the connection between love of God and love of neighbor, reminding us that we often best experience the former by practicing the latter.

Mom and Dad’s married life has in turn been a workshop for me. I have seen two people who approach faith very differently, who think of church differently, who teach Sunday School differently, who pray differently, who love God’s children differently. But despite those differences, they have taught me the importance of approaching faith, thinking of church, teaching the scripture, prayer, and the love of God. None of you who knows them has any doubt of their faith and their relationship with Jesus Christ.

A marriage of fifty years deserves a party, a round of applause, and some time to reflect on what those years really mean.

A Bear in Aggieland

2011-10-16T19:49:00.000-07:00

To the editor of The Battalion (the Texas A&M school newspaper):

I am an alumus of Baylor, the father of a current Baylor student, a member of the Baylor Alumni Council, and an adjunct professor at the Baylor Law School.

I bought a ticket for Saturday’s “Battle of the Brazos” football game. Before leaving home, I put this note on my Facebook page: “On the road to College Station for the last foreseeable Baylor-A&M game. While I thoroughly enjoy rooting against the Aggies, we have to have a healthy respect for their good team, their rabid fans, and the awesome Kyle Field experience. Sic 'em.” I had been to games at Kyle Field before, so I knew what an incredible atmosphere the Aggies create for the games. Despite the unease between the two campus communities arising both out of the conference alignment situation and our natural rivalry, I was really looking forward to sharing in what may well be the last Baylor football game in College Station.

Having bought my ticket on eBay, I assumed I was getting it from some rich Aggie season ticket holder who could not make it to the game. Imagine my surprise, then, when I found myself in the middle of the A&M student section. Yes, I was the guy in green and gold about ten rows directly behind the Aggie Band. I am not ashamed to say that I was a little uncomfortable. For a Baylor fan, this could have been a scary place from which to watch the game.

It is the nature of competitive football for fans to support their own team and deride the other. Collectively, the Aggie fans were appropriately disdainful of the Bears, and there were one or two cheers (and one particular gesture – you know which one I mean) led by the Yell Leaders that crossed the line of offensiveness.

But I write to tell you how impressed I was with the individual A&M students who surrounded me. Not a single person was rude or even anything less than a perfect lady or gentleman. The people directly around me introduced themselves and talked with me. The young man in front of me, when I jokingly remarked that I hoped these new friends of mine would protect me if my Baylor shirt and cap attracted some mischief, said, “We Aggies are generally self-correcting. If anything happens, you let me know, and I will take care of it.” Chris, the Aggie sitting next to me, kept up a running conversation with me about the game throughout out the afternoon. As I turned to leave, the same young man in front of me (whose name I did not get) made a point to catch up with me and shake my hand, thank me for coming, and wish me safe travels going home.

We live in an increasingly uncivil world. I bleed green and gold, and I guess I was surprised that the middle of the A&M student section, during a rivalry football game surrounded by the disagreements and hurt feelings of the past weeks, would be a place where I would find such friendliness, sportsmanship, and genuine acceptance. I congratulate your students and your university. You showed me hospitality and some real hope for how we can all get along in the coming days.

While I did not Whoop, and I sat down to try to stay out of the way when everyone else locked arms and started swaying, I can say that I truly enjoyed my three and half hours in Aggieland. I even found myself enjoying the War Hymn – after all, any song that makes fun of Bevo and that school in Austin cannot be all bad!

Gig ‘em, and sic ‘em.

Lyn Robbins

Blinded

2011-10-12T11:37:00.000-07:00

The story of the Damascus Road, of Saul’s becoming Paul, is known well. It is the original “Blinded By the Light.”

Do you ever wonder what went through Paul’s mind immediately after blindness struck, while he was still on the road toward Damascus? He had not yet met Ananias. What he would later describe as “scales” had not yet fallen from his eyes. He was just blind.

Put yourself there for a moment. Saul/Paul knows what he saw… whom he saw. He knows the voice he heard. He knows that he is different, but what now? What difference will it make that he saw that light?

The truth is that there are many stories of blindness throughout scripture, and even beyond scripture, that teach us much.

Samson had it all. He was a judge, which was about as important as he could be. He had fame, a sexy girlfriend, and power. He could do whatever he wanted, and he knew he was destined to deliver the people of Israel from the horrid Philistines. But it was not enough for him. He got lazy, and he forgot who gave him his power. He lost it all. And then, he was blinded. Not by a light, not in the same way as Paul. No, Samson was blinded by the bad guys. But he was blinded just the same. And Samson learned. He began to understand what he had thrown away. He knew that he could never get back what he had lost. And yet, he felt power return, and he knew that God had not forgotten him. Even at the end of his life, he fulfilled God’s destiny.

Jonah could tell Paul, and us, that sometimes the dark is the best place to learn. Jonah spent three days in the dark. Not because his eyes did not work, but because the sun does not shine inside the belly of a big fish. Whether or not the Jonah story is a metaphor is not the point. The point is that Jonah was so far onto the wrong track that God had to stop him cold to get his attention.

Think back further, to a ninety-year-old woman. It was not per se blindness with her. It was something different, and perhaps more personal, than that: pregnancy at the age of ninety. Nine months of bloating, swollen ankles, and kicks on top of osteoporosis and hearing loss! God got Sarah’s attention. So she laughed. Wouldn’t you? Can you think of anything funnier than turning up your hearing aid to find out that you are going to be pregnant, when you have been childless for ninety years? That’s a riot. It took Sarah a long time to get to the point where she thought the birth of Isaac was a great thing. She had to go through months of something she had never experienced before, and she had to do it with a dried up, elderly body that had no business going through it, and a husband who was ten years older than she was. It was no more natural for her than blindness was for Paul.

Then there is John, who was exiled. Not just away, but alone. Just John on a very small island, with nothing to do but write letters. It wasn’t long until he started seeing things.

Maybe this happens more than we think. Maybe there are times that God has to make sure there are no distractions, when He has to get our complete attention.

For Job, it happened when he lost it all.

For Philemon, it happened when he lost something (or should I say someone). It was devastating to him. He had to review his whole life – what did he really believe? What did he value?

Helen Keller could not remember losing her sight, because she lost it when she was less than two years old. She got sick as a small child, and the disease left her without sight and hearing: Blind and deaf and unable to talk in the back woods of Alabama. She was never in the belly of a fish or on a desert island, but I can’t really believe that anybody has ever been more alone than she was.

For Martin Luther, it was betrayal. A man of God and a preacher of the gospel, he was called a heretic. Talk about being blinded… for him, it was being blindsided.

For Corrie Ten Boom, it was a prison camp, a concentration camp built for Jewish people. She was not Jewish, but she was imprisoned among them. And only because she had tried to help.

And of course, there is Jesus. He knows about being alone and being betrayed. For Him, it was not three days in a fish or on a desert island. It was in a tomb. There is no darkness darker than that.

It would not be hard to decide that God is smiting us with blindness, but that conclusion is inconsistent with what we know about God. God did not smite Paul. In fact, God saved Paul. Remember your Exodus? “While my glory passes by, I will hide you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with my hand as I pass. Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen. For no man can look upon my face and live.”

Yes, when Paul met the risen Jesus on the road, blindness was a gift. God protected him so that he would not be overcome by seeing all there is of God. Paul was not then ready, not then able. One day, Paul would be ready, and he would understand. He would write that the gift of the Holy Spirit means that we can become able to see the full glory of God. But on the road, Paul was not yet ready.

When Samson was blind, he saw that he was not self-sufficient. We are not the source of our own strength. We owe everything to God.

In the darkness, Jonah learned that God never takes His eyes off of us. His plan for us endures even the weirdest circumstances and the widest detours we can take. When Jonah’s soul fainted within him, he could remember the Lord. Jonah’s prayer went up to His holy temple, and he cried out to God, and God answered.

Sarah learned to see that there is nothing that God cannot do, even when we have given up all hope. He showed her, in what she thought were her most useless days, that He could use her for His purposes. It was a vision from which ninety years of life had blinded her.

John learned that when there is nothing to see, God sends vision. He learned that Jesus Christ is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, that He is worthy to receive glory and honor and wisdom and blessing and riches and power. He learned how extravagant the love of the Father is, that we should be called children of God!

Job never learned the answers to all his questions, but he came to know that it is OK that we don’t understand it all, for we are only human. Where were we when God laid the foundations of the earth? Do we know what it sounded like when all the morning stars and the angels sang together for joy? No. We know that the redeemer lives and that He will stand at the last day. That is enough.

Philemon learned that we must love and forgive, just as God loves and forgives. He learned that what he had lost was really useless until it was touched by God.

Helen Keller learned the name for God. She had always known Him. He came to her in her silent darkness. But now she knew His name.

Martin Luther learned that our God is a mighty fortress.

Corrie Ten Boom learned that there is no place, no matter how dark, where God cannot find us.

What if we are suddenly alone? What if we are betrayed, abandoned, rejected? What if we lose those we love? What if we cannot see what Christ is setting before us? What if everything we understand is suddenly taken away? What if we are asked to do something that all common sense tells us we cannot do, because we are too old or too young or too weak or too … whatever? What if we are blinded by a light?

Or what if we simply lose focus?

We are often blind. We cannot see what is there before us. We lose our focus. I was in a bookstore the other day, and some of the Christian bestsellers illustrated the point so clearly. One was all about how we can simply decide to be happy. Another proclaimed that the single most important issue before us is how the United States chooses to treat the current political nation of Israel.

The number of Christian books that were focused on Jesus was way too small.

We can lose our focus. Our blindness can be self-inflicted. There is nothing wrong with the power of positive thinking. Many Christians hold pro-Israeli political views. I am not disparaging either. But neither is the point of what we are about.

Like Paul, we are blind. Like Saul, perhaps we need to be blinded from the things that have captured our focus.

There is so much that we need to learn, to see. And the only way we will see some of it is if we don’t see anything else. We need to see Jesus. We need to learn about Him. We need to know what it means when He calls. We need to understand to see people and to love people the way that God loves them.

When a storm tosses a child of God into the sea, God sometimes send a fish, but that is to save, not to harm.

Paul learned much that he could only learn first as a blind man: God is the king who is immortal and invisible. Even after he got sight back, Paul would not be able to see God, to understand God, to take God in. Whether we have eyesight or not, God is invisible to us: not because He is transparent but because we have limited vision. At best, we see through a glass darkly. One day, we shall see Him face to face. Now, we are beginning to know in part, but we are still so blind. One day, we shall see God and know Him fully.

Creating God in Our Image: Post-Modernism Run Amok

2011-09-15T19:30:00.000-07:00

There is a bracing article in Tuesday's USA Today. George Barna, religious pollster whose new book cites some breathtaking trends and data, is quoted in the paper about "designer" Christianity. Barna says, "People say, 'I believe in God. I believe the Bible is a good book. And then I believe whatever I want.'"

The attractiveness of this view, of course, is easy to see. When we are the ultimate authority about all things supernatural, religious, and extra-sensoral, nobody can argue with us. The article sites a woman named Sheila who says that her religion is "Sheilaism... just my own little voice."

I understand where this comes from. Philosophically, today's post-modern denial of ultimate truth means that everybody can reach his or her own conclusions. And, to be fair, there are doubtless many questions asked sincerely in our churches for which there is not a single clear answer. We can and do have legitimate disagreement and debate about a number of issues of the faith. When this debate is allowed to extend to what are the bedrock tenets of doctrine and ultimate answers are not agreed upon, however, the healthy discussion becomes an excuse for designer Sheilaism.

Empirically, so many authority figures in the church have turned out to be charlatans, definitive hypocrites, laughingstocks, or combinations of all of the above that the public ideal of church or religious authority is often dismissed. Even when they are not Ernest Angley or Jimmy Swaggart, preachers have gravitated (like much else of our public rhetoric) to extreme positions that make little sense to many.

Separate and apart from its leaders, the church itself is to blame. The debates between the liberals and the conservatives, the moderates and the fundamentalists, the mainliners and the evangelicals, the moderns and the traditionalists, the black-and-whites and the authentics, and the serious and the casual among churchgoers have left many both in the church and without it who could not care less.

But I think there is another reason that we may be, as Barna says with only a hint of tongue-in-cheek whimsy, headed for "310 million people with 310 million religions." That reason is a tremendous arrogance. It is simply very difficult for most modern people - at least most modern Americans - to accept that they are not the final authority on everything. We live in a world where we have so trumpeted our "rights" that we have created a false sense of superiority in each individual, and any institution that dares to assert guidance or principle that overrides individual choice is derided.

Of course individuality, freedom, and personal rights are critical. Historically, however, these concepts have carried with them understandings of both horizontal and vertical responsibility. Horizontally, our freedoms have always ended at the end of our fellow citizens' noses. Vertically - as countless of our historical documents and speeches demonstrate - our freedom has been viewed as bestowed by and subject to higher power. I am not suggesting that our nation's founders were beholden to any particular brand of current Christianity; but it is either ignorance or the worst kind of revisionism to argue - as many now try - that the nation's fathers were not profoundly influenced by their view of God.

To form our own versions of "Sheilaism" is to say that we have the last word on what God is like. It is to make God into our image. It is the folly of Job's friends, who all demonstrate throughout that story a combination of proclaiming that they know what God is like and projecting what they think God ought to be like. The grand finale of that story is not God's answer of their questions but rather the self-evident question that God presents to all of us who get too big for our britches: "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?... Tell me if you know."

This is ultimately a failure of liberal Christianity. We can say what we like about fundamentalists, but fundamentalists do not fail to recognize the authority of God. It is those of us who attend the moderate and liberal churches who have to look in the mirror and ask if we have so abandoned the fundamentalist slant that we have forgotten the fundamental: God is God and we are not. In the beginning, God. God is creator and sustainer, and we are subject to God's laws and rules and - yes - grace.

The temptation to make God over in our image is clear, but so too is the solution. The authority of God exists even when God's messengers are flawed. The sovereignty of God is supreme even when God, in God's grace, allows us choice. The power of God is always present even when God withholds judgment.

We have to recognize our weakness, our need, our failings. The Bible calls that sin. Sheilaism cannot save anyone. To channel Dr. Phil, "how is that workin' for ya'?"

God made man in His own image. In the image of God created He him. Male and female created He them.... And God called His creation good.

We would do well to remember.

It's The Way Things Ought to Be

2011-08-13T21:03:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow, we leave to take Trey, our oldest child, to college.

I have not cried.

I suppose that there will be some weepy moments as we drive away, leaving him on the campus that I know so well. I suppose that, remembering how it feels suddenly to be "on your own" no matter how responsible you are, I will have a stirring in the pit of my stomach as I realize what he is feeling.

But I am not sad.

This is the way things ought to be. This is what we have been shooting for since his birth. Parenthood is the job you strive to work yourself out of.

I have friends whose children are leaving for school as well. One says she does not know what she will do without her only child, who will be several states away. Another says that if I say I haven't cried, I am lying.

Well, I'm not crying, and I'm not lying.

I remember a sermon that I heard Dan Francis preach years ago. The title - not original with him - was "Roots and Wings." It struck me then that a parent's job is to ground the child and then let the child go.

We have worked hard on the roots for almost 18 years. Now, we turn to the wings part.

I will write again when we get back. Perhaps I will have been stricken with loss, with the knowledge that never again will our family life be the same. Maybe the idea of not having Trey around all the time will have torn me up.

But I don't think so. The truth is that he is gone much of the time now, even when he is "at home." The fact is that he is very ready to be on his own.

Where he goes, I know the way. I know that he will encounter uncertainty, temptation, hard times, rejection, failures (both large and small), and days of utter loss. But there will also be discovery, challenge, fun, achievement, growth, and (undoubtedly) love. There will be friends, old and new. There will be new knowledge. His academic world - defined by the nature of high school as English taught by those to whom it has been assigned, math, history taught by coaches, foreign language, and basic science - is about to discover psychology, political science, literature taught by those who write it, history taught by real historians, music theory, philosophy, and scores of subjects he has not yet really imagined. Before him lie principles of deontology, third world literature, theoretical mathematics, rhetorical criticism, quantum physics, and great texts that will boggle his mind even as they fascinate and elate him. Names like Kierkegaard, Plato, Burns, King, Ellison, Hawking, Arendt, Teresa, Rawls, Einstein, Malthus, Russell, Jefferson, Aeschylus, Watson and Crick, Locke and others who may be no more than game show answers right now will become permanently etched on his emerging understanding of humanity and his role in it.

Yes, he is ready. Yes, we will miss him, but how exciting this is! How right it is that he step out.

Our little boy is long gone. Tomorrow, we take him to college.

It's the way things ought to be.

Songs of "Wicked": The Gospel in Three Acts

2011-07-19T20:40:00.000-07:00

Last week, I had the pleasure of seeing the musical "Wicked" for the second time. What a great show, on so many levels.

As I listened carefully to lyrics of songs that blew past me the first time, I was struck with three of them particularly. No, I do not think the plot of "Wicked" is the gospel or an allegory of the Bible or even something that particularly tells part of the Christian story. What I do think is that these three songs, taken out of the context of the story of "Wicked" and viewed on their own, can be used to describe with some specificity three major acts of our Christian lives.

If you don't know the story of "Wicked," I don't think this blog will spoil anything for you, at least not any surprises or major plot developments.

- The first song is Elphaba's solo "The Wizard and I." Regardless of what ultimately turns out when she meets the wizard, think with me here just about what this song says in the context of what we see and feel when we become Christians, when we enter into a relationship with Christ. It is at that moment when we realize that, walking with Jesus, we are empowered to new things. We understand that a relationship with Christ means that we are changed, we are different, we are loved.

Elphaba sings, in part: "He'll say to me, 'I see who you really are.'... Once I'm with the wizard, my whole life will change, cause when you're with the wizard, no one thinks you're strange. No father is not proud of you, no sister acts ashamed, and all of Oz has to love you when by the wizard you're acclaimed... And one day, he'll say to me, 'Elphaba, a girl who's so superior... would it be all right if I de-greenified you?' Oh, what a pair we'll be, the wizard and I! My future is unlimited... And I'll stand there with the wizard, feeling things I've never felt... and so it will be for the rest of my life, and I'll want nothing else till I die. Held in such high esteem, when people see me they will scream for half of Oz's favorite team: the wizard and I!"

I do not pretend that conversion is purely so emotional, nor have I forgotten that, in the show, the wizard fails to live up to Elphaba's dreams. Still, I cannot miss the first act of the gospel here - the change that we know is coming upon us when we first choose to walk with Jesus.

- The second song is "Defying Gravity." Act Two of the gospel, following our conversion, is the move from understanding Jesus as Savior to understanding Him as Lord. It is the beginning stages of knowing what walking out on faith really means. There is much we cannot do in our own strength that faith allows us to do.

Elphaba sings: "Something has changed within me. Something is not the same. I'm through with playing by the rules of someone else's game. Too late for second-guessing, too late to go back to sleep. It's time to trust my instincts, close my eyes, and leap. It's time to try defying gravity, and you can't pull me down... There's no fight we cannot win, just you and I together, defying gravity."

Faith is a mystical thing. It defies the rules that the world understands but fulfills the plan of the Master. Those who choose to remain earthbound will never understand. It is Act Two of the gospel.

- The final song is "For Good." Having been converted by our relationship with Christ, and having exercised our faith, we are ready to affect the world. We love our neighbors as we love ourselves, and as a result, the world is changed.

"I've heard it said that people come into our lives for a reason, bringing something we must learn. And we are led to those who help us most to grow ... I know who I am today because I knew you... Who can say if I've been changed for the better? Because I knew you, I have been changed for good... So much of me is made from what I've learned from you. You'll be with me like a handprint on my heart, and now, whatever way our stories end, I know you have re-written mine by being my friend... I do believe I've been changed for the better. Because I knew you, I have been changed for good."

Isn't that how the gospel ought to play out? Walking with Jesus, we are changed. Like "The Wizard and I," Jesus and I together offer promise to my life that I could not see before my conversion. Like "Defying Gravity," our willingness to step out on faith makes things possible that are nothing more than wild fairy tales to the rest of the world.

But the reason for all of that is so that we can touch the world for good. Because the world knows us, those who have chosen to walk with Christ and defy the world's gravity, the world is changed for good.

Did God Really Say That?

2011-06-30T17:04:00.000-07:00

The story of Abraham and Isaac from Genesis 22 is another one of those Bible stories that even those of you not immersed in the church know, at least tangentially. According to scripture, God tested Abraham, telling him to take his only son Isaac up a mountain to sacrifice him there. Obediently, Abraham headed off with his son. When the boy asked where the lamb was for the sacrifice, Abraham responded that God would provide. Atop the mountain, Abraham bound his child and raised the knife before the angel stopped him. Then Abraham saw a ram caught in a thicket nearby, and Abraham sacrificed the ram instead of the boy.

Because my pastor preached on this story recently, and because the lectionary made this the topic for many churches in the last couple of weeks, I have found myself in several deep conversations about this passage. The basics of the conversation are this: Did God really tell Abraham to kill his own child? And if God really did that, why would I want to follow such a mean, sadistic God?

I think God really did say it, but I respect those who do not. I understand the interpretation that says that God did not say it, but I want to explain why I disagree.

To begin with, however, let me explain the other view, at least as I understand it. The writer of Genesis collected oral histories that had been passed down, augmented, interpreted, and amplified. Those stories were about people like Abraham, who lived in a primitive time. Abraham himself lived among the Philistines, a primitive people worshiping a god called Dagon. The culture times in general, and the Dagon-worshiping Philistines in particular, called for child sacrifice. It would have been exceedingly natural for Abraham to believe that God wanted him to sacrifice his child. The story then progresses to a point where the angel stops Abraham's hand just in time, and Abraham learns that our God does not demand child sacrifice and is in fact interested in far more loving and heart-oriented ways.

I agree with everything in that previous paragraph, but I disagree with the conclusion that God did not say what Genesis 22 records. Let me see if I can explain why.

First, scripture is clear. It is hard for me to interpret away "God tested Abraham.... Then God said, 'Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there....'" Redacting or smoothing out the difficult parts of scripture that don't line up with our theology on the basis that they are just "interpretations" is a slippery slope towards making God over in our image. It could be our theology that needs to be polished a little.

Second, I believe there is a strong difference between saying that God is "mean and sadistic" and saying that God is "demanding." Through the very life of Jesus we find out that God demands that we - like Arbaham - are to put away the things that bind us, that we leave father and mother and sister and brother, that we take up our cross to follow. The example of Christ is His willingness to give up His life and God's willingness to sacrifice God's own son. The parable of the pearl of great price teaches that we are to give up all that we have to gain the kingdom of God. And on, and on, and on. Nothing about that is easy.

What would be mean and sadistic would have been for God to allow Abraham actually to have killed his son, but the story does not end that way. I am not minimizing the test, but the test was ultimately not about child sacrifice; in fact, one point of the story is that God decidedly does not want child sacrifice. The test was about obedience when we do not understand. The test was about trusting God.

When my children were small, before they learned to swim, they would stand on the side of the pool. From the water, I would call on them to jump. I did not explain that my arms were strong enough to catch them. I just asked them to jump. I taught them to trust me. They learned to jump into water and know that their father would provide protection. It even turned out to be fun.

Third, I do not think that Abraham believed that God would ultimately require him to kill Isaac. Remember, God had already told Abraham - in covenant language - that he would have offspring as countless as the stars, and that this covenant would be accomplished through Isaac. Those words had to be ringing in Abraham's ears as he led Isaac to the mountain. Indeed, Abraham's words in the story are plain: "God Himself will provide the lamb." Abraham's obedience here is counted, we are told, as faith. Abraham believed God and did what God told him to do.

Fourth, we must always read stories like this, especially from early in the Old Testament, with an understanding of progressive revelation. When our two-year-old daughter wants to touch the shiny round red thing on the stove, we yell "no." We tell her not to touch the stove without explaining either the theory of thermodynamics or how our ovwerwhelming love for her means that we are denying her the temporary fun of touching the burner; similarly, God's early explanations to the chosen people were direct without including all that we now know about God and theology. As scripture stories begin, we learn that God is creator. Quickly following that is the idea that God demands obedience. Then, we get a long lesson in the holiness of God and the holiness God expects from God's people. We start getting some ideas that God gives to us and answers our prayers in the stories of Samuel and Kings, and the Psalms of David finally begin to talk of God's love. It is not really until the writings of Isaiah and Jeremiah that we begin to get a clear definition of the love of God, and of course it is not until the appearance of Jesus that we see the love of God fully. And yes, there are early glimpses of God's grace - clothes for Adam and Eve, the mark of Cain, an ark for Noah - but the concept of grace as anything other than a form of one of many religious adjectives for God ("gracious") is scant before the prophets.

In other words, as of Genesis 22, God is still in the business of teaching the basics of obedience. I am not suggesting that God was any different than God is now - no more sadistic or cruel in ancient times than today - but instead that God was reinforcing a prior issue. God called on Abraham to obey and expected obedience. That of course foreshadows our Lord calling on us for radical obedience. Greater love has no one than this, that we lay down our lives.

That is hard. It is difficult. But it is not sadistic. We know God better than that. And the God we know better than that now is the same God who called to Abraham.

Fifth, the ram in the thicket no doubt is a type for Jesus, the substitutionary atonement who takes our place atop the sacrificial pyre. If the call had not been there to sacrifice Isaac, the shedding of that ram's blood would have meant far less.

Some are frustrated that they do not hear God speak today in the same way that Abraham and other Old Testament figures heard God. Some figure that if we don't have burning bushes and talking donkeys today, then perhaps those Old Testament stories really are not so literal. Maybe they are just interpretations of events told in dramatic ways.

I often share that frustration, but I come back to this: Unlike Moses and Abraham, we have scripture to record the words of God. Unlike Balaam, we have Jesus and the indwelling Holy Spirit of God to speak to us constantly, showing us what God wants and what God is like. Those ancients who predated Pentecost and the gathering of scripture did not have those advantags, and God compensated by speaking to them in other ways.

It is fortunate that God has never asked me to sacrifice any of my children, for I am pretty sure my faith would not stand up to the test in the way Abraham's did. In fact, other than Abraham, the only person to have such a requirement was God Himself.

Yes, I believe God really told Abraham to take his son, his only son, whom he loved, and sacrifice him on the mountain. I believe Abraham followed because Abraham obeyed God, and because Abraham remembered the covenant of God and knew that God had long-term plans for Isaac, and because Abraham believed that the God who tested him was also the God "who will provide."

Is it a hard story? Oh yes. Does it teach us much? Oh yes.

When God Is Silent

2011-06-17T19:46:00.000-07:00

There are times we have to hold on to that which we cannot see or hear. We have to hold on to what and whom we know.

That is true with marriage and with friendship and with why we are still in our jobs.

And it is true with God.

God is not talking to me right now. I am reading scripture every day. I am active in church. I am praying. I am listening. God is silent.

I have learned not to be upset about that. I remember times of clarity in the Word of God and in the word of God. I remember times of direction and spiritual certainty. I know without doubt that God has spoken to me multiple times.

It is just not happening right now.

And that is ok. The will of God has been demonstrated clearly at times through study of scripture, through prayer life, through worship, through the voice of a friend or a mentor, and through experiences. Other times, the will of God is elusive and even silent, for a while.

God is not playing tricks. When I am hearing Him clearly, I walk, obedient and trusting, with Him. Then, when the voice of God is not clear, I walk where I know to walk, and I trust that I am walking where He wants me to walk. A big facet of faith is trusting that I am being led, even when I don't hear the commands. I have to trust the signs - my talents, my likes, what I am obviously good at, what the right people ask me to do – in concert with those times of my clear understanding of God’s voice through scripture and prayer and all those things I put in the paragraph above. If I walk where God is leading when His voice is clear, then I know I am on the right path when I don’t hear Him so well.

The silence of God can be like the doldrums. Literally, the doldrums are those periods at sea when there is no wind. A sailing ship that hits the doldrums can’t go where it wants to go. It is at the mercy of the current.

In life, the doldrums are those times when we have no wind in our sails. We feel powerless to control what is happening to us. We feel that life is moving along without us.

We have relationship doldrums, where those around us seem to be moving at a pace that does not include us. Those we love and those with whom we spend time have not really changed, but we are not feeling any excitement, any spark, and transference of energy between ourselves and them. After a while, we can wonder if we are in the wrong boat and whether anybody we know ever cared about us.

The periodic silence of God is the spiritual doldrums, when it seems that God has ceased speaking, when Bible study holds little of new interest, when worship itself seems routine. Before long, we can wonder if we ever really heard God speak. We wonder if the current will just sweep us away.

I have grown to understand that the doldrums are a natural part of life. It is the rest in the symphony that makes the crescendo that much more important. It is the black in the painting that allows the master to create that extra perspective. It is the doldrums that allow the best of the sailors to watch for and take advantage of the slightest breeze; before he knows it, he has found the headwind.

Doldrums are not fun, but they are not a disaster, and they are certainly not unique to any of us. Part of maturity is knowing they are coming and recognizing them when they arrive. I try not worry about them, and I do my best not to let them throw me off my game. Perhaps the silence is meant to allow me to take advantage of the rest.

We walk by faith, not by sight... or by hearing. We know what we know. Those who love me still love me. God is still present, even if quiet.

The Theology of Exhaustion

2011-06-12T20:47:00.000-07:00

I don't mean to whine. I know that lots of folks are busy.

I am tired. I am so tired that I cannot make a meaningful contribution to a conversation with my wife about upcoming birthday parties and whether to buy new cushions for the outside furniture. I am so tired that random songs are going through my head with no explanation - today it is "Pancho and Lefty" and "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?".

So, not to whine, but here are my last six days - I taught at a trial college for 30 excellent young lawyers who want to get better. When your students are 27-to-40-year-old professionals, there is no letting up or sliding. You have to bring it, constantly, for four days from 8 till 6. Then, each night of the college, there were fun but draining social events. Two of the nights, I took friends from the college to see Gena and my two daughters in a local production of "The Sound of Music." (I guess that explains one of the songs in my head.) One night was a ball game, and one night was our traditional trip to Trail Dust to go dancing with the students. To top it off, Saturday morning brings a mock trial for the benefit of the students, and this year, I was one of the participants in the mock trial.

The college was over at noon on Saturday, and I promptly drove to Houston for a wedding, after which I drove back home, arriving at 2:30 this morning. Later this morning, I taught Sunday School, sang in the choir, saw my two older kids off to youth camp, and brought my youngest and her friend home for a sleepover.

I had to clean the pool filters.

Enough whining.

In the midst of all this, God speaks.

Not, today, with complex deontological prompts. Not in eight-part harmony. No, today, I hear the age-old message to be still and know that He is God. Today I hear, through the haze, that it is all ok, that I can let down for an hour or two, that I am covered in the cleft of the rock.

Jesus famously told his apostles to go away with Him to rest. In truth, He did not get much rest, since the demoniacs and the physically ill and the hungry never left - or leave - Him alone. But He calls for me to rest, and to rest with Him.

Frantic pace is not bad... it is just frantic. It needs some balance.

Today, I am finding that balance in a simple concept - when I can't, He can. When I am weak, He is strong. He watching over Israel slumbers not, nor sleeps.

It is ok for me to be exhausted, to whine a little, and to take a nap.

He's got me covered today.

The Good New Days

2011-05-26T08:15:00.000-07:00

Periodically, I get an email that is making the circuit, reminiscing in a “Pleasantville” sort of way about halcyon days gone by, when movies cost a nickel and nobody had to worry about locking their doors, when the harshest word on television was “Gee whiz” and nobody had ever heard of AIDS. Merle Haggard would be proud.

Don’t get me wrong. I think that the language and the subject matter on television are dangerous. We eat too much fast food. The internet brings much bad with its good. Our political debate, with its talk show extremism and unwillingness to accept the truth when it is placed in front of our eyes on certified public documents, is depressing. Casual public immorality, STDs, the pandemic of divorce, and the level of disrespect for what I would call basic values are distressing.

Still, I think the status quo has a lot going for it. I am excited to be raising teenagers in this era. The opportunities that abound dwarf what was available for me, much less for my grandparents. Health is much better, wealth is significantly greater, and educational horizons are exponentially beyond what the “Leave It to Beaver” generation could have reasonably anticipated.

To reduce this thought to a microcosm, consider how I spent my day today so far. Let me catalog for you – not in a Twitter “here is what I am having for breakfast” kind of way – how I have spent the three and a half hours I have been awake. I am struck by how I routinely conduct my life today in ways that would have been unthinkable fifteen years ago, much less in the 1950s.

I was awakened by an alarm on a clock with a digital readout. I did not have to wind the clock. I was able to press a “snooze” button which automatically programmed the alarm to reset and sound again nine minutes later.

I did not have to worry about having enough hot water for my shower.

I pressed a button so that my garage door would open and pressed another button so my car would start, without my having to turn the ignition with a key. On the way to the airport, I listened to ESPN radio, where I heard discussion about a basketball game. I did not have to wait for details about the game, because I had been able to watch it live, in high-definition color, last night. Instead, I heard analysts from five or six different locations offer opinions and anecdotes about the teams.

If snooze buttons and national sports radio do not sound vital, keep reading.

I interrupted listening to the radio broadcast to make a couple of phone calls while I was driving. I did not have to take my hands off the steering wheel to do this, however, because I could simply push one button and then speak to the microphone invisibly planted somewhere in my car. The calls went through flawlessly. One of the calls was to the airline, where a disembodied voice told me to which terminal I needed to drive to catch my flight.

When I arrived at the airport, so that I will remember where I parked my car, I pulled a portable telephone out and used it to take a picture (!) of the sign indicating the section of the parking lot where I was. I did not have a ticket for the airplane, but that was OK. I walked up to a small machine and typed in a number. Shortly, the machine gave me a piece of paper that allowed me to move through security and later board the plane. The security process involved my sending my bags through one machine and walking through another. Nobody touched me, and I was through the entire process – which included a longer line today than usual – in about ten minutes.

While waiting to board my plane, I read, on a small device I keep attached to my belt, about twenty communications – we used to call them “letters” when they arrived on paper – sent to me by friends and work colleagues this morning. I was able to answer them and send my responses within minutes of when they had been sent to me; in one case, a colleague and I exchange seven letters in the space of about twenty minutes. On the same device, I checked into what is called a “social network” site long enough to catch up on the goings on of about seventy-five of my friends in about nine states.

Still using the same device, I read an editorial from the Los Angeles Times and two articles written by recognized scholars, one in Dallas and one in Louisville.

When the time came, I boarded the plane, showing the airline employee the piece of paper I had gotten out of the little machine when I arrived at the airport. (That is the only piece of paper I have touched for the whole morning other than a napkin.) Now I sit in my seat, typing this essay on a portable machine with capabilities that would have required a large room to hold fifteen years ago.

I was not "dehumanized" by this technology; I was simply helped out. I still read books, talk to people face to face, walk around in the sunshine, smell flowers, and pat the heads of puppies.

Yes, there is much about today that is not as good as “it used to be.” But there is also much today that makes life so much better. That is worth acknowledging.

OK, now I am going to shut down this computer and turn on my portable DVD player, which is plugged into a small outlet in my airline seat. I will listen through noise-canceling earphones.

And I will watch an episode or two of “Magnum PI,” a show from back in the good old days.

News for Readers of Blogarithmic Expressions

2011-05-16T12:32:00.000-07:00

I am pleased and excited to announce the publication of my new book, In the Court of the Master: An Ordinary Man's Walk with an Extraordinary God . For those of you who regularly read this blog, the style and subjects of my book will be familiar. I have chosen my practice of law as a motif on which to build a discussion of some of the questions that face both us Christians who wonder about facets of our faith and non-Christians who are curious what this whole "church" thing is all about.

Here is the blurb my publisher wrote: "In the Court of the Master: An Ordinary Man's Walk with an Extraordinary God is an examination and exaltation of the Christian life from the perspective of a practicing attorney. Taking images and language fresh from the courtroom, Robbins provides a unique perspective on living with Christ. The author is not only familiar with legal terminology and understanding, he also possess a thorough knowledge of Christian hymnody and contemporary culture. In the Court of the Master will provide the reader with a better understanding of what it means to live before the only Judge who truly matters."

I hope you will be interested in reading the book. The easiest way to get it is to go to my new website, www.LynRobbins.com, and click on the "Order Lyn's book" tab. You can also order it through Amazon.com. I don't know yet what stores (if any) will stock it on shelves. There will be a Kindle and a Nook version at some point - they may be ready now, I am just not sure. My hope is that the book will be interesting to you and will be something that you can share with others who may be asking some of these same questions. I also hope that it will open some doors for me to speak to churches and groups and congregations, so if you know of any...

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read this note of shameless advertisement. If you have questions, you can email me at Lyn@LynRobbins.com.

Mixed Emotions, Two Weeks Later

2011-05-16T12:30:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago, I posted a blog here that has gotten more reaction than almost anything else I have written. The reaction has not come from only one side.

Some of my friends have shaken their heads and wondered where my sudden "liberal angst" was coming from. Why would I worry about patriotic Americans celebrating military victory?

Some of my other friends have wondered why I hesitated at all in the blog. How could I possibly understand anyone celebrating the death of any human being under any circumstances?

It tempts me to take the earlier blog down, but that would be the chicken way out. I wrote that in the heat of the moment. So I think it is fair for me to come back now and ask if my reactions are different.

Well, we know more facts now. It looks as if, in fact, there was no wife-as-a-shield, and it looks as if there was not the "firefight" that was initially reported.

On the other hand, I am becoming more and more convinced that the vast majority of those celebrating were reflecting on a military victory in a way much like many celebrations of our past, from Bull Run to VE Day.

So here is my take now. I have no problem with the military action. I have no problem with those who celebrate our military victory.

Where I think my reaction was justified was with those who have - or appear to have - blood lust for an individual. The word I used in my original blog was "giddy" - some of those whose celebration approached "Ding Dong! The witch is dead!" appeared to me to be bloodthirsty. The celebrations of some seemed to me to be bloodthirsty, kind of like some fans of football or Nascar or hockey who seem to be there just to see the bloodshed or the fight.

I know that was not most of you. I know that exultation in this great turn in the War on Terror is not an unChristian act.

All I meant to do was express a view that I felt - and that I still feel - that perhaps the worst part of war is this emotion that is brought out in some of us to revel in the blood sport. As I said in the original email, that should give us pause.

That is my only point, but I still believe it. Once we have paused and evaluated why we feel the way we do, we can move on. But we ought at least to think about it.

The Cost of Doing the Right Thing

2011-05-10T20:27:00.000-07:00

Interesting story on the cover of today's USA Today. It seems that churches who want to practice forgiveness are running into resistence from their attorneys and insurance companies.

This caught my attention. I am, among other things, my church's attorney. I am called upon to give advice about things like liability for the church. When asked, I advise the church on what actions might expose the church to liability.

That is a legal opinion. When I advise a business, I expect the business leaders to take my legal advice and apply business judgment to it in order to decide what to do. It is not different for the church. I give a legal opinion and expect the church to apply the church's collective judgment in deciding what to do.

The story in the paper is about a church who had a staff member who sexually abused some girls in the church. The church is apologizing and publicly accepting some of the blame. The church's insurers are apparently apoplectic. The article quotes a number of people about the "widespread issue" of churches taking actions in violation of the wishes of their attorneys and insurers.

I say good for them. Of course actions of a church are often going to be costly. Nobody ever said anything different. The insurers and the attorneys are right to say that taking responsibility and offering an apology is bad from a liability standpoint.

So what? Since when is doing the right thing governed by the cost?

Mixed Emotions

2011-05-02T13:18:00.000-07:00

Osama bin Laden was a very, very bad man. He was responsible for more evil than virtually anybody else we have seen in decades. Certainly he was in the same league with Milosovic and Pol Pot in character if not in sheer numbers. He had blood on his hands.

Still, it is hard for me to be totally joyful about a sniper's bullet to the brain killing a human being.

I understand just war. I understand self-defense and defense-of-nation and defense of all that is good. The man had to be eliminated from the world stage, and it needed to have been done years ago.

Still, I was much happier with the capture and trial of Saddam Hussein. There is just something about that intentional sniper's bullet to the brain.

As the news comes in, it is becoming clear that capture was an option given to bin Laden, who instead chose to grab a weapon and apparently use one of his wives as a shield.

My politics tell me this was a great thing. My national pride tells me this was a great thing. My cold examination of the world stage now vs. eighteen hours ago tells me this was a great thing.

What I am finding interesting is the spectrum of reactions within the Christian world. On one hand are many of my friends who join in the national celebration. I have read the words of those who have confidently pronounced last night's killing to have been God's judgment. On the other hand, I read the words of a young friend - a college student at the top of her inquisitive game - as she asks if God can ever be pleased by a murder. I resonate with the words of Father James Martin, who says, in the midst of his joy that bin Laden has left the world, "[a]s a Christian, though, I can never rejoice at the death of a human being, no matter how monstrous he was." For many, intentional and directed killing of an individual is more than a little troublesome.

I tossed and turned last night. Not so much at the act of killing bin Laden, for I know that war has its own rules, and when we find a cruel and evil person of this magnitude - who has lived to destroy... who revels in beheadings... who is trying to shoot back - we have little alternative. War is not murder, no matter how well-meaning my young university friend and her honest questioning may be.

No, I did not lose sleep over the demise of bin Laden. I tossed and turned at the reactions of so many who were celebrating. Reading the Facebook posts of Christian friends who were positively giddy at the thought of the death of another human being is a sobering experience.

I am not saying that they were wrong. I am not suggesting that they are bad Christians. I am simply trying to process the thought of such exuberance over any human being's taking a bullet to the brain.

I know the reactions this blog will draw from many. Please understand that I understand the necessity of eliminating this kind of enemy. If it could not have been done the same way we got Saddam, then so be it. War is hell. And this war is different from any we have fought before; instead of a nation-state enemy whose corporate defeat can be easily celebrated in an impersonal way, we now fight a collection of individuals. We choose to treat them not as criminals with basic rights to be observed but instead as military targets. I don't know another way to protect ourselves. This war becomes Hell-plus. If you comment on this page and say that ridding the world of Osama bin Laden was worth any moral price, I am unlikely to disagree.

That is not my point. My point is only that such revelry in the death of another person - another creation, no matter how flawed and how guilty, of the Father - ought to give us pause.

What Faith Looks Like: Another Look at the Feeding of the Five Thousand

2011-04-09T13:14:00.000-07:00

Even if you are not a churchgoer or well-versed in scripture, you probably know the story. This is the only miracle, other than the resurrection of Christ, to be recounted in all four gospels.

Jesus and the apostles are grieving the execution of John the Baptist. They have tried to retreat, and the crowds have followed them. The apostles, making sure the logistics are covered, point out to Jesus that the hour is late and it is time to dismiss the crowds who are getting hungry. They pray - for, after all, prayer is simply a religious word for conversation with the Almighty - and tell Jesus what He should do.

We are all often guilty of this kind of prayer. Intercessory prayer is a decidely New Testament concept, and we are indeed often called to lift up our brothers and sisters to the throne of grace. What we tend to do, however, is exactly what the apostles did. Not content to point out the people's need to Jesus ("they are hungry"), the apostles proceed to tell Jesus what to do ("send them away so they can go to the villages and buy food"). How often we do the same - going to Jesus with our own program and expecting Him to bless our choice of how to address the need?

Jesus surprises the apostles as He often surprises us. He says "no." He has no intention of sending the crowds away. Jesus continues, moreover, to tell those saying the prayer that they are the answer to the prayer: "You give them something to eat."

How often is our prayer simply a disguised request for the mantle of responsibility to be lifted off of our own shoulders? We have little trouble praying for the starving people of Africa. When the issue is the need of those immediately around us, we may hesitate to pray, because we know the answer may well come back to us: "You give them something to eat."

At this point, the apostles are at what Henry Blackaby would call a "crisis of faith." Notice the order of what happens here. If I were writing the story, I would tend to put it in this order: (1) Jesus finds the loaves and fishes that someone in the crowd has brought; (2) Jesus performs the miracle and expands the food to an amount sufficient to feed the crowds; (3) then Jesus tells His followers, "You give them something to eat." That is how I like things to happen - I like to know the program, see the results, know that the path to which I have been called will be fruitful. The apostles, however, don't get a formula or a set of empirical results on which to rely. They do not know what Jesus is going to do. They are given only their relationship with Jesus. Jesus gives them an instruction that has no apparent chance of success - there are no raw materials with which to work, and the apostles have no ability to make it work. All they have is Jesus. Faith says to follow Jesus. Jesus has told them to feed the crowds. It is crisis time.

The apostles answer as we would: "We don't have enough food." It is the same answer Moses gave when God called him to go to Pharoah: "I can't do it. I don't speak well. They won't accept me. They won't know you sent me."

Jesus' question in answer to the apostles is the same as God's question in answer to Moses: "What have you got in your hand?" It is the same question He asks us. Moses had a rod in his hand, and God told him to throw it down. The apostles had five loaves and two fish, and Jesus demanded that they "bring them to me." For us, our crisis of faith is to accept that the recipe of whatever we have, added to Jesus, is enough.

Jesus blesses the two sandwiches and leftover biscuit, and there is more than enough. God transforms the rod and empowers Moses to let the people go. And God waits for us to act in faith.

Don't be too hard on the disciples. They could have laughed at Jesus. They could have looked around dumbly. They could have waited for more explanation. Instead, they take some action. Jesus tells them to feed the people, and they look around to see what food they have. That is better than most of us would do.

I think it is easy to see a miracle of Jesus and respond to it appropriately. If you see Jesus heal someone, you are likely to bring your own sick friend to see Jesus. That is not really faith. That is just good sense.

It is not easy to respond to the command of Jesus as though you can already see the miracle. It is not easy, but it is faith. Faith dances today to the music of the future.

You have prayed. It may be for your country, or for your church, or for the poor, or for a specific person. The answer may have come echoing back to you: "You give them what they need." You have no idea how to do it. You don't see the raw materials. All you know is that God has called. You are at a crisis point.

Jesus is waiting for you to offer what you have. His words, as in the gospel, will be simple: "Bring them to me."

Hats and Doors

2011-03-26T22:05:00.000-07:00

I am amazed that "The Adjustment Bureau" has not gotten better reviews. Oh, the reviews have been fine. Some have even been good. But none has seemed to rate the movie as "great."

I think it is a great movie.

If you have not seen it yet, don't read this blog. Go see the movie first. This blog is full of spoilers.

The movie is based on a Philip K. Dick short story that I have not read. I do know that Dick was an Episcopalian and that he dealt with issues of spirituality in many of his works. I do not know if the adapter/director/producer of the movie, George Nolfi, is a Christian or not.

I, however, view the film though my personal lens, so I have to see a film that deals with issues of fate, determinism, predestination, and free will from a Christian perspective. I believe this movie is outstanding because it raises questions and offers some answers. It is also flush with symbolism that speaks to me.

1. The free will question. I address this first not because it is easy - of course it is not - but because anyone who has seen a trailer for the movie knows that this is the clearest theme. The point of the movie, to me, is that we all do in fact have free will - or at least we can have free will - but we have to want it enough to fight for it. There is no requirement that we have to exercise it, and indeed we can allow ourselves to submit to currents and influences and perhaps even intentional forces around us sufficient to sweep us along to an end that we have not chosen. For those willing to fight for choice, however, there is no plan that cannot be rewritten.

There is a limit to our choice, of course. I believe that God is sovereign, and where God's specific will is involved, we are powerless to defeat it. We cannot, for example, create a 25-hour day. My wife Gena could not have decided not to have a beautiful singing voice.

Gena could, however, have chosen not to practice, not to sing, not to take her talent and make the most of it. In the extreme, she could choose to abuse her voice and herself so as to ruin the gift she has been given.

God's sovereignty is matched by God's love. The love of the Father means that we have options... choices. The Father desires to be loved by us, and forced love is of course no love at all.

I believe that God's specific will appears far less often than many others seem to believe. I think that God's permissive will is far more pervasive and that it can involve a number of scenarios that God will allow depending on how we act, mature, choose, and function. What appears to be "the plan" may in fact be a starting point; indeed, it will take us to a predetermined ending point if we let it, but if we, like David Norris in the movie, choose to fight for what we know is right, God's permissive will in fact has more than one possible outcome.

2. The power of love. As I have written here, I look for this in movies. In "The Adjustment Bureau," the key to Norris' determined fight for his own choice is love. What ultimately makes the black-clad storm troopers disappear at the end of the movie is the expression of that true love, the kiss. As Richardson foreshadows early on, a "real kiss" will create unthinkable problems for "the plan."

3. The symbolism of the doors. If you know what you are doing - if you have the right map and know the way to go - you can move more quickly than others. There are doors everywhere, but not everyone knows how to use them. What is a simple closet door to most people is, to those who see and understand, the portal to freedom or to success. The key is to learn how to recognize and use the doors.

4. The symbolism of the hats. The "angels" or "case agents" or "adjusters" or whatever you want to call them have limited powers, thanks to the Chairman. They can only travel through the doors when they are wearing a hat.

We too have hats. Probably not bowlers. What we have are the tools God gives us. Some come to us supernaturally, like the gifts of the Spirit. Others come to us naturally as talents and abilities. Still others come through hard work. There are some that are simply bestowed. What becomes important for us is to recognize that we cannot operate the doors - we cannot take advantage of everything the world has to offer - on our own. Our powers are limited, but thanks to the Chairman, we have the chance to wear our hat and use the doors. If the hat blows off, we need to stop long enough to pick it up. If the enemy improvises and knocks our hat off, we are going to be in trouble. We have to protect our hats.

5. The symbolism of water. When Harry and Matt are on the boat or in the rain or in Manhattan's central pumping center, they can talk without detection. To make their most important plans, they need to be "surrounded by water." I don't know if we should make too much New Testament intrigue out of baptism as the meaning of water here, but I do think a broader interpretation is clear: we can find protection. There are places we can go where the encircling protection from those who would harm us is apparent. Sometimes, it stops raining. Sometimes, we have to get off the boat. Ultimately, we have to make a run for it to the courthouse. But, at least for a moment, we can find the water and know that we have a chance to refresh and have some of our questions answered.

6. The symbolism of light. I missed this one the first time I saw the movie, but it reached out and grabbed me the second time. The movie is, by and large, set in dreary greys and dark rooms. But at critical moments, the light shines. When Harry sleeps on the bench so that David can find Elise, the sun beams. When David finds Elise again after three years, the sun has just broken through. Just before David walks in with the coffee and he and Elise realize how deep their love is, we see the light of the full moon. As the climax of the movie approaches, even through the rain, we see the nascent sunrise trying to overcome the storm clouds. At the denouement itself, as the camera encircles the kissing lovers on top of the building, the dreariness is overcome by brilliant sunshine.

Since we know at the end of the movie that the Chairman was always involved with David, always ready for David to exercise choice, always hoping for David to break free of the plan, we can look back and see the presence and help of the Chairman in these criticial events. They did not happen without the light.

My New Testament lens sees here the Light of the World, the lampstand, the Light of Men.

Let there be light.

7. My view of "the plan." I suppose some will watch the movie and view it as an attack on the Bible. After all, the movie raises any number of questions about whether "the plan" is good, is loving, is changeable, is really worth following.

I see it differently. I see the mindless following of a narrow reading of the plan by the Bureau. I see those who have no interest in why the plan is written. I see those who are confounded by the idea that the plan may have been different in earlier times, that the plan may be viewed differently by others, that the plan in fact has a number of interpretations.

I do not think the point here is to say that the Bible is changing. I think the point is that interpretations of the Bible can be narrow, limiting, misunderstanding. The Bureau members are not evil; indeed, they are earnest and sincere. They are simply narrow. They look at the plan and think they know what it means, and they are not interested in alternative views.

The key language in the movie to me occurs when David says something like "if we don't understand the plan, maybe we can find who wrote it." That has gospel all over it. The Bible, and others' interpretations of it, are important, but they are less important that the One who wrote it. The Bible tells us of God and of God's plan. The Bible describes to us the Word of God. But God is more important than the description of God.

I do not denigrate for one second the importance of scripture. Any honest reading of my blogs will reveal the high reverence I have for scripture and my belief that it is authoritative. I am in no way suggesting that the Bible should be interpreted away. I do believe, however, that there are multiple interpretations for much of scripture, many of which equally sincere believers espouse in contradictory ways. The answer, I believe, is to go to the One who wrote it.

I don't mean to suggest that this movie is an obvious allegory for a New Testament Christian understanding. A quick scan of the internet will show you that plenty of folks have seen it without seeing a clear religious message of any kind. I freely admit that my view of the movie is shaped by my world view.

That said, I like the questions the movie raises and the tools it gives us to discuss them. The movie gives us a hat and points us to a door.

Life Expectancy

2011-03-17T17:22:00.000-07:00

It was there in the paper today - life expectancy in America has, for the first time, crept over 78 years. Of course, that statistic is for babies born in 2009, but it strikes me as good news nonetheless.

Except... that means that I am well past halfway home. I guess I have known that, but to see it in stark black-and-white is a little jolting. When exactly did I cross the halfway line? It wasn't when I was 39, because life expectancy was shorter back then. I suppose I could go back and figure it out, but it is not really the mathematical that has caught my attention. Nobody rang a bell when I crossed the midpoint. Nobody waves a flag to tell you when the next lap - or the last lap - is beginning.

Nobody gives you a roadmap or a schedule for your life, of course. We don't know if we will live to be 78 or not. That is an average, so half of us will live longer and half won't make it that far.

I am 46. If anybody had asked me before I saw that article, surely I would not have predicted that I will live to be 92, so I guess I have known that I am on the homeward side of halfway. Still, to read it in the paper is a different thing.

Have I accomplished what I set out to accomplish? Am I anywhere close to "halfway" there? When I was my son's age, getting ready to head to college, would I have been pleased to read the biography of the 46-year-old me? If today I could read the biography of the 56-year-old me, would I be pleased?

In light of the Japanese earthquake - superimposed on events of Libya and Iraq and Korea and Afghanistan - I have read a new round of "Are we in the 'End Times'?" emails over the last week or so. The answer, as always, is "yes and no." The universe is run by a God to whom a day is as a thousand years, so questions of time-and-God are nonsensical. Jesus Himself did not know the answer to the question of when The End will come.

What I have - what we all have - what we all have always had - is today. I don't know how many more tomorrows I will have, but reading the paper today makes it clear that I have a lot fewer than I thought I did.

Simon and Garfunkel sang it well: "I am older than I once was but younger than I'll be. That's not unusual."

Maybe today I should hug my kids a little more. Maybe write a blog with more meaning than this one. Maybe build a bridge or cure cancer. Maybe I should go find somebody I can teach to read.

All I have is today. That's not unusual.

What Do Christians Know?

2011-03-02T12:24:00.000-08:00

John 8:32 famously says, “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

We have all heard that we have entered the "post-modern world," where truth is relative. Agnosticism – literally the view that you know nothing for sure – is in style. It is impolitic to be certain of anything that smells religious.

I believe that we as Christians minimize what we know. We act as if we don’t know anything, that we only think or prefer. We act scared of the word “truth,” preferring instead to say that we have a "point of view." We are too quick to retreat to a position that says something like this: "Faith is inherently unproveable. If it were a scientific formula, it would not be faith. Therefore, since we cannot prove matters of our faith in a laboratory or a courtroom, it would be presumptuous of us to say that we know them."

A dangerous extension of this view goes to our witnessing, our evangelism. Because we cannot really say that we “know” our faith, it is impolite, if not outright unacceptable, to attempt to persuade someone else of our faith. We can too quickly fall into the view that decides that faith is just a matter of opinion and that we therefore have no business talking to anyone else about it.

I have written before (here) that we Christians share our faith (what the New Testament calls "evangelism") in a genuine desire to help, that we have to package what we say properly, and that we have to base that sharing on a pre-existing personal relationship with the person with whom we are sharing.

But the point is that we know something. Jesus says that we shall know the truth, and the truth will make us free. The concept of what we can know is all over the New Testament:
- When the apostles ask Jesus why He speaks in parables, Jesus responds that “the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given” to them. (Matthew 13:11)
- After Jesus speaks to the woman at the well, she tells her friends that she has met the Messiah. They run to meet Jesus and then tell her, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the savior of the world.” (John 4:42)
- At the Last Supper, Jesus tells us that the Holy Spirit will bring glory to Him by taking what is His and “making it known” to us. (John 16:14)
- John finishes his gospel by saying that “we know” that what Jesus has said is true. (John 21:24)
- Paul tells us that in Jesus we have been enriched in all our knowledge (1 Corinthians 1:5), that we know the mystery of His will. (Ephesians 1:9)
- John tells us that this is how we know we are His: that we keep His commandments and walk as Jesus walks. (I John 2:3,6)
- He tells us that we know we have passed from death into life because we love our brothers. (1 John 3:14)
- And we know that we live in Him and He is us because He has given us His spirit (1 John 4:13), which Paul calls a deposit that guarantees our inheritance. (Ephesians 1:14)

Of course, we see through a glass darkly. We do not know now as we will one day know. (1 Corinthians 13:12) Still, the key to all of this scripture is that there are things that we know. We do not know it all; we will never know it all. We cannot know our way to heaven – salvation is a matter of faith and the heart, not knowledge and the brain. But, as children of God, one of the great gifts we have is insight, clarity, knowledge, the unraveling of at least some of the mysteries of God.

A key gift of God to us Christians, of course, is hope. We typically use that word wrong – I "hope" she will go out with me, I "hope" the Titans win the Super Bowl, I "hope" it doesn’t rain tomorrow, I "hope" Mom orders pizza tonight. Those are not hope – those are wishes.

Here is my favorite quotation, from Peter Kuzmic: “Hope is the ability to hear the music of the future; faith is the courage to dance to it today.” Hope is not a wish. Hope is tangible, it is real. Hope is knowledge. Having hope means that we know what is going to happen. The writer of Hebrews says this:
"Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of his purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, he confirmed it with an oath. God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure." (Hebrews 6:17-19)

We shall know the truth, and the truth will make us free.

Taking that verse out of context is dangerous. I see it on pediments in courthouses where I practice. The truth shall make you free. And yet many who walk down those hallways have no idea how to access the truth that is described.

Jesus is specific on how we know the truth that makes us free. With the preceding verse, John 8:31, in context Jesus says this: “If you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” That is a different ballgame – we can certainly know things, but we can only attain that particular freedom-giving knowledge one way: we have to have an encounter with the one who is truth. For if the Son sets us free, we are free indeed. (John 8:36)

The Perils of Democracy

2011-03-01T08:28:00.001-08:00

Like you, I have watched the events in Egypt over the last month in awe. How a people can rise up and throw off its masters so suddenly is fascinating. For it to happen in Egypt, of all places, gives it special significance to students of the Old Testament. For it to arise out of - at least partially - the use of social media is truly amazing.

I have read and watched and listened as friends and media have applauded and praised. And I too, of course, have been thrilled to see ideals like self-rule and individualism take root.

But there is another side to this.

Whom will the people choose? True democracy is rule by the majority. Is rule by a majority of Egyptians what the world needs? Is it what Egypt needs?

Where is Egypt's Thomas Jefferson? Where are Egypt's Madison, Washington, Paine, Franklin, de Tocqueville?

American democracy was guided in its infancy by thinkers of care and intelligence. The riots and whiskey rebellions were far outnumbered by those who deliberately planned for what kind of government would replace the thrown-off kingdom. The cry of "no taxation without representation" presaged a carefully created representative structure. When Articles of Confederation were far too imperfect, the reaction was to call for a constitutional convention.

Is that what the Middle East will see? Will the Muslim Brotherhood and the National Democratic Party and Al Wasat and the many other rising factions come together in the name of liberty and peace?

For every scholar who believes that democracy is the antidote to terrorism because it allows the critic a safety valve of free speech and governmental participation instead of throwing bombs, there is another who believes that new fledgling democracies simply present tempting targets for the radicals.

We all remember Iran in the early 80s. Having deposed the Shah and his autocratic rule, a relatively (for that part of the world) advanced Iranian people fell under the rule of Ayatollahs and radical theocracy - ostensibly democratically chosen - that has devolved into what we see today in the frightening world of Ahmadinejad.

Asking where the Egyptian Jefferson and Adams are just scratches the surface. What about the moral leadership that democracy demands? I recognize the deism of Jefferson and historical questions about Washington's piety - it is not my point to say that all of our Founding Fathers were deeply Christian men. But, there clearly were a number of deeply Christian men involved in the process, and there were even more men of sturdy character - whether their "religion" was the same as mine or not - who shepherded the process. Is the same true in Egypt?

Now, of course, the spread goes beyond Egypt, as Bahrain and Libya and who knows where else the seed of democracy spreads. And that is a good thing.

But it is a good thing fraught with peril. As we cheer, we must keep our eye on what fills the vacuum. Democracy is demanding. Are the Egyptians ready to meet the demands?

Poor Rhetoric, Bad Arguments, and the Evolution Debate

2011-02-04T12:16:00.000-08:00

Regardless of the position taken, I am not a fan of bad argumentation. The evolution debate among evangelical Christians is one place where bad argument seems to abound.

While there are a number of critical issues on which I disagree with the fundamentalists, we are in the same camp on some things. For example, I agree with them on the authority of the Bible – although we certainly disagree fairly radically on the interpretation of some scripture. I also agree with them on much of the evolution/creationism debate... At least, I agree that God created the world out of nothing and that many of the theories espoused by evolutionists are insufficient to explain what we can see around us. I think that looking at ordinary adaptation and labeling it “evolution” confuses the two ideas. That a single species adapts to its environment and its needs does not mean that one species evolves into another.

That said, however, I am not at all prepared either to (1) dismiss all evidence of evolution as bunk or (2) declare that evolutionists are intellectual rivals of Christianity. Many creationists do both. They often argue that the theory of evolution cannot be reconciled with the Christian faith.

I am not here to ridicule creationists or to accuse all fundamentalists of taking a position on evolution with which I disagree. If I did that, I would be guilty of the same sort of rhetorical fallacy of which I accuse them. Instead, I am limiting my criticism only to those who take a position that says that any recognition of evolution is antithetical to Christianity and that all evolutionists are enemies of the faith. For purposes of this blog, I will call them the “EBATs”, which, in my parlance, is shorthand for “Evolution is Bad All the Time.” There may well be fundamentalists who do not hold those positions and are not EBATs, and if so, I applaud them on that point. They are not being criticized here. I write this blog after reading a piece by one writer who, I believe, projects himself as a spokesperson for his point of view. It is that point of view - EBAT - that I am challenging here.

I am also not out to pick a fight with any individual writer, so I am not naming names. I make that choice not out of cowardice but rather out of a conviction that we Christians do not need to have personal catfights in public. I want to keep the focus on the arguments and the rhetorical devices used to communicate.

It is not difficult to ridicule your opponents in a debate when you first take it upon yourself to define their position for them. Calling out evolutionists as a group for not acknowledging divine causality, EBATs often attack people, like me, who think there is room for both Biblical creationism and some parts of evolutionary theory in a consistent world view, arguing that we are simply looking for a way to resolve conflict and implying that we are without conviction. A favorite argument is that we, in attempting to negotiate middle ground, always favor the godless construct and dilute the basics of the faith.

The argument that I think is most persuasive is that the Bible tells the story of the who and the why of creation, but not the how. EBATs tend to counter by claiming, in authoritative tones, that the Bible does in fact explain the how, but unfortunately, these fundamentalist EBATs do not tell us what the Bible tells us about the how. Genesis 1:27 says that God created man in God’s image. I don’t find a how in that verse. Genesis 2:7 says that “the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” Again, the mechanism is neither obvious nor explained. Genesis 2:22 says that God “made a woman from the rib He had taken out of the man” without detail.

That’s it. There are not any other verses in the first three chapters of Genesis that address the how.

I am curious – what does it mean to say that God breathed into Adam the breath of life? What exactly did God do with dust and a rib to end up with Eve?

Let me be clear. I agree absolutely with the doctrine of creation ex nihilo – that is, God created out of nothing. God needed neither raw materials nor help to create human beings, or anything else for that matter. I agree absolutely that creation was not a matter of chance but rather resulted solely from the intentional will of God. I even agree that some – perhaps even many – evolutionists deny the role of God in creation.

As a matter of faith, I don’t have to know how God did it. I am fascinated by the issue from an observational and scientific standpoint, but the answer has little to do with my faith.

Where I part company is in the assertion that those who look around and study the world and conclude that evolution is a reasonable explanation for part of the process of creation are necessarily rivals of Christianity. I disagree partly because that makes me an enemy of Christianity, and I do not think that anyone is any position to pass that judgment on me.

I started this blog talking about bad argumentation. Let me return there now. Here are some of the classic rhetorical fallacies in the common EBAT argument:

1. Faulty syllogism/inductive reasoning. Example – most Americans are Caucasian; Tom is an American; therefore, Tom is Caucasian. Of course that may be incorrect. The logic is fundamentally flawed.

In like fashion, the EBAT position is that, since many evolutionists attack the authority of scripture and the role of God in creation, therefore anyone who believes in evolution cannot be Christian. The claim is that the entire understanding of the Bible has to be revised if evolution is given any credence. There is an assumption that all of Christian doctrine rises and falls on one particular view of the first three chapters of Genesis. (The third chapter is the story of the fall, and the fundamentalist position is that the remainder of scripture is based on their interpretation of that passage.) Regardless of the theological differences (and there are several) I have with their interpretation of the fall, original sin, and the role of Adam, my point here is to point out how poor the argument is that all Biblical narrative must be revised simply because of any partial truth in the theory of evolution.

2. Ad Hominem attack. Example – Hitler was evil; Hitler says that broccoli is good for you; therefore broccoli must really be bad for you.

Here, these EBATs bash the entire “evolutionist” community as though it were a monolith and throw out everything that anybody says who believes anything about evolution.

Again, I am trying to be careful in how I write so that I am not accused of the same thing. I am writing this blog largely in response to particular writings from particular writers, and perhaps I am treating the fundamentalist camp monolithically. Let me emphasize again that I am only speaking about those I am calling EBATs, those who group the entire evolution debate into a single camp. If you are a fundamentalist who does not do that, I am not including you here.

3. Hasty Generalization. Example - Every ten-year-old girl I have seen in Keller, Texas likes Justin Bieber; therefore, all ten-year-old girls like Justin Bieber.

EBAT writers pick a few striking examples of evolutionists with whom they disagree (and often evolutionists with whom I disagree) and assert that therefore all who believe anything about evolution must also take the same anti-Christian position.

The care I am taking in this blog to limit my criticism to EBATs is precisely because I do not also want to be guilty of hasty generalization. I am not generalizing the EBAT position to all creationists or all fundamentalists - I am speaking specifically and only of those with a particularly point.

4. False Dilemma. Example – I assert that every car in the parking lot is either silver or aqua; your car is not silver; therefore it must be aqua. The fact is that your car is red, but I created the dilemma by narrowing the field to two choices when nothing requires that limitation.

For the EBATs, there are only two options: either you accept “naturalistic” God-rejecting evolution; or you accept their view and interpretation of scripture. They allow for no other alternatives. They defend this approach, of course, by saying that they have not picked the alternative – Jesus did. They have the only line to Jesus (made clear in the Bible as they interpret it), and if you disagree with them, you don’t believe the Bible and therefore reject God. Once you formulate and build from that premise, you get to set the boundaries and create whatever dilemma for your reader that you so choose.

5. Straw Man. Example – Mother tells son to clean out the garage. Son responds “You are so mean, making me do meaningless work every day of my life.” It is easy to attack doing meaningless work every day, even though that has nothing to do with the premise before you – to clean out the garage today.

The EBAT position is based on effective uses of straw men, criticizing poor positions advanced by evolutionists such as claims that finding authority in the Bible is a “thought crime.” Well, of course, none of us wants to be accused of committing “thought crimes.” We can all recognize that those who cast the debate in that light are silly. It does not follow, however, that all evolutionary evidences are therefore wrong.

6. Appeal to belief. The EBAT trump card is to paint evolution as the key threat to everything that good Christian readers hold dear. EBATs will say something like this: There can be no question but that the authority and truthfulness of the entire Bible are at stake. The claim will be made that the New Testament gospel is based on a literalist account of creation, and that if the EBAT position on creation is not accepted, the gospel of Jesus falls like a house of cards. Leaving aside the literalist/fundamentalist vs. moderate debate over inerrancy, this argumentation is faulty because it reduces a legitimate discussion that can take place among Christians to a “you’re either with me or against me” line in the sand. It is made more offensive by the implication that Jesus is the one drawing that line.

I believe that arguments like those forwarded by the EBATs drive hordes away from the gospel. When someone asserts that the Bible means one thing (in this case, the how of creation) without explanation and then says that everyone who disagrees is a heathen, I believe many will choose to go a different direction. There has to be a way to allow for discussion about many issues like this one without sacrificing the true basics of doctrine.

What underlies the EBAT position, of course, is the belief that (1) anyone who disagrees must not believe the Bible and that (2) if you don’t believe the Bible, you are free to reject whatever parts of Christianity are inconvenient for you. I sympathize with this position. As I said at the outset, I agree about the authority of scripture. I wish that proponents of the EBAT position were more willing to allow for a wider interpretation of scripture, wherein smart Christian people could disagree on some of the sub-doctrinal details and still find unity on the critical items of our faith. I also wish that they would not rely on common classic fallacies to make their point. Rhetoric is a tool to be used by the Christian, but it should be used properly.

I Remember Exactly Where I Was When I Heard

2011-01-28T21:22:00.000-08:00

It was 25 years ago today.

I had not realized that today was the anniversary until I saw this Facebook status post from a friend: "It's almost hard to believe it's been 25 years since my vintage had our 'I'll never forget where I was when I saw that' moment in life."

I knew immediately the event to what he referred. Do you? It was the Challenger explosion, a horrific event that highlighted the mid-eighties and ended innocence for many. I remember where I was - I was on an airplane, returning to Waco from the University of Utah debate tournament. The pilot came on the speaker and announced the news. The shuttle had exploded. All aboard, including a female civilian school teacher, were killed. Space exploration had been our debate topic the year before, so I was pretty well-versed in the space program in 1986. I took this very personally.

My friend's post has gotten me to thinking.... What are the events of national and international significance during my lifetime that cause me to remember exactly where I was when I heard about them?

I was born in 1965, which makes me, depending on which article you read, either the very tail end of the Baby Boom or the very beginning of Generation X. Either way, I am of a generation that was not alive for Pearl Harbor, D-Day, Sputnik, or the Kennedy assassination. For me and my generation, the defining world events are different.

Listed below are what they are for me. These are not all necessarily the most important events of the last 46 years (although some of them certainly are). Not included are wars, invasions, deaths, economic crises, genocides, scientific breakthroughs, presidential elections, Super Bowls, or many other significant events that I of course remember as critical history, even though I do not recollect the exact place where I was when they occurred. Instead, these are the events that, as I look back, I remember with specificity when and where I was when I first heard about them.

1. Neil Armstrong walks on the moon. July, 1969. My parents and I were on a trip returning home, and we stopped at a motel in Fort Smith, Arkansas - a mere 50 miles or so from home - and checked in so that we could watch. It was a little black-and-white tv set, and I was only 4, but I remember.

2. Hank Aaron hits his 715th home run, breaking Babe Ruth's record. April, 1974. I was at my grandparents' house in Gladewater, Texas, watching what was at that time a rare Monday night national broadcast of a baseball game.

3. Nixon resigns the presidency. August, 1974. Another motel. Family vacation in Boone, North Carolina.

4. The bicentennial. July 4, 1976. At my house in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

5. Elvis dies. August, 1977. Again at my grandparents' house in Gladewater.

6. John Lennon is shot and killed. December, 1980. In my bed in Nashville, listening to the radio when I was supposed to be asleep.

7. President Reagan is shot. March, 1981. I was a sophomore in high school. It was early afternoon. I heard about it on my high school campus. Some cynical students cheered; that really ticked me off.

8. Space shuttle Challenger explodes. January 1986. See above.

9. Police pursue O.J. Simpson in a slow-speed chase. June, 1994. Gena, 9-month-old Trey, and I were on vacation. On our way to a family reunion in Phoenix, we stopped in Las Vegas to see one of my old roommates and his wife. They took us to dinner in the sports book at Caesar's Palace at a restaurant of which we had never heard at that time - the California Pizza Kitchen. Dozens of TVs all over the walls showed a plethora of different sporting events. All of a sudden, every TV was showing a white bronco. It was surreal.

10. Timothy McVeigh blows up the Murrah building in Oklahoma City. April, 1995. I was in my office in Nashville. The radio was on as I worked. I heard the news and went in to tell Mr. Robinson, the firm's senior partner.

11. O.J. Simpson is acquitted. October, 1995. I was standing in Demos' Restaurant in Nashville with co-workers, after lunch, watching the TV over the bar.

12. Two planes crash into the World Trade Center. Tuesday morning, September 11, 2001. I was leaving an early morning Bible Study at Belmont University, heading to my office, listening to the radio when the news came on. I was so stricken and distracted that I got a ticket for speeding through a school zone. (The judge subsequently dismissed the ticket, himself remembering how shaken we all were when we got the news.)

13. My now 17-year-old son receives his first college acceptance. Today, January 28, 2011. OK, maybe not an event of international importance, but you could not tell that at our house.

Events that shaped a generation. As I look back, the ones of these that most affected me were 9/11, the shooting of President Reagan, and the Challenger explosion. That is not to diminish the tragedy of Oklahoma City or the cultural significance of John Lennon; I am just recalling which ones made the most indelible marks on me.

Where were you?

Brothers and Sisters

2011-01-09T19:29:00.000-08:00

I am an only child. I don't feel bad about that - it has its advantages. But one thing that I clearly missed was the relationship among siblings.

I have seen that with Gena throughout our marriage. Her relationship with her brother and sister is something to which I cannot relate. I admire it. I am thrilled that she has it. These three siblings have a bind and a support system that is different in kind from mere friendship.

I have been reminded again of this sibling bond this weekend. Trey, my son, had a huge victory Saturday, being named First Chair in the All-Area Choir and securing his spot in the All-State Choir. When we got the news, his sisters set to work - unbidden by us - to make Trey's return home special. Carolyn baked, iced, and decorated a cake for him. Annessa made posters and signs all over the house: "This is where a winner parks."... "This is where a winner sleeps."... "This is where a winner brushes his teeth." ... etc. You get the idea.

Their love for each other is remarkable. It is palpable. They pick at each other and nag each other and irritate one another, and none of that matters. I admire their relationship. I am thrilled that they have it. While I love all of them and their mother deeply, their particular relationship with each other is one to which I cannot relate.

It is time for Americans to learn a lesson from the siblings around us. The idea of shooting 20 people at a "Congress on your corner" event is beyond my comprehension. I don't know what motivated Loughner. He apparently is deranged. Whether politics per se had anything to do with it or not, there is no escaping the fact that his apparent primary target was a congresswoman, that he killed a federal judge who had gone out on a limb making decisions that he felt were called for by the law, and that he chose a political event as the site for his assassination.

Over the past months, I have decried in this blog the disintegration of our political rhetoric. I wrote about it here , here, here, and here among other places.

We live in a free, open society. The American dream binds us all in ways that our politics should not be able to sever. It is not sappy uber-patriotism to say that we are all American brothers and sisters. Too many people have fought and died - and still fight and die - for us to live where we live and how we live for us to take it for granted. It is not easy, and it requires self-restraint; but we should be treasuring each other as a type of siblings. We should have the kind of relationship with each other that others in the world admire, even if they do not understand it.

I don't know why Jaren Lee Loughner opened fire. It is undoubtedly premature to attribute his actions to any particular political rhetoric, and I do not mean to do so here.

But yesterday's obscenity in Arizona is the opportunity for all of us to rethink how we approach our versions of "Congress on the corner." The enemy is not the other party, the "wrong" talk radio host, or the group marching this week in Washington. We are all a part of a pluralistic fabric that makes up a larger singular design, and we simply cannot continue in the spirit of political incivility that has infected us.

My college debate coach had some cheesy rules for our squad. Rule #1 was "Our knives are pointed outward." We were a team, and the coaches simply would not tolerate our taking potshots at one another. We had bigger fish to fry that required a collective effort. We were, in a real fashion, brothers and sisters.

I am not really an only child. You are my brothers and sisters. I do well to remember that.

The Model Prayer as the Antidote to the Temptations

2011-01-07T09:13:00.001-08:00

A while back, I wrote here about what I consider the five basic temptations. In short, I said that the appearances of Satan in scripture outline these five temptations: 1. Be like God. 2. Blame God. 3. Satisfy your physical hungers.
4. Show off. 5. Grab power.

The Model Prayer, found in Matthew 6 (and, in part, in Luke 11), is one of the best known sections of scripture. It is probably not hyperbole to say that millions recite the Matthew version from memory daily. Many studies and interpretations of the Model Prayer have been written.

I want to suggest an additional purpose of the prayer. The five requests that Jesus teaches us in the Model Prayer are, in my view, directly related to the five temptations. I believe that Jesus' prayer is an antidote to the basest of the temptations that beset us.

1. "Hallowed be thy name." This is the first request of the prayer. Jesus, speaking to His father, asks that God's name be kept holy. The first temptation, verbalized by the serpent to Eve, is that we can be like God. The way to fight that temptation is constantly to be reminded that God is God and we are not, that God is holy and we are sinful, that God is creator and we are creatures, that God is king and we are subjects. The first supplication of the prayer, then, asks God to remind us and the world of the uniqueness of God's station, God's name, God's very being. We are unlikely to fall for the temptation that we can be godlike when we are aware of the nature of God.

2. "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done." In this second request, Jesus raises the will of God above others' desires or choices. This same idea, of course, is echoed in different words by Jesus' prayer in Gethsemane - "nevertheless, not my will but Thine be done." The second temptation, exemplified in the devil's shenanigans played out through the advice Job receives from his three "friends," is to blame God. Even Job's wife tempts him to "curse God and die." Blaming God is natural for the one who does not recognize that God's ways are superior to our ways. That we do not understand God's will does not make it any less overarching. This request, then, is asking that God's will be done to the exclusion of any contrary will of human beings. We don't blame God for doing or allowing when we have first requested that God be in charge, that God exercise God's will.

3. "Give us this day our daily bread." The third appeal is for provision. The third temptation, which comes to a very hungry Jesus from Satan in the wilderness, is to turn stones into bread; in other words, the third temptation is to take matters of our physical needs into our own hands and to prioritize them, using even supernatural powers to satisfy them. The Model Prayer, on the other hand, recognizes the provision of the Father for His children. We rely on God for what we need; then, we do not need to fall prey to the temptation of figuring out how to satisfy ourselves.

4. "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." This part of the Model Prayer dually shows our own sinfulness, and thus our need for forgiveness; it then directs us to focusing on others, thus recognizing their need for forgiveness. In contrast, the fourth temptation is all about self-aggrandizement. Jumping off the temple to make a public display of how God has gifted you is the height of arrogance, control, and selfishness. The antidote for the temptation of exalting self is to recognize our errors and to turn our focus to others.

5. "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." The fifth temptation, that of grabbing power, has a condition attached to it. To get that power, we have to bow down to the tempter. This last request of the Model Prayer is a recognition of the lure of what is offered if we simply abandon the First Commandment and have other gods before God. The prayer, if prayed sincerely, is the antidote, asking to be led away from such enticements, regardless of what illusory rewards are dangled before us.

I do not mean to suggest that the entire purpose of the Model Prayer is tied up in an Old Testament understanding of temptation, but I do think that Jesus knows what faces us each and every day when He tells us how to pray.

A Christmas Prayer

2010-12-24T21:02:00.000-08:00

God who came as a baby,

We, the faithful, come to worship and to adore you. These last weeks, we have walked through Advent in search of new and different important meanings to find in this season. Now, we gather to celebrate the familiar. Now is the time for “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” and “The First Noel.” We sing the carols we have known since childhood.

We sing the familiar with assurance because we know what we will find: you, awaiting us in a manger, under a star.

We come with a strange combination of emotions. 2010 has been difficult. Friends are sick. We have lost loved ones. Family crisis has not spared us. Floods have touched us and those we love. We are older. Divisive political rhetoric continues to turn up the volume and the vitriol on both sides. We hurt, and we grieve. The longest war in our nation’s history rages on.

And yet… the sense of joy and expectation cannot be defeated. We hear the angels singing. We are ready to join them.

We come to you because love has come to us. We seek your presence with us because we come to worship you... to see your newborn face... to hear your infant laugh... to come, like shepherds, poor as we are, to offer our hearts. We thrill to hear the angels singing “Gloria in excelsis deo.”

We come to your manger expecting Jesus.

Our soft, introspective “O Little Town” and “Silent Night” match the majesty of Christmas Eve. Christmas morning, then, is a day to overcome, to rejoice, to celebrate. Christmas morning, we are poised to declare “Joy to the World.”

Jesus of the manger, we receive you as our king. We come because we know that joy has come to the world. We join the triumph of the skies.

We pray today in the name of a baby. Amen.

Helping the Poor - The Politics of Jesus

2010-12-20T11:49:00.001-08:00

Stephen Colbert is brilliant and funny. He is also thought-provoking. His rant from December 16 in which he declares that Jesus would be a liberal Democrat because He was always talking about helping the poor and because He never suggested tax cuts for the rich Romans has something going for it - it talks about Jesus in the present tense as a realistic basis for our decision-making. I applaud Colbert for that.

I do not applaud him for his politics, but it is probably no surprise to anyone reading this that I disagree with Colbert's politics on this one.

That is not what this blog is about. This blog is about the idea that our Christianity necessarily compels one answer to the question of dealing with the poor. The leap from "we should help the poor" to "therefore we must be liberal Democrats" is simplistic and narrow-minded. To think that all conservatives are against helping the poor is either tragically ill-informed or deluded by the extremists.

If you want to believe that the President's economic program is the best way to help the poor, you have every right to believe that. I would be happy to debate the point with you. What is sad, however, is to suggest, as some who have latched onto Colbert's rant have done, that the only way to follow Jesus is to be a liberal Democrat.

If some who wear the label "conservative" have looked down on the poor or treated poor people as lesser beings or selfishly refused to help them, that is wrong. Come to think of it, if liberals have treated poor people badly, that is wrong. None of that is inherent in being conservative or liberal.

I believe that President Obama's economic plan is not a good way to help the poor. My understanding of both economics and human nature informs me in that view. Of course, so does my religion. I agree with my friends that following Jesus necessarily calls on us to take care of the poor and to do so sacrificially. It is just that I believe that liberal Democratic economic policies are perhaps the worst possible way to do it. That is not religion. It is politics and economics.

I am not writing this blog to convince anyone to be a conservative. I don't believe the only way to follow Jesus is to be a conservative. Many of you are good Christian liberal Democrats. I hope you allow me the right to be a good Christian conservative.

It is dangerous to claim that God is on your side in a political discussion. (These claims come from both sides of the aisle, of course. On the same day several friends forwarded me the Colbert rant, I got an email from another friend decrying someone's "Obama-loving atheism.") I don't believe that Jesus' teachings allow us to do that, at least not in this particular political discussion.

A very good friend of mine (who is still a liberal Democrat, despite my efforts) makes a brilliant point about Jesus' "render unto Caesar what is Caesar's and unto God what is God's" response to the question about whether it is right to pay taxes. My friend says this: "These who questioned Jesus were trying to push him onto one side of the fence or the other ... and Jesus, in a fantastic move, demolished the fence."

There is much for us to learn. Jesus is about His father's business, and He is not distracted by lesser things like the divisive political questions of His day or ours. There is no question that Jesus told us also to be about the father's business, which of course includes taking care of the poor. But that is where the Christian unanimity ends. There are many, many ways of taking care of the poor, and some work a lot better than others. And just because the press, or the President, or Stephen Colbert declares that Jesus would have chosen a certain one does not make it so.

Don't try to force Jesus on one side or the other of the fences that we have chosen to build.

With Friends Like These... : Why Manners Still Matter in Political Discussion

2010-12-09T11:42:00.001-08:00

I should have known better.

I have an old friend who was in elementary school and the same church youth group in high school with me. I have not seen her since the early 80s, but through the magic of the internet, we have "friended" each other and occasionally drop each other a line.

She has a job that involves politics. She is, as best as I can tell, a spokesperson in her state for a particular party and often writes about certain issues and candidates. While I almost never respond to these posts, yesterday, I did. She had made a statement about a certain issue that I felt was unintentionally misleading, and I offered a different idea.

In rejoinder, she launched a long paragraph beginning with that dreaded phrase, "With all due respect..." You know you are about to get pounded after an intro like that. She then stated her position and listed some examples, and she concluded by saying that those who disagree with her "have not only proven to be an abject failure, they are immoral."

This is where our political dialog has gone. In what should have been a light-hearted exchange between two old friends, I made one statement and was called both an "abject failure" and "immoral."

Our two respective viewpoints are not material to this blog. You can find this level of personal attack on both sides of the political spectrum.

My point is to note that if a semi-public forum where a politico is responding to a "friend" produces this type of name-calling and insensitive rhetoric, it is not hard to understand how bad the hard-core political debate has become.

We have a serious problem in this country. It is a problem that goes far beyond tax policy, abortion, the war in Afghanistan, or WikiLeaks.

The problem is this: We don't like each other. We don't trust each other. Too many of us want everyone else to shut up so we can speak.

We have a fear of opposing views. We are largely unwilling to encounter, understand, or tolerate the opposition. We have a great deal of trouble getting along in what our grandparents would have called the required fashion.

It was not so long ago that calling somebody "immoral" would have earned you a punch in the nose.

How did we get here? Undoubtedly this is, at least in part, a necessary by-product of the combination of the explosion of information technology and the constant pressure to protect First Amendment freedoms. Both of those are good things. But they require common sense and decency among us. When the sphere of public debate opened to anyone who has a computer or a videocamera, the standards of what it takes to be a "commentator" plummeted. It's like expansion in baseball - it is a lot easier to be a starter, or even an All-Star, when there are a lot more teams that have to be filled.

Another reason we got here is the sense that the person who yells the loudest wins the argument. Whether we follow someone who says he can win the debate "with half my brain tied behind my back" or we adhere to the views of one whose "honesty ... has set the boundaries of where funny, political talk can go," we see celebrity debate defined by volume, pique, and highbrow insult.

However we got here, it is time to evaluate where we are going. Does anybody at this point think the level of political dialog in this country is on-balance good? Is there anybody left who really believes the discussion can be bettered with just one more ad hominem attack?

It is an individual responsibility. Each of us needs to remember what our mothers taught us. Watch the shows that respect people. Use language that engages issues without demeaning the opponent. Vote for candidates who are interested in bettering your community instead of earning the sound bite.

I know I may be dreaming.

So let's just start here. Don't call your friends "immoral" because they take a different political position from yours.

Welcoming the Early Christmas Lights

2010-11-28T19:19:00.000-08:00

I am a traditionalist. I don't think we should decorate a tree, listen to Christmas music, or generally think about things Christmasy until December 1.

Don't get me wrong - I love the Christmas season. I sing the songs - from "Here Comes Santa Claus" to "Messiah" - with great gusto. My house is (largely due to the efforts of my bride) decorated with the best of them. I go to the parties and dutifully watch "It's a Wonderful Life" and the Grinch every year.

But I also understand those who are fed up with the commercialization and the over-production of the season. I laughed all the way through John Grisham's Skipping Christmas.

So I want my Christmas, but I don't want it overdone. And, usually, I only want it in December. The competition between the Christmas decorations and the Halloween costumes in Target bugs me.

This year is different. The calendar falls so that Advent starts in November. Most of my neighbors had their lights up by nightfall on Thanksgiving. A couple had their lights up before that. Even we got our tree up on Thanksgiving night.

For some reason, this year I am ready for it. Christmas cannot start too soo for me. I wonder why?

Surely part of it is a genuine thirst for Advent, for a reminder of the coming of the Christ child and the hope that means for all of us.

Perhaps some of it is a longing for good news to end a year that has been trying in a lot of ways. Serving as executor of the estate of my uncle has been a constant reminder that he is gone. Friends have died; other friends are sick. Family strife has struck some very close to us. We live in a world of recession and "maneuvers" in the waters off Korea. The divisive political rhetoric continues to turn up the volume and the vitriol on both sides.

Undoubtedly, part of my feeling this year is because it is the last year that my oldest child will live at home. He has made a point of wanting us to decorate the house "fully" this year, his last Advent here with us. What has been something of a task in the past this year seems to be more of a joyous gift, both to him and to the girls as well.

Whatever the reason, though it is still November, I am ready for holly and mangers, flying reindeer and Magi, gift wrap and candles, carols and hymns, Santa and the baby, "Ho Ho Ho" and "And there were in the same country shepherds, abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the lord shone round about them, and they were sore afraid. But the angel said unto them, 'Fear not, for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the City of David a savior, which is Christ the Lord!'"

Bring on the good tidings of great joy! And go ahead and turn your lights on.

What I Have Learned at the Chiropractor's Office

2010-11-01T12:55:00.000-07:00

I had some back pain, so I went to a chiropractor. He is helping my back pain. That's a good thing.

But that is not what this blog is about.

I go to a chiropractor who is an evangelist for his particular brand of chiropractic. Literally, he is religious about it. His staff is religious about it. They preach the word. They offer written materials. They constantly cajole me about their methods. They make promises of a greater life.

And I am unmoved. I just want him to make my back feel better.

I have a better understanding now of how non-believers may react to Christian witness. The following are my reactions to the "message" I get every time I go to my chiropractor's office. They could also be your reactions (or the reactions of someone you know) to church, Christianity, the witness of a Christian friend, or the gospel message of Christ.
1. These folks are extremely nice to me, and I appreciate that, but that does not mean that I am going to believe what they believe, or what they tell me to believe.
2. These folks sincerely believe what they say they believe. I have no quarrel with that. I am not persuaded by their sincerity to change my own mind.
3. These folks walk the walk. They cleanse their toxins and go to their burst training and take the supplements and get regular adjustments. As far as I can tell, they are not hypocrites. But I am not moved.
4. These folks have gone out of their way to educate me. They offer me written information. They invite me to seminars, dinners, and meetings. I do not have the excuse that "I don't understand."
5. These folks care about me. I believe that.

So why am I not fully sold on everything? Why won't I buy into the full program instead of just "settling" with having them make my back feel better?
1. Their message is inherently unbelievable.
2. Their message runs counter to what I know and to what I read and hear everywhere else.
3. Their message is too demanding of my time, energies, and commitments.

Sound familiar? All three of those are reasons that my friends routinely reject (openly or subtly) my Christian witness.

So, here is the question: Is what we Christians have to offer any different from the cultish, slightly nutty lifestyle that the very nice people in the chiropractor's office are selling?

I think it is. Christianity is not a lifestyle, a religion, or a philosophy. Christianity is a relationship. Ultimately, what we Christians "have to offer" is not a program - it is an introduction to Jesus Christ.

I believe with everything that is in me that Jesus is alive. I worship Him as my Lord and my Savior, and I believe that others need to accept Christ as Lord and Savior. Still, as soon as I say Jesus is my "living lord and savior," I know that some will be turned off. I become "slightly nutty" to them. As soon as I talk about a Christian lifestyle, some will write that off as too demanding. Others will simply not understand it, since it runs counter to what they hear in the rest of the world.

What I can do is introduce you to the One who has changed my life. I have to trust Him to take it from there. Yes, I can answer your questions. Yes, I must model what it is to be Christlike. Yes, my lifestyle is radically different because of Christ, but it is silly of me to want you to change your lifestyle if you don't first know Jesus.

Some will come to church for good music, or good fellowship, or beautiful architecture, or any of a score of other reasons. They are not interested in everything Christianity has to offer; they just want us to make them feel better. Like the nice young receptionist in the office who just shakes her head when I turn down yet another invitation to a free dinner, we can be truly offended when those who come to our church do not "make a commitment" when and where we think they should.

Ultimately, I have not bought into the message at the chiropractor's office because nothing has touched my soul and convinced me that I need a change. The nice folks have not introduced me to anything or anyone who knows and understands me and can move me toward the truth of their message. So I remain unmoved.

We Christians should learn a lesson here. Reciting our rituals and our benefits is easy, but I do not think it is what Jesus taught us to do. Telling people how we live and how they should live is convenient, but it skips too many steps. We Christians should not be surprised that a "witness" that sounds like an infomercial for a faddish trend fails to attract disciples.

We Christians should remember that we are Christians because we met and said yes to Jesus.

The Consequences of Freedom

2010-10-15T15:20:00.000-07:00

Are you sick of the political ads yet? Do you wish that those wretched conservatives/liberals/fill-in-the-blanks would just shut up?

Are you tired of reading Facebook status updates and Tweets from long lost friends who feel compelled to tell you what they are thinking about having for dinner or where they might go grocery shopping?

Do you wish "those people" would keep their foreign religions to themselves?

It should be axiomatic that a nation that protects freedom has to be made up of people who are willing to put up with what their neighbors choose to do with that freedom. It should be beyond discussion that you don't get to celebrate only the liberties that are exercised in the ways that suit you.

We all know that these principles are in fact not givens. We see every day efforts to curtail freedoms, not because the exercise of the freedom is a clear and present danger but because somebody is offended, outraged, angered, or inconvenienced.

My defense of freedom should not be confused with an agreement with a particular point of view that is being expressed, but it often is. If I object to somebody's being shouted down, it should not be interpreted that I agree with that somebody's message, but I am often so misunderstood.

That is OK. I will be misunderstood for one reason or another anyway - the defense of the right to be wrong is more important. In history classes, we celebrate John Adams' defense of the British soldiers from the Boston Massacre and his eloquent "defend to the death their right to say it" argument. When we come out of the history class, we don't remember the message.

Free speech necessarily means we will hear things we do not like. We will see flags burned. We will have offensive movies screened in our neighborhoods. We will have to suffer through interminable bottom-of-the-barrel political ads.

Freedom of religion has two aspects. (1) The establishment clause means we don't get to have our particular point of view receive the imprimatur of Congress, the local police, or the public schools. (2) The free exercise clause means that our public school teachers can still individually practice the religion of their choice. Together, these ideals mean that the Sikhs and the Muslims and the Jews and the atheists and that Hindus and Buddhists get to live and work and worship - or not worship - on the same street with the Baptists and the Methodists and the Catholics.

Freedom of assembly means the Nazis can march through Skokie and the Rainbow Brigade members can have a party wherever they can get a license.

Freedom of the press means Keith Olbermann and Glenn Beck get to opine on competing channels, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal get to publish in the same town, and anybody can "report" pretty much anything they think to be a fact if they act without actual malice.

Freedoms are ultimately not likely to be lost because of the rise of a dictator, at least not in this country. Freedoms are likely to be lost because of thoughtless, stupid, offensive exercises of the freedoms. Gun control is unabashedly a movement to restrict the freedom to own guns, arising almost exclusively because of the use of guns in stupid and harmful ways. Similarly, those who choose to exercise their "rights" without caring how others feel about what they are doing or saying ultimately risk placing those rights in jeopardy for everyone.

It should not be so, but it is.

The way to confront the offensive use of freedom is by exercising your own freedom. Engage in debate. Have a conversation with someone with whom you disagree. Go read a book and learn something about those you despise.

The way to protect freedoms is not to abuse your freedoms just because you can. Life on the margins may be theoretically protected, but a realistic understanding of how your actions will be received is necessary. There is a reason our grandparents tried to teach us how to "get along" with other people.

Freedom has a price. Protecting my freedom means putting up with yours. Exercising my freedom means risking having it taken away. We need to decide what we really value.

The Temptations

2010-09-21T19:50:00.000-07:00

Be like God. Blame God. Satisfy your physical hungers. Show off. Grab power.

These are the great temptations. Pretty much anything that entices us can be traced to one or more of them. Even if you are not a Christian… even if scripture holds no meaning for you … even if you believe that “Satan” is a non-entity that just stands for a generic concept of evil in the world … you can see the basics of what haunts you in these great temptations.

Interestingly, these five great temptations are the subject matter of Satan’s appearances in scripture. I know there are some other places where the devil makes a brief appearance here and there, but in truth, this character gets three big scenes to strut his stuff: The Fall in Genesis 2 and 3; the Book of Job; and the temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4 (and corresponding passages in Luke and, briefly, in Mark).

All five of them are branches off of one tree - selfishness. All temptation attacks at our most vulnerable point - ourselves. Some are based on our love for ourselves; others are based on our areas of self-loathing where we are tempted to try to make ourselves better. Selfishness, then, lies at the heart of what is evil within us. Ultimately, our failures relate to our attempts to promote ourselves, to strive for that next blessing, to assure ourselves our “best life now.”

Temptation #1: Be like God.
In the Genesis passage, the temptation is simple: “Don’t you want to be like God?” The essence of this story is not that we are like a four-year-old who does not know better when we are tempted to disobey. No, the forbidden fruit story is about the lie that the serpent offers: if we eat the fruit, we can be like God. We can know good and evil just like God does. This is what speaks to us – the chance to make more of ourselves than is intended, than is good for us, than we can really be.

In the end, while the fruit may have been lovely to look at, its taste would not have compelled Adam and Eve to break the rules. What made the difference was that they wanted to know what God knows, to see what God sees. The temptation was to go beyond their limited human view and to become godlike.

That is, always has been, and always will be Temptation #1. We do not like natural limitation. We chafe under the idea that there is something out there that is better, stronger, faster, smarter than we are. That is why “The Six Million Dollar Man” was a hit TV show. It is why movies like “Transformers” and “Superman” and “The Incredibles” tickle our fancy – the idea that we can transform into something more godlike holds great sway.

To let go of this temptation is to accept that we are only what we are. We can achieve, we can grow, and we can learn; still, there is only so far we can go. That acceptance – which is ultimately the key to reliance on God – is difficult for most of us. We can’t accept that there are things we do not understand, that we cannot do.

Temptation #2: Blame God.
Job has been blessed. He is rich and happy and respected. Satan offers the proposition that Job will only be righteous so long as he continues to be rich, only so long as the blessings continue to pour. This temptation comes to Job not directly from Satan but instead from Job’s companions who philosophize through the bulk of the middle of the book. If, like me, you read the Book of Job as a play, you see Satan as the background godfather of these unhelpful speakers. They may not know who is pulling their strings, but those of us who have read the first two chapters of the book – Act One if you will – understand who is feeding them their lines.

Job is told that his onslaught of problems must be God's reaction to Job's sinfulness, despite Job's protestations of piety. Ultimately, even Job’s own wife urges him to “curse God and die.”

This is Temptation #2. Blame God for what is wrong. We can dress it up in great philosophical debates surrounding the question that seems to haunt so many: “Why do bad things happen to good people?” As we debate that question, we find ourselves saying that bad things really should not happen if God is actually all-loving and all-powerful and all-knowing; therefore, our reasoning goes, God must not be one of those things. Or maybe God is none of them. We blame God. We say God really does not love, and/or God really is impotent, and/or God really has no clue.

Once we give in to Temptation #2, of course, we become an easy target of the other great temptations. If God is really not “all that,” then it is much easier for us to try to be godlike, and our self-interests are that much more at the forefront.

Temptation #3: Satisfy your physical hungers.
Jesus has wandered in the wilderness, fasting, for almost six weeks when the Tempter makes his third great entrance, stage left. It is now that the last three great temptations are scripted.

The suggestion that Jesus turn the stones into bread is not a temptation for Jesus to do a cheap magic act. If that were all it is, it would not have much application to us mere mortals who can do no better than silly card tricks. No, it is far baser than that – the temptation is for a very hungry Jesus to make Himself some bread. Forty days of fasting and wandering has left Jesus tired, hungry, and needy. “End your fast. Use your power. Eat something. Nobody is here to see. Nobody will know. You have needs. Make some bread.”

Timing is everything with Temptation #3. There would have been no point in coming to Jesus at the wedding feast at Cana and suggesting that He turn rocks into bread while He is turning water into wine. Jesus was not hungry then. He was not needy.

We can look back at things that have tempted us and recoil at our foolishness, forgetting what our perceived needs were at the time. The physical temptations that come to us are always timed to hit us the hardest. I am willing to bet that very few are tempted to sexual promiscuity on their honeymoon. But when things are hard, when we have needs that we are certain no one else can understand … then is when the temptation comes to fulfill the need, to satisfy the hunger. After all, God made us this way, right? Our hunger is natural. God will understand that the rules don’t apply to us. God would not have built this desire into us and then expect us not to do something about it, right?

Temptation #4: Show off.
Satan proposes that Jesus jump off the temple roof and let the angels gently carry Him to the ground. Satan even quotes scripture – accurately, I might add – to make the point. This misuse of Psalm 91 is the great example of why using individual verses as proof-texts for our own needs and over-literalizing scripture is dangerous, but I digress.

What is the essence of Temptation #4? At first glance, it is popularity, esteem, and self-aggrandizement. What could be in it for Jesus to jump off the temple? Part of the answer lies in the fact that the temple was very public, and surviving such an event would make Him an instant hero. His personal relationship with the angels would be the talk of the town.

The temptation is that life is all about me. What can I do? What do I have to offer? Who will notice me? When will the world stop for a moment so that I can have my fifteen minutes of fame?

Temptation #4 has another level. It is about control ... self-importance ... ego. Perhaps more subtly, but much more dangerously than a simple reach for popularity, His focus would be on all the cool things He could do rather than on fulfilling His sacrificial mission. For Jesus to use His power in such a way would bastardize the power of God. To make such a production – even if nobody saw it and popularity were not an issue – would be to take gifts God has given Him and use them as a sideshow. Showing off cheapens everything you have been given, every talent you have, as you cram them into a box for display, even if you are just displaying for yourself. Jumping off the temple to force the angels to catch Him would be, for Jesus, the ultimate demonstration of controlling the world through egotistical whim.

That is a prospect that makes all of us salivate at times. If only we could do such a thing!

Temptation #5: Grab power.
“I will give you reign over all the kingdoms of the world” is Satan’s final shot at Jesus. We can debate whether or not Satan is telling the truth – does the devil really control the world enough that he has this to give to Jesus? Would he have followed through on the promise and given this power to Jesus if the Christ had bowed down to him?

I think the answer to both of those questions is yes – if not, this is not a real temptation for Jesus. Temptation #5 is all about the chance to grab what can truly be yours. It is no temptation to suggest to me that if I do what you want, you will make me King of Sweden – you do not have that power, and so I have no temptation to follow your suggestion.

But when power is there for the taking, this temptation is real. We have to be careful, because we want good people to have power. Having power is not necessarily bad, any more than having wealth is bad or being popular is bad. When, however, grabbing power for its own sake becomes an end in and of itself – when we agree to bow down to Satan so that we can have power – then we are in the midst of this great temptation.

Machiavelli teaches us that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, but that cliché misses the point of scripture. Before you can be corrupted by power, you have to gain the power. There are those who sincerely seek power as a means of helping and leading, and more power to them – show me where to vote. But the person for whom power is the end instead of the means is the person targeted by Temptation #5.

I believe we overcomplicate much in life. Our analyses of what is evil and wrong in the world can take complex turns as we dissect our motivations and actions.

Perhaps it is not so complicated. Perhaps it is all about these five great temptations: Be like God. Blame God. Satisfy your hungers. Show off. Grab power.

It is worth thinking about.

God in the News

2010-09-10T21:58:00.000-07:00

It is the eve of the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. I want to focus on two instances where God is in the news.

One is the much-discussed (and now at least temporarily "suspended") plan of a church in Florida and a church in Kansas to burn a copy of the Qu'ran, apparently in protest over the planned Ground Zero mosque or maybe just as a general anti-Islam statement. This choice has been fully vetted and discussed in print and in cyberspace, and I am not going to add to that debate per se.

The second is the cover story of today's USA Today concerning actor Michael Douglas and his ongoing treatment for throat cancer. Saying that he has not really thought through mortality issues because he does not think he is dying, Douglas is quoted as saying "I haven't found God yet."

These two seemingly unrelated items strike a chord with me. On one hand, a church openly appeals to hatred as a tool to provide a message. On the other hand, the concept of God is a punch line. I believe that each has to do with the other.

So long as the church operates not as the Body of Christ but rather as just another human organization with very human ideals, it will focus on political goals and popular ends. The politics is not limited to any one direction, of course. For every right-wing church that wants to burn a book or picket a funeral, there is a left-wing church that wants to promote a coffee shop agenda of so-called tolerance that in fact amounts to anything goes.

It is not unforeseeable that in such a world, ideals of God are laughable to many. Why should God be a realistic concern of those whose primary public view of the alleged people of God is caricature?

The anniversary of 9/11 will provide opportunities for God to be in the news again. Some will blame the attacks on God (or praise God for "causing" the attacks). Others will use the opportunity to evaluate one or more of the leading religions of the world, all of which call on God - whether they use the name "Yahweh" or "Allah" or "Jehovah" or "Father."

I am not suggesting that all religions are the same, for they are not. I am not suggesting that all religions are equally acceptable, for they are not. I am not suggesting that Islam is as reasonable a way to approach God as is Christianity, for I do not believe that it is.

I am suggesting, however, that when people choose to act or speak the name of God, they do damage to that name when they act stupidly, unlovingly, counter-productively, or insanely. Blowing up buildings in the name of God is insane. Burning books (especially books that you have not read) in the name of God is, at least, counter-productive. It is not, however, the same as blowing up buildings, and the hyperbolic editorials that have suggested that it is are reaching for a story. Still, for the people who claim to be God's to disregard how their actions will affect the perception of God because they want to make a point seems to me to lead more and more people simply to disregard any serious consideration of God at all.

I have no idea about Michael Douglas' personal religious convictions, if he has any at all. But I do know that "finding God" in deathbeds and prison cells is a common joke.

I don't pretend that we Christians will be anything approaching perfect. We are going to make horrible mistakes that defame the God we represent - we often do. But to do so intentionally in the name of an end that is not even claimed to be a godly goal is beyond me.

If our Christian witness is to have any meaning at all, it has to mean that we are conscious of how our words and actions portray God to the world. When churches are embarrassed to say the name "Jesus Christ" out loud for fear of making someone uncomfortable, it is not surprising that people are not interested in Jesus. When churches are indistinguishable from shopping malls, it is not surprising that visitors act like customers, who expect to be "always right" and who will move on to the next location as trends change. When churches strive primarily to be culturally relevant, it is not surprising that they fail to have any permanent meaning to those who can find better music online and cooler pop culture references on "The Daily Show."

And when any so-called church makes the news for politics (much less hatred), it should be expected that the response will be a political one. God gets left in the dust, to be picked up by the quipsters who need material.

Life Is Not Fair

2010-09-07T13:47:00.000-07:00

I will call them "the Smith family." "Smith" is not their real name, but I want to respect their privacy. Most who have known me a long time will know about whom I am writing.

The Smiths and my parents were best friends as I grew up. I am an only child - the Smiths have lots of kids. I just went to their big house and blended in whenever I got the chance.

I was with one of the Smith daughters the night I broke my elbow and ended my baseball career.

When we made a move and sold a house before school was out, we lived with the Smiths for several weeks.

I could go on about the nature of my relationship with this family, but you get the point.

Dr. Smith died this week. He was 80 years old. I understand that these things happen. It is sad, but it is a part of life, and I am at that stage where many of my friends' parents are starting to pass on.

But the Smith family is different. In the last 10 years...

... their son-in-law was sued. I represented him. He won, but the process was debilitating. He had done nothing wrong, but he suffered the indignity of accusations directed toward his personal and professional competence.

... they lost a granddaughter to a drunk driver. She was brilliant and funny and beautiful and completely innocent, and her life was snuffed out by idiocy.

... their daughter and her family lost their house to Katrina. Washed away. Nothing left.

... they lost another grandchild - this time a boy - and a son-in-law to yet another drunk driver. Again, no fault at all on the part of the Smith family. Complete lunacy.

I am pretty good about philosophizing about why bad things happen to good people, and I think that my answers make some sense in the abstract. I don't think Dr. Smith would argue with them.

Still, as yet another blow strikes this good family that means the world to me, the philosophies and the answers don't satisfy. They seem, in the words of the great Old Testament Teacher, to be a chasing of the wind. My humanity wants the good guys to win and the wicked to suffer. My world, however, does not work that way.

Dr. Smith would have found that Teacher's approval, for he loved God and obeyed God's commandments.

You know Smiths in your life - good people who, for some reason or for no reason, appear to be special targets for what life has to throw at all of us.

For today, I am not thinking it through. I am not philosophizing. I am not trying to satisfy myself or anyone else with so-called answers. I am just sad.

Say a prayer for my friends the Smiths and for whoever the Smiths are in your world. Life happens to all of us, eventually. You will be a Smith some day, and you will covet the prayers and cares of your friends then too.

Smith family, I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, and I am sure that He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it at the day of Christ.

Forgiveness

2010-07-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

Forgiveness is a paradoxical concept, at least the way we Christians put it into practice. On the one hand, we treasure the forgiveness we have from Christ. We teach that we should and must forgive each other. We tell our children to forgive.

On the other hand, in practice, our lives are full of exceptions to the principle. It seems that, for most of us, there is a specific sin or list of wrongs that actually are unforgiveable. There is a certain wrong done to us we do not feel we can forgive or that God really wants us to forgive. Whether it is marital unfaithfulness by our spouse, selfishness by another that leaves us behind, or dishonesty in the church that results in turmoil and upheaval, we seem to shove the concept of forgiveness far into the background.

In short, often we do not feel like forgiving. It is thus timely and critical to circle back to the basics of this New Testament tenet to examine what we are actually called to do, because, like many others of the commands of Christ, forgiveness is indeed based on our actions irrespective of our feelings.

God’s forgiveness of us (Matthew 6:12, 14-15)

It is axiomatic that we have been forgiven of our sins. The singular act of salvation, while we were yet sinners, is the triumphant moment of our lives. As far as the east is from the west have our sins been removed from us.

Forgiveness, however, is not limited to that singular salvation event. We continue to sin, for we have not yet laid hold of the prize. We still see through that glass darkly, and as Paul laments in Romans 7, we do what we do not want to do, and we do not do what we know we are supposed to do. As children of God and royal priests, therefore, we are constantly in need of God’s ongoing forgiveness; we crave our daily relationship with God, yet our sin separates us from God.

In the Model Prayer, Jesus teaches us to ask for God’s forgiveness “as we forgive others.” Too often, we tend to hear only the first half of that, the reminder to ask for forgiveness. Jesus does not leave us there and reminds us, immediately after the text of the Model Prayer, that our continued forgiveness from God is tied to how we forgive others.

You may well be saved, but if your daily walk with Christ is hampered, if you feel separated from God, if you do not share the closeness with God you once knew, perhaps the cause is unforgiveness to which you cling. If you are not forgiving the trespasses of those around you, you are unable to access the full offerings God has for you.

The parable of the unforgiving slave (Matthew 18:21-35)

Few of Jesus’ parables are this clear or this hard hitting. We have been forgiven of a debt so huge we cannot imagine it, yet we turn around and fail to forgive wrongs that are minuscule in comparison.

There are two causes for our failure in this regard. First, despite the fundamental knowledge we have, we underestimate what we owe God. We forget how overwhelming our sin was before we were forgiven by God. Though we were not ax murderers or child abusers, the sins we did commit were detestable to a holy God, whose very nature means that He cannot commune with any impurity. The wages of our sin was Christ's death. For God to forgive the sins of rebellious creatures and allow them eternal life with Him was the act of supreme generosity and love. Too often, we have simply forgotten the depth of the debt we once owed that we could never pay.

Second, we overestimate what others owe us. We magnify the wrong done to us. In the moment, the denarius owed to us seems to be of such importance that we think (in fact, the tempter is whispering in our ear) that surely God will understand how important it is that this wrong be recognized for what it is. To forgive something that has hurt us so much—the infidelity, the rift in our church, the abandonment—cannot be, we tell ourselves (and in actuality we hear the tempter tell us) what God expects.

Of course God expects it. Indeed, God demands it. Not just once. Not just seven times. But more times than we can count.

The clothes of the Christian (Colossians 3:12-14)

Paul reminds us to live constantly with the recollection of how God has treated us. We must never forget we are “holy and dearly loved” ones, chosen by God. To “clothe ourselves” with compassion and humility is to live out these virtues so that they are seen by all around us.

As a part of this clothing, we are to forgive anyone against whom we have a complaint. Once again, like Jesus has done in the Sermon on the Mount, Paul reminds us that we forgive not because of our personal feelings or because of what seems right to us but rather because God has forgiven us.

Paul adds the final word—the outer garment, if you will—that over all these things we must put on love. This is not just our love for each other, for we humans can and do fail regularly. No, here Paul is talking about the “tie that binds,” the love of the Holy Spirit that covers us and prompts our forgiveness, as it does our compassion and our humility. We must wrap ourselves in the love of God, for it is only then that we can find the way to forgive those around us.

Forgiving little grievances is easy. We would not need these strong commands and parables to remind us to forgive the child who spills milk or the co-worker who accidentally takes our paper clip. It is where forgiveness is hard—where we have been truly and deeply hurt, where the one who has wronged us is not seeking forgiveness—that we need the instruction. Neither Christ nor Paul conditions our duty to forgive on the gravity of the wrong done to us or on the apology of the wrongdoer. We are simply to forgive.

It is not easy. It often does not feel good. It may go unnoticed.

But it is a reflection of our loving, holy, forgiving God.

A Couple of Kids' Movies

2010-07-10T22:21:00.000-07:00

I am not sure if it is a good or a bad comment about Hollywood, but there is no question that the best couple of movies I have seen in 2010 are both animated - "Toy Story 3" and "Despicable Me."

I was expecting TS3 to be good. The first two installments were excellent. Pixar produces great stuff. Tom Hanks is in it. What's not to like?

I was not expecting to like "Despicable Me." The previews made it out to be a silly adolescent semi-gross out movie, sort of a dumbed down cartoon version of "MacGruber." The previews are wrong.

The lessons that abound from these two movies are profound. They are not necessarily multi-layered feats of subtlety, but they are worth contemplation. Don't worry - I am not going to spoil the intricate plot twists of the movies for you.

None of this is new, either as a movie device or as a thought for us to consider. But seeing these two movies so close together, I am struck by the critical importance in these age-old themes.

First, both movies focus on teamwork. In TS3, the toys work together to escape the seemingly inescapable. In Despicable, a group of lovable "minions" come through more than once by working together to overcome very long odds.

Teamwork sounds sanitized. It sounds like athletics. It reminds of vaunted "teambuilding activities" that dot the itineraries of corporate retreats. In fact, teamwork is a crucial biblical theme. Jesus chose twelve, and then seventy, and He sent them out in groups. He said that He joins groups of "two or three gathered" in His name. The description of the church is the "body of Christ," with each of us fulfilling only one role and thus needing each other for our very existence.

Secondly, and more importantly, and more profoundly, both movies focus on the transforming power of love. The message in TS3 is expected - the toys have grown to love each other and "their boy" over the years, and this love motivates everything they do. In "Despicable Me," the power of love takes a different tack: innocent love transforms a bad guy into a good guy.

Love cannot be oversold. It cannot be the theme of too many movies. We hear it all the time, and still we don't really get it. Love is not, really, about feelings or eroticism or even emotions. Love is about commitment and actions and putting the needs/desires/wishes of the loved one above your own. Love motivates even when the feelings are absent. We love in spite of our emotions, not because of them.

It is tempting, in both movies, to get distracted from these basic themes. In "Despicable Me," we can easily find ourselves following the bad-guy-vs.-other-bad-guy storyline. In "Toy Story 3," there is a legitimately heart-tugging tone to the whole movie, and for people like me (my son leaves for college one short year from now), the boys-and-their-toys message is one to ponder.

Still, let's not forget the importance of relying on each other and loving each other. Cooperation and teamwork are empowering, for "two are better than one; ... if one falls down, he has the other to help him up, but pity the man who has no one to pick him up!... Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves, and a cord of three strands is not easily broken." And love "bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails."

I have no idea if the producers of these movies know their scripture, but their message certainly does. We need each other. We should act like it.

Peace

2010-07-03T20:01:00.000-07:00

Peace does not come when something is taken. Peace is something added.

Most of the world says that peace means taking something away. If we could stop wars, or stop fighting, or stop arguing, or stop the noise, we will have peace. That is what the world has always thought. Jeremiah says: “'Peace, peace' they say, but there is no peace.” And they will never have peace as long as they keep trying to get it by subtraction.

When Jesus was born, the angels sang “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace.” The wars in the Roman Empire did not suddenly stop. In fact, there has not been a single day since the birth of Christ that somebody on earth was not at war with somebody else. So, were the angels wrong? I don't believe they were. I believe that peace arrived with the Prince of Peace.

Have you ever wondered why Jesus, when describing His gift of peace, said that He does not give us peace "as the world gives"?

The world seeks for peace, visualizes peace, sues for peace, signs peace treaties, marches for peace, and even smokes the peace pipe. And, as Jeremiah prophesied so long ago, there is no peace.

Jesus came to give us life more abundantly. That means He adds things. He does not subtract. He brings something new. Paul said that Jesus Himself is our peace. He gives us peace not as the world gives but as He gives.

And we have peace... in a storm, amidst the noise, even where there is war. I don't for a minute suggest that we stop trying to end wars, for of course war is inhuman and evil. My point is only that ending war is not the same as peace.

Peace is the addition of something. It is something supernatural, mystical, mysterious. There is no recipe. Peace comes with relationship with the One who is beyond. Jesus did not sleep through the storm because He was unconcerned - He was able to sleep because He knew the one holding the wind. Peace comes when you trust the one in control.

So we go about our daily lives with joy, led forth in peace. We don’t worry about anything, but we pray about everything; and the peace of God, which passes all understanding, guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Go in peace.

Promises I Have Not Kept - A Father's Day Reflection

2010-06-20T11:38:00.001-07:00

I have the world's greatest kids. I am really bad at letting them know that I know that. I am quick to teach, to explain, to correct. I am too quick to discipline, to come across as biting, to undercut. Without intention, I too often make them feel small.

When they were born, I made promises to them, to Gena, to myself, to God. When I looked forward, I had no doubt that I would be the Dad with the intimate, sharing relationship with each of my kids. There would be nothing that they could or would not tell me. I would be full of compassion, kindness, and patience. I, who have been such a recipient of the grace and lovingkindness of God, would be a conduit of that same grace and lovingkindness to my kids.

I have not kept those promises. I am not patient, not nearly patient enough. I speak unkindly far too often.

Oh, I have my excuses. I have high expectations for my kids... I see things in them that they don't see and to which they need to be pushed ... The world out there is tough and they need to be ready... I am tired... They know better...

I could go on and on.

But to push my kids to meet my personal expectations in the midst of a tough world was not my promise. My promise was to be patient and kind and to model for them the incredible grace that has been shown to me. I fail.

I think I know why. Oh, of course part of the "why" is my own selfishness and my own inflated ego. Part of the reason is my unwillingness to take my eyes off my own goals, whether they be goals for them or goals for me.

But the real reason is self-reliance. I have thought for years that I have this parenting thing figured out. I know what is best and I know how to get there. I have smart kids, and they will figure out what I intend and what I know - even when I don't bother to verbalize those things - and cut me slack when I am ungracious along the way. If everybody will just follow my plan, the results will be wonderful.

That is so counter to everything I know about the gospel. The point of our lives is that we cannot help ourselves. I am stuck in a miry pit. I am a sinner. The hymnwriter says I am a wretch. How can I possibly keep these promises?

I cannot keep these promises myself. Years of empirical evidence prove that only too well.

Of course the gospel does not stop there. Patience and kindness are not something I can gin up on my own, but I have a Helper. Patience and kindness and goodness are fruit of the Spirit. They are His work, not mine.

It is time for me to get out of the way. It is time for my kids to see less of the promises and more of the Promise.

Half Pint and Me

2010-06-12T22:43:00.000-07:00

Melissa Gilbert is in town, playing (ironically) the mother in the musical version of "Little House on the Prairie."

I am a child of the 70s. Melissa Gilbert is my age, give or take a year. Like most kids my age, I grew up watching her on TV. Like most boys, I never actually admitted to liking "Little House," but I nevertheless had a crush on Melissa Gilbert. I have watched her grow up as I have grown up. I have admired her.

The newspaper story about the musical mentioned her recent autobiography. I have a new Kindle, and I decided I would download and read it. Surely I would find out more about my secret junior high celebrity crush.

Turns out her life was not what I imagined when seeing her as Laura Ingalls... a life of Hollywood celebrity in the 70s and 80s that was complete with sex and drugs and the whole nine yards. OK, I get it. I saw a well-crafted image, and I fell for it.

That is not what speaks to me. What speaks to me is the life that so many lead. I wrote a blog a while back about how I recognize that my life is vastly different from that led by so many. And I know that contrasting my sheltered, straight-laced Southern Baptist upbringing with the Brat Pack lifestyle is not a stretch.

But it is not just Hollywood. I have a good friend who shares many of my values. This friend would be considered to be much "like" me by folks who meet us both. But this friend's life has been much different from my own. Choices - both moral and emotional - have been so different. Experiences that for me would have been earth shattering have instead been routine. Conversely, this friend is astounded at how I have lived my life, never really believing that anyone took seriously some of the things that have dominated my decisions.

My parents were visited last week by distant relatives who, according to my mother, "come from another world."

We are surrounded by people from another world. We interact with them every day. One of the great faults of my culture is the assumption that everyone else is "like me." Oh, it is easy to assume that those Hollywood nuts are running wild, but to think that the person I talk to every day has tried things and experienced things - and liked them and thinks they are perfectly acceptable - that I would consider taboo is a critical reminder. I cannot assume that my particular bubble describes everyone else - or even anyone else.

We are all different. How we see the world is different. When someone disagrees with me, I would do well to remember that.

I am not nearly as judgmental as I used to be. I still know what I believe to be right and wrong. I am no more inclined to situational ethics or relative morality than ever. But I also am learning more and more that everybody has his or her own parameters and viewpoints, largely shaped by environments and influences that were not chosen.

I can still admire Melissa Gilbert. And my friend and I are continuing to forge a relationship. In fact, all of my friends and I forge relationships out of our varied histories.

God placed us in a world of interactions with all kinds of people, all created in God's image. Having our eyes opened to more and more varieties of people - who have made choices different from our own and have had experiences we would never approach - does not taint us. It enriches us.

Open your world. Aristotle said that it is the mark of the educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it. Jesus said that we should welcome the stranger. It is no compromise to have relationship with those different from you, to hear of their experience, to consider their point of view.

My life is fuller because of all the people in it.

Freedom

2010-05-22T18:05:00.000-07:00

I have a GPS in my car. It speaks with a feminine voice, and I have (oh so creatively) christened her Sacagawea, my guide. I am quickly finding myself reliant on her directions, even in my home town. Sometimes, though, I find her telling me to make a turn to get somewhere when I can clearly see a more direct way straight ahead.

When do we follow the roadmap, the rules, the voice that the store sold us... and when do we ignore the guide and set out on a different road because of what we know in our gut is right?

I am a rules follower. Some of that comes from being a lawyer - I like procedures to be in place, and I like everyone to follow them. If they don't, I object (literally).

Still, inherent in the nature of rules is a limitation on our freedom.

So, what is "freedom?" We say we want it. We fight wars over it.

I find certain things in my life - things I believe are gifts from God or ways to follow God's will for me - often are outside of the rules. Stay with me. I mean to say they may well not fit the rules that society has set up. God's ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts. Please understand … I do not mean that they will be outside of God's rules. Paul writes very clearly that while we are called in Christ to be free, we are not to use that freedom to indulge our sinful nature. If some spirit is telling you to rob a bank or commit adultery or walk upon the downtrodden so that you can gain something you would not otherwise have or deserve, then you are listening to the wrong spirit.

So what do I mean about freedom and the rules of this world? I mean that our faithful God will have a new mercy for you tomorrow morning, and it may well surprise you, because you never expected it. Perhaps your peers do not expect you to have or do or be anything like that. Maybe society says that that cannot be a part of your way of life. Conceivably, some religious figure may tell you that good Christians do not go there or do that. I suggest you evaluate the source of those rules.

Many of our rules were not made with the realities of God in mind. The rules say that you cannot walk on water and that you cannot be raised from the dead and that Jesus will not want to stop to spend time with little children. The rules say that certain people do not associate with other certain people – whether it is because of their race or their class or their marital status or their income; fortunately, the Good Samaritan did not follow that rule. The rules say that you should not take chances so that you will not get hurt.

The rules say, "Follow the rules, and you can stay in a world that is predictable and explainable and safe."

Many of our rules are well-intentioned guidelines to keep us from stepping too far, and it is always safest and easiest to stay trouble-free if we steer well clear of the boundaries. But for those willing to search for God and the freedom that He offers, it is at the boundaries of what the world understands that God does His most exciting work. Do not be surprised that society does not want you there.

I know that what I am saying is dangerous. Testing the boundaries is only for those who are firmly planted. I run the risk of someone’s hearing me say that it is OK to go break all the rules.

Charlie Johnson says that our faith has Christ in the center but has no circumference. There is no border keeping anyone out of the faith. Just so, there is no predetermined outline limiting what we can be.

In C.S. Lewis' masterpiece The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, the hero is a lion named Aslan, an allegorical Christ figure. When one of the children asks one of Aslan's faithful followers about the safety in being around such an animal, the classic reply tells us so much about the nature of Christ: "Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you." You see, what I am saying is dangerous because our freedom can be dangerous. You know that I am not saying that you should go break all the rules – do not go cheat on your taxes or kick the dog – but there are such blessings that await us new, each morning, if we trust totally in the good giver of freedom.

Freedom is a gift. Like any gift, it must be used carefully. Jesus did not come to erase one bit of the law but instead to fulfill the spirit of the law. He said that if we continue in His word as His disciples, then "you shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free.... And if the Son has set you free, then you are free indeed." Freedom, then, does not come from an anarchical throwing off of all authority or an idealistic search for the glimmer in each individual. Freedom comes from the truth that can be ours. Freedom comes in trusting God and not leaning on what we understand.

Then, and only then, the rules do not matter so much. If we are walking the right road, we don't need so many maps. We can leave the GPS at home.

Going Back to Bethel

2010-05-15T17:39:00.000-07:00

Jacob is a biblical character whom you would not characterize as "good." He is not faithful like his grandfather Abraham. He is not a model citizen like his son Joseph. He is, instead, aptly named, for Jacob means "grasper" or "deceiver." He wants what is not his. He schemes. He hurts his brother. He lies, even to his own father. In short, he is like you and me.

Bethel, part one - Stopping for the night to rest, Jacob has a dream. He sees a ladder going to heaven, with angels moving up and down —the literal “stairway to heaven.” He hears, for the first time in his life, God’s recital of his promise to Abram, now repeated to Jacob: “I am God, the God of your father and his father. I will give you this land, and the number of your descendants will be as the dust. Wherever you go, I will bless you.” Awakening, Jacob does a curious—and instructive—thing. He recognizes the presence of God. “Surely the Lord is in this place … . This is none other than the house of God, the gate of heaven." Out of the mouth of the deceiver—the liar—comes this truth that faces each of us: God is here, and we need to take notice of it. This place that hours before seemed no more than a place to stretch out and lay our head on a rock is in fact the place where angels tread, where God moves. It is a sanctuary.

So Jacob builds an altar and names the place Bethel, “the house of God.” He promises allegiance to God and offers a tithe. God has chosen him, and Jacob recognizes God is present.

Peniel - Fast forward now to a new place, another stop on a journey seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Jacob wrestles with God. The metaphor here for our own lives is strong. We start out as "Jacob," a deceiver. We become "Israel," one who struggles with God. We humans, who have a deceitful and manipulative nature, will inevitably struggle with God. God blesses us despite our failings, but God does not want us to remain as we were. God meets us on our road and touches us.

Struggling with God is not taboo. Like Jacob, we find ourselves alone with God, and we fight. Like Jacob, we come out of this fight with two marked changes:

• First, we find that our name has been changed. God no longer sees us as the deceiver; God knows we are a struggler. We do not “win” the struggle or change God, but our very nature is changed. God speaks to us differently. We are Israel.
• Second, we find that our walk is changed. Jacob, now Israel, walks with a limp. In struggling with God, Israel has had his body touched. When we struggle with God, we will find that our way of doing things has changed. The more manipulative we have been—the more we embodied the grasping, deceiving “Jacob” within us—the more that change will hurt, at least initially. Changing the ingrained can be painful.

Again, Jacob recognizes the significance of the place and of the presence of God, and he names the place Peniel, for there he has seen the face of God.

Bethel, part two - Israel is in trouble. His sons (the apple does not far fall from this tree) have created havoc, and Israel fears the worst. Life is not going as planned. Suddenly, the word from God comes: it is time to go back to Bethel.

Bethel is the place of Jacob’s ladder, where he had first heard the covenant of God. Bethel reminds Israel not only that God is with him but that God has blessed and protected him. When Jacob arrives again at Bethel, God reminds him of both his name change and the covenant. Jacob’s nature is changed—he is no longer the grasper; he is the struggler. He is Israel. God’s covenant still is sure, and God’s plans are not changed.

In “Les Miserables,” Jean Valjean steals silver candlesticks from the bishop, but the bishop forgives the transgression and sets Valjean free, giving him the candlesticks to take with him as a sign the bishop has “bought your soul for God.” In the stage production, the director always makes sure the candlesticks remain prominent for Valjean, and the audience, to see: the reminder of the sacrifice made and the time when Valjean first understood the presence of God is never far away.

We Christians all have markers in our walks, places and times in our journeys that have signified the very presence of God to us. When we are in trouble, we need to find that marker, to look at our candlesticks. We often need to go back to Bethel.

I have gone back to Bethel over the last few weeks. I have not literally traveled there - my travels have taken me far and wide, but not back to a place of importance for my faith. I have been shown no candlesticks. But I have re-discovered that which I already knew - God is planning with me and for me, God is protecting me, God is blessing me, God is using me. I have spent time in what are basics for me - the Roman Road, "the truth shall make you free," what it is to have "been with Jesus" - and I have come away renewed.

I have been back to Bethel.

Arks of Grace

2010-04-17T11:16:00.000-07:00

We all know the story of Noah and the ark: grace comes in the midst of a flood. The grace is actually carefully planned before the first raindrop falls, when God talks to Noah, giving him precise instruction as to how to avoid the coming catastrophe.

The provision of grace to Noah can be broken down into recognizable acts of God.

• Noah is known. God sees Noah, recognizes Noah’s faithfulness and makes gracious provision for him. Our love for God and our lives of obedience amidst the hordes are not unnoticed by God.

• A way of escape is planned. Just as God’s command to Adam and Eve in the garden may not have made immediate sense to them, the word to Noah—build something called an ark in the middle of the desert that had never known rain, much less a flood—could not have been reasonable in any human sense to Noah; still, it was the word of the Lord, and Noah was a blameless and upright man.

• The future of all of mankind was secured. You and I would not be here now but for the gracious provision for those in the ark. Grace is found in this provision for millions of future generations through the life and work of one blameless man.

• The act of grace is secured by God’s promise. The rainbow may be explained by a physicist with a prism, but its meaning as a sign of God’s gracious covenant is clear to all who know God.

God sends arks of grace. I believe that the ark is a manifestation of the grace of God. Sinful society has so separated itself from God that it is on the road to destruction, yet God sends grace. Just as naked Adam and Eve were given clothes, just as Cain received his mark, now Noah and his family receive building instructions for an ark. Following those instructions faithfully, Noah finds himself with the only salvation available.

Floods come to us for all sorts of reasons.

• We cause them. Often, every intention of our heart is only evil all the time. We get what we deserve. Our sins find us out.

• Others cause them. Sometimes, we have been blameless, but the sins of others catch us up in the storm, bringing us disease, destruction, divorce, disappointment or disloyalty. Wars rage over issues that have nothing to do with us, yet we are caught in the crossfire.

• Nature causes them. We may never understand this side of heaven why the tornado or the hurricane comes, why the cancer strikes the healthy teenager, why psychosis attacks the brilliant mind.

• God allows them. For some storms, there is no explanation for us. We can struggle with the questions of why an omniscient, omnipotent, all-loving God can allow them; whether we find an answer or not, God allows the storms.

The lesson is that arks — just like the floods — come to us in all sorts of ways.

• Sometimes, we build them. We hear a word from God, and we understand His instructions. Faithfully following, we find ourselves positioned to ride the storm out, rising above the waves.

• Others build them for us. God works through the church, through our friends, through the prayers of those whom we have never met. Through driving rains, we see the hands of rescuers that reach out to us, lifting us out of the rushing tide.

• Though we often miss them, some arks come to us naturally. The hands of the doctor, the calm of the southern wind, the mutation that fights the disease—God’s grace often is extended to us in ways that have no explanation beyond nature taking its course. It was, after all, a great rush of wind that parted the Red Sea.

• God simply intervenes. The word “miracle” has gone out of style for some, but we cannot ignore the arks that come without explanation other than the grace of God.

To be sure, grace does not come to all in the same way. Some are saved from the flood; others are protected through the flood; still others are swept away by the flood, only to receive the ultimate healing of the grace of God through eternity.

When I was writing the lyrics to my first published anthem, "He Gives More Grace," I initially had a line in it about "arks of grace." I was persuaded to change the line to "gifts of grace," because, I was told, many would not know what I was talking about otherwise. Perhaps that is true, but I find in Noah's ark as amazing example of the grace of God.

Tea Parties and Wal-Mart: Where Is Conservatism Going?

2010-03-30T08:21:00.000-07:00

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal included an opinion by respected neoconservative Norman Podhoretz entitled "In Defense of Sarah Palin." The point of that editorial is that just because Palin is being attacked by the intellectual elite as being dumb is not a reason not to vote against her; in fact, the author embraces those attacks as a reason to vote for her.

I don't want to write a blog about Sarah Palin. Please do not comment here with your personal views for her or against her - there are plenty of places on the web to do that.

Instead, I want to address the question of the value of gravitas , that often indefinable "something" - quality, depth, substance - that only the giants and heroes have.

Noting that Palin's attackers come from both the right and the left, Podhoretz quotes a satirical attack on the "unsightly hordes of Wal-Mart untermenschen typified by the loathesome Tea Party rabble" with their "base enthusiasms and simian grunts." Podhoretz concludes by saying that since high-IQ types like Carter, Clinton, and Obama have been (in his opinion) poor presidents, he would be happier with the grunting Tea Partiers.

Podhoretz writes well, but I must confess that I am skeptical of the argument that boils down to “smart people have done badly, so let’s elect a dumb-dumb.” That is not exactly what he is saying of course, and I don’t think that Palin is a dumb-dumb. But I am skeptical of the position that says that - because many intellectuals are (1) liberal, like the MIT and Harvard faculty (William Buckley is quoted by Podhoretz as saying he would rather be governed by the first 2000 names in the Boston phone book than by these faculties); (2) embarrassing, like Biden; (3) failures, like Carter; or (4) morally questionable, at best, like Clinton – we should therefore elect someone who is not very smart.

I admire some things about Sarah Palin. I liked her speaking during the campaign, and I admire her carrying the banner for what she believes is a principled message. I wish she had been better prepared for Katie Couric, and I wish she were not quite so quick to embrace the “Wal-Mart untermenschen” persona that is being thrust upon her.

I believe we can find a conservative who has the gravitas that Palin does not. Yes, given a choice, I might vote for her over President Obama. But I would rather have Ronald Reagan. I don’t see another Reagan on the horizon. Frankly, though, I think the time is ripe for one to arise.

Here is what I mean. The Republican Party in the late 70s was (or would have been, but for Watergate) the world of Nixon, he of wage and price controls and appeasement of China. It was the party of Ford, a middle of the road nice guy with no real conservative credentials. Conservatism was still exemplified/lampooned by the failed and over-the-top Goldwater. The party was in trouble. The only thing worse was the stagflation, Iranian hostage world of the Democrats. Not a clash of the titans. Out of that morass arose someone who could visualize, who could dream, who could articulate what was not apparent. In short, a man of faith (here, I mean faith in what American could and should be, not Christian faith (although he was also that)), a person who could preach the substance of things not seen.

I am no more a fan of today’s Republican party than I am - in retrospect - of the Nixon/Ford party of the 70s. I have not given money to the party in years. McCain and W were not, by any stretch, my choice as excellent candidates. I voted for them only because I could not stomach the alternative... but being better than John Kerry or Al Gore is no great prize. Dole would have been a reasonable candidate if he had been 20 years younger, but of course Kemp was a much better choice. In other words, yes, I am saying conservatism's best national candidate since Reagan has been a losing vice-presidential nominee from 14 years ago.

The time, like in 1979, is ripe for the rise of a true conservative statesman or stateswoman. Somebody is going to ascend. Sarah Palin is trying, but she is not the one. I really think she is laying the groundwork for somebody else. I don’t know who that is. It could be Mitt Romney. It could be Bobby Jindal. It could be Condolezza Rice. It could be Eric Cantor. I don’t think it is Tim Pawlenty. It might be Charley Crist. It is not Gingrich or Huckabee or Giuliani.

It may well be somebody I have never heard of. But whoever it is, I believe that our present political arena is speeding up his/her appearance. The trick will be if this person can rise above the mess the Republicans have made of conservatism – all about hatred, abortion, yelling loud, racist junk about President Obama, and personal attack – to become a leader. If President Reagan could rise out of Watergate/pardon, then it can be done again.

Social Justice and the Better Choice

2010-03-24T10:53:00.000-07:00

On his radio and television shows a couple of weeks ago, Glenn Beck set out to convince his audience that "social justice," the term many churches use to describe their efforts to address poverty and human rights, is a "code word" for communism and Nazism. Beck urged Christians to leave their churches if leaders would not reconsider their emphasis on social justice.

"I beg you, look for the words 'social justice' or 'economic justice' on your church web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! … Communists are on the left, and the Nazis are on the right. That's what people say. But they both subscribe to one philosophy, and they flew one banner. . . . But on each banner, read the words, here in America: 'social justice.' They talked about economic justice, rights of the workers, redistribution of wealth, and surprisingly, democracy."

I want to set aside Beck’s tortured view of history and political philosophy and ask this question, from the point of view of the church: Why the attack on social justice? After all, the Bible seems very clear on these issues:
• Jesus chastises the Pharisees, saying, “Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? But give what is inside [the dish] to the poor, and everything will be clean for you.”
• Later in the same gospel, Jesus says, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”
• Many of the Proverbs address the issue. For example, “Do not exploit the poor because they are poor and do not crush the needy in court, for the LORD will take up their case and will plunder those who plunder them.”
• It should go without saying that the Torah is clear on the issue: “There should be no poor among you…. If there is a poor man among your brothers in any of the towns of the land that the LORD your God is giving you, do not be hardhearted or tightfisted toward your poor brother. Rather be openhanded and freely lend him whatever he needs.”
• Jesus’ first public declaration of His ministry was in the context of social justice: “He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read. The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written: ‘The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.’ Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying to them, ‘Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.’”
• In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus teaches us to “give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.”
• The sheep and goats passage contains Jesus’ famous line that “whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.”
• The Apostle James, the half-brother of Christ, teaches: “Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, ‘Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?”

It is simply axiomatic that the Bible teaches, repeatedly and emphatically, that what most of us call “social justice” – giving to the poor, striving for justice, helping the less fortunate, standing up for those who cannot stand up for themselves – is expected of believers.

So, why question churches involved in social justice? I think there are two answers. (OK, there are more answers than that. These questions could well be cover for all sorts of agenda that fill the blogosphere and the airwaves. If so, the substance of the question is not worth discussing - it is just a tool for opening a pet can of worms. But I think there are two legitimate bases for at least raising the question, and those are what I want to address. The others are not worth a response.)

The first is political. The fact that social justice is a requirement for Christians is not the same thing as accepting that government should be in the social justice business. The calls in scripture are for believers, the church, and the people of God. The calls in scripture are for voluntary service, not compulsory action. Is it really an offering to pay taxes? Does government action answer the demands of scripture?

I understand these political arguments. To take them to the extent of demanding that I leave my church, however, is ridiculous. For Glenn Beck, who as I understand it is a relatively newly-minted Mormon, to deign to tell any of us that we should leave our churches based on his political agenda is insulting. If I disagree with my church on individual issues (and I often do), the answer is to work within the church, not to leave it.

There is a second answer to the question, and it is decidedly not political. It also has nothing to do with Glenn Beck’s rant. It is an issue of competition, of the “good” getting in the way of the “best.”

When Jesus comes to Bethany with his entourage, Martha sets about to prepare food and lodging for the several dozen drop-ins to her home. Her sister Mary, we are told, sits at Jesus’ feet, listening to Him teach. Martha is no dummy – we see in her discussion with Jesus in John 11 that she is theologically deep, and she is the one whom Jesus chooses to hear the critical words “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me, though dead, shall yet live.” Now, she sees a need for service to those who need help, and she sets about to fulfill that need. Mary does not help, and Martha complains to Jesus.

Why? Is Mary a slacker who is once again shirking responsibility? I don’t think so. I think Mary normally is one who pitches right in with Martha on the service front. Today is different, and Martha notices. Today, Mary is leaving the work to Martha.

It is important that Jesus never once indicts Martha’s service. What catches Jesus’ attention is Martha’s distraction. She is “worried about a great many things” while Mary is focused on “one thing.” Jesus refuses to find fault with Mary, for her “one thing” is the most important.

In “City Slickers,” Curly tells Billy Crystal’s character that the secret to life is “one thing.” Crystal spends the better part of two movies trying to figure out what it is.

In scripture, Jesus tells the rich young ruler that he lacks “one thing.” The healed blind man could not answer all of the synagogue leaders’ questions, but he knew “one thing.” Paul had not taken hold of everything that he could have, but “one thing” he knew.

And therein lies the lesson. I don’t think it is a lesson that Glenn Beck had in mind, but it is a lesson for all of us concerned about social justice. We cannot let the good get in the way of the best. When serving in the soup line replaces the inner yearning for relationship with Christ, we have become Martha. When marching for justice or running the yard sale becomes our worship, we are "worried about a great many things." We are distracted.

Jesus approves Mary because she has made the better choice. Sitting and listening – today we might well call it worship and prayer and Bible study – grow out of commitment to “one thing,” and Jesus approves that choice. Never blaming Martha for her honest desire to help those who need help … never hinting that service is wrong … never once suggesting that social justice is the wrong aim … Jesus treasures our attention. He always seeks relationship.

That is the one thing. That is the better choice.

We of course must seek social justice. If your church is using “social justice” as a code word for some political agenda as Beck suggests, then perhaps you need to address that. I don’t think most of our churches are guilty of that.

But in performing your service, don’t get distracted from the one thing. Always make the better choice.

The Most Famous Verses that are not Really in the Bible

2010-03-10T12:31:00.000-08:00

If we were to take a poll to discover the greatest movies of all time, we would have a lot of choices, but I am sure that my favorite movie would be in the top three. That movie is “Casablanca:” Great plot... Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman and Sydney Greenstreet and Paul Heinreid and Claude Rains and Peter Lorre... Wonderful ending. But the thing about that movie that makes it a true classic is the amazing number of famous lines that are so much a part of our culture.
 “Here’s looking at you kid.”
 “Round up the usual suspects.”
 “Not an easy day to forget. I remember every detail. The Germans wore grey. You wore blue.”
 “We’ll always have Paris.”
 “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.”
 “This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

But, none of those is the line that is widely accepted as the most famous line from the movie. I looked up three different internet polls to see if the answer to that question has changed since I first heard it when I was in college, and it hasn’t. Let’s see if you know. The line comes late one night, when Sam, played by Dooley Wilson, is playing “As Time Goes By” on the piano. He finishes playing, and Rick, played by Bogart, says ...

...

I am guessing that you have given the same answer I heard in a trivia bowl in college and found on those three internet polls. And you are wrong. The line “Play it Again Sam” is never heard in the movie “Casablanca.” Ilsa says, “Play it Sam,” and Rick says “you played it for her, you can play it for me.” But nobody ever says, “Play it again, Sam.”

That has some gospel on it. Here is what I mean: Just as a great deal of “Casablanca” trivia has grown up around a quote that is not in the movie, a lot of very well-meaning folk build their theology around ideas that are not in the Bible. These folks are just sure that these "verses" are in fact biblical. I hear them all the time in my Sunday School class, when someone will say something like, “it says somewhere in the Bible, I am not quite sure where, but somewhere, that...."

So, with that in mind, I want to mention the most famous "unverses" that are not in the Bible.

1. “I am not my brother’s keeper.”
Now, isn’t this a good basis for theology!? Of the three "unverses" I am going to discuss, this is the one that is closest to the actual words of scripture, but a little change in words creates a huge difference. The actual words are “Am I my brother’s keeper?” God comes to Cain and asks where Abel is, and Cain, perhaps out of smugness, perhaps out of fear, perhaps out of disdain for both God and Abel, says “I don’t know. Am I my brother’s keeper?”

From there, we somehow move to this basis of theology – I am not my brother’s keeper. Now stay with me on this. Politically, I am a staunch individualist. I believe in the preservation of individual rights, and I believe that a promotion of individualism is the best system for promotion of the common good. Economically, I am a capitalist. I know that the profit motive and the ability of an individual to move up a ladder are the cornerstones of the best way for a market system to create the best situation for all of us. But, to jump from individualism to “I am not my brother’s keeper” is a jump that I am not willing to make. It is also a jump that the Bible does not make. Not only is it a misquote, but it is a misquote of the world’s first murderer – not my first choice for inspiration.

Instead, let’s see what the Bible does say.
 “Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift.”
 “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
 “Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification. Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food.... It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause you brother to fall.”
 “Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, ‘Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed, but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?”

You see, even as we work in our politics and our economics, we also must understand that we are all created in the image of God, and we have a responsibility to each other.

2. “…and David lived happily ever after.”
Now this is a tough one. We start with David playing harps and leading armies. Then we move to his writing Psalms and serving kings. Finally, we understand that he was a man after God’s own heart.

Contrasted to that we have terrible sin. You know the story of Bathsheba. What starts with David's avoiding his duty as commander in chief of the army moves to invasion of privacy, then to lust, adultery, and murder. Not just a single murder, but instead, murder of many soldiers just to make sure that Bathsheba’s husband is killed. Multiple, horrific sins.

David was forgiven. There is no question of that. He was repentant, he asked for forgiveness, and he got it. He was still a man after God’s own heart.

But sin does not quit affecting us when God forgives us. Most of the book of Second Samuel is given to describing the horrors in David’s life that resulted from his sins. A baby died. His children who grew up alternated between raping each other and trying to steal David’s throne from him. Rather than living happily ever after, the lasting words of David are laments as he cries over the death of his son Absalom.

Forgiveness comes. We continue to seek God. God even restores to us the joy of our salvation. But scripture is clear that your sin will find you out.

My point is not to rail against David or to minimize the importance of his writings or of God’s forgiveness. My point is that many build a theology around the principle that they can do what they want because, like David, they will be forgiven, and then everything will be hunky dory. They are right – they will be forgiven. But it is naïve and unscriptural to think that the consequences of sin will vanish.

3. “The Lord helps those who help themselves.”
This is my favorite of all. How many hundreds of times have we all heard this one? Again, I am a capitalist and an individualist, and I believe in working for a living and putting your money in the bank. But, this "unverse" is not scriptural. In fact, scripture is just the opposite. If you want to build your theology on an idea, then make it this: the Lord helps those who cannot help themselves!
 “But God commended His love toward us in this, that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
 “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things – and the things that are not – to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before Him.”
 “They will see the splendor of God, who strengthens the feeble hands and steadies the knees that give way; who says to those with fearful hearts, ‘Be strong, do not fear, your God will come to save you.’”
 “I waited patiently for Jehovah; He turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; He set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth.”

The words of a great man, Jehoshaphat, make this clear, and these words are particularly timely for us today. Listen to these verses from 2 Chronicles: "O LORD, God of our fathers, are you not the God who is in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. Power and might are in your hand, and no one can withstand you. O our God, did you not drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel and give it forever to the descendants of Abraham your friend? They have lived in it and have built in it a sanctuary for your Name, saying, `If calamity comes upon us, whether the sword of judgment, or plague or famine, we will stand in your presence before this temple that bears your Name and will cry out to you in our distress, and you will hear us and save us.' But now here are men from Ammon, Moab and Mount Seir, whose territory you would not allow Israel to invade when they came from Egypt; so they turned away from them and did not destroy them. See how they are repaying us by coming to drive us out of the possession you gave us as an inheritance. O our God, will you not judge them? For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are upon you."

Jehoshophat was a great king. If anyone could help himself, it was Jehoshophat. But his prayer should be ours. I do not understand. I cannot fix it. I do not know what to do. I am powerless. My eyes are on you, God.

The Lord helps those who cannot help themselves.

Don't rely on things that aren't really there in scripture. Don't live by a "Play it again, Sam" theology.

Is It Worthwhile to Raise a Tiger?

2010-03-03T08:07:00.000-08:00

Let me start by saying that I don't know if what the press is reporting is true. I am, for the purposes of this blog, going to use as my example the "Tiger Woods" that has been painted by the press. I could just as easily write a blog about a fictional character that I named "John Smith," but the Tiger story is too much in the news for me to ignore. If the press reports are wrong, then that is an injustice to him.

But just for example purposes, let's assume the following (We will call it "Group A") is correct:

1. Tiger is a serial adulterer.
2. Tiger needs treatment for a "sex addiction."
3. Tiger needs treatment for addiction to pain medication and sleeping pills.

Now again, I don't know if all of that is true, or if any of it is true. But let's just assume it is.

Here is what else we know ("Group B") about Tiger (and these we know, we are not just assuming):

1. He has more money than virtually anybody else short of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett.
2. He is the best golfer on the planet, and he is likely the best who ever played.
3. He is world famous. His face and name are known anywhere you go.
4. He is handsome, well-spoken, and smart.
5. His wife is one of the most beautiful women in the world.
6. He has two attractive kids.

So, here is the question: as a parent, would you put up with Group A if you knew you could get Group B?

Tiger's father, Earl, began teaching Tiger golf and drilling him on the game before Tiger could walk. Tiger appeared on TV at the age of 3 to show off his golf skills. His single aim was determined for him by his father, although it seems clear enough that Tiger has embraced and expanded that aim beyond what even his father could have imagined.

I do not for a minute suggest that Group A has to follow in order to get Group B. I suppose there are many successful athletes, actors, musicians, and other celebrities who "make it" without involving themselves in addiction, adultery, abuse, or crime.

Neither do I suggest that Earl Woods had any idea that Tiger would end up with Group A. I have no stones to throw there.

Finally, I do not suggest that the reason Tiger has the Group A stuff is because he is the world's greatest golfer, or because he is rich, or because he is famous.

But there are certainly a lot of "Group B" folks who have their share of Group A.

So, back to my question. If you knew that you could get your child to Group B, but only a cost of Group A, would you? Of course we would sacrifice all sorts of things from our own lives to help our children succeed. But what would you sacrifice from their lives?

It is a real question. Of course, nobody sets out to send their child down the road to addiction and adultery. But if you knew that was a byproduct of the "successful" road you were outlining, would you still do it?

I am not here today with an answer. I am only suggesting that we have more than one certain priority list in this generation, and different ones of you have different lists. Some of you would answer the question "yes" and some would answer "no."

Would you do it?

Koinonia

2010-02-27T22:13:00.000-08:00

I am very "churchy."

I am often accused of being "too churchy," "too involved," or "too busy with church." I respect those who offer those opinions, and I respect the opinions. But I am who I am.

I am not churchy by accident. I am not that way because my parents started me in church early. I am not that way because I can't think of anything else to do. I am not that way because it is of any great profit to me, financially or socially.

I am churchy for two main reasons.

First, I believe deeply in the New Testament concept that the church is the body of Christ. In other words, the way that Christ touches the world is with the fingers of the church. He hugs the young and the frail with our arms, feeds the hungry with our hands, sees needs with our eyes, and speaks the gospel with our tongues. Conversely, the way the world sees Christ is by seeing us.

I don't mean to imply that the church is the only way that Christ works in the world, for it clearly is not. But I do emphatically believe that the church is the bodily way that Christ works. The New Testament makes that clear. Consequently, if I want to be a part of how Christ is working in a tangible fashion in the world, I feel a strong pull to do that through the church.

Similarly, as the body of Christ, we worship our head - Jesus - together. We study scripture together. We pray together. It is as a body that we function.

Second, I am addicted to koinonia. If you don't know that word, it is the English transliteration of the Greek word κοινωνία, which literally means "community of intimate participation." It is the New Testament word for the fellowship of Christians found in the church. It is the relationship that arises from breaking bread and sharing communion together. More loosely, it is the idea of fellowship that uniquely springs from those who join together in the church setting.

Please understand me: I am not for a moment suggesting that there are not many other worthy organizations wherein fellowship is enjoyed. There are many groups related to social clubs, neighborhoods, places of employment, sports, activities of every stripe, and just random groupings that become centers of personal human relationship and fellowship. I do not denigrate any of them.

But, at least for me, my experience is that nothing matches the koinonia. It is not simply personal human relationship but instead is a unique relationship joined by Christ Himself. Where two or three are gathered in His name, He is there also.

That is pretty mystical, I know. I just lost many of you. But stay with me.

I have just finished a two month project with about fifty fellow church members. It was not overtly "religious." We put on a show...literally - a two-hour concert of music drawn from Disney movies. Other than "God Help the Outcasts" from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, nothing in the show could possibly by misinterpreted as anything "religious." But participating in this program with these people was a celebration of that unique kind of fellowship.

The same group of us will join with our church to feed the homeless and teach children and sing Messiah and declare the gospel. We are strengthened in our love and regard for one another, and as a result, doing something as simple as singing a concert of songs from "The Lion King" and "Mary Poppins" takes on a deeper meaning.

If you too are joined in the koinonia, you know what I mean. If you are not, and if the mystical part of what I have said has missed you, understand that I am not trying to get you to go join a church so much as I am trying to get you to understand why there are some of us who are so "churchy." There are some very real reasons we spend so much time and energy and money and commitment on this thing called church.

Oh, yeah, I would love for you to be a part of a church, but it won't mean nearly the same thing to you if you have not first found a relationship with Christ, for the koinonia necessarily involves His involvement. Otherwise, a church is just another social club.

I am pretty unimpressed with the prosperity gospel. I don't believe that finding Jesus will make you rich or healthier or a better cook. I think the egocentrism of prioritizing your "best life now" is antithetical to the New Testament.

But there is no doubt that the life of the koinonia, fellowshiping with Jesus and with those who are fellowshiping with Jesus, is worthwhile, even advantageous. It is what drives me. I recommend it.

Requiem for The Duck

2010-02-01T09:01:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, I was privileged to be one of the eulogists at the memorial service held in the Millar Chapel on the campus of Northwestern University for Scott Deatherage, who died on Christmas Day. For those who did not know him, I cannot here give a full bio - he was the most successful coach in college debate history, leading Northwestern to seven national championships in a mere 18 years, and he followed that up by becoming the Executive Director of the National Association of Urban Debate Leagues, dedicating himself to bettering secondary education by bringing debate back into the world of the inner-city high schools.

Below is the full text of the eulogy that I wrote before I had to edit it significantly for time purposes. As you read it, you need to keep in mind that the audience was primarily the college debate community of the last 25 years from around the country - because of that, there are a number of references that will not make sense to those of you not familiar with the world of debate. I can help out a little by telling you that "the NDT" is the National Debate Tournament, that Scott's nickname universally was "The Duck," and that "Robin" is Dr. Robert C. Rowland, Scott's and my debate coach at Baylor. I was privileged to speak right after Mark Dyer, who spoke eloquently about Scott in the context of the parable of the Good Samaritan.

Christmas Day, 2009: The day Scott Deatherage died.

I heard the bells on Christmas Day, their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair, I bowed my head: “There is no peace on earth,” I said.
“For hate is strong and mocks the song of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Observation One - There are some words that I believe we would all use to describe Scott Deatherage:
• Driven
• Strategically brilliant
• Tireless
• Dedicated
• Kind
• Caring
• Selfless
• Awkward
• Forward-thinking
• Smart
• Well-read
• Committed
• Music lover
• Baseball fan
• Guileless
• Dependable
• Generous
• Passionate
• Friend

Observation Two - There are some words that I believe that none of us would use to describe Scott Deatherage. Those might include:
• Graceful
• Happy-go-lucky
• Greedy
• Uninvolved
• Impatient
• Self-absorbed

Observation Three - There are some words that I would personally use to describe the roles that Scott played in my life at various times:
• Teammate
• For one tournament, debate partner
• Graduate Assistant Coach
• Rival workshop squad leader
• Coach of worthy opponents at Samford and Northwestern
• Rival coach in many deep elimination rounds
• Tab room colleague
• For 24 years, rotisserie baseball league member and rival coach of a team, known as, of course, the Ducks
• Information source for what was going on in the college debate world, including how many points the Top Speaker had every year at the NDT, an encyclopedic knowledge of useless trivial detail, and a multi-byte memory for who judged what round between what two teams, including what four debaters, in round six at the Utah tournament in 1985
• Collaborator on unwritten, and now never-to-be-written, books
• Political sparring partner
• Groomsman
• Friend

As many of you know, a couple of years ago, I launched a campaign to nominate Scott as an outstanding alumnus of Baylor University. That nomination is still pending. As a part of that process, a number of you wrote moving letters about Scott’s contributions to your life. There is not time now to quote them all, but here are a couple of responses that exemplify what you, Scott’s friends and colleagues, feel about him. First, from Cate Palczewski:

The end results of Scott’s coaching are unmatched. But what is not revealed by the results is the pedagogical skill he puts into the process. Every time I walk into a debate in which a Northwestern team is involved, I know I will be hearing quality arguments, supported by the best possible evidence… Northwestern debaters are known for their research skills and ability to explain and advocate complex policy arguments. The reason for this? Scott is a teacher of argument, not just a coach of winning teams. He coaches debate not in order to amass trophies, but to teach critical thinking, analysis and advocacy skills to students, students who will be (and are) leaders in their respective fields.

The hallmark of Scott’s teaching and coaching is a deep and abiding commitment to the students with whom he works. If you are coached by Scott, you know he is as committed to your education and success as you are. If you work with Scott, you know he is deeply invested in the well-being of the students with whom he works. If you work for Scott, you know that the decisions governing the team will be made with the utmost of integrity. And, if you coach against Scott, you know your students will be debating against well-researched, prepared, and gracious teams.

Quite simply, Scott is the most successful coach the debate community has ever seen, and may ever see.

Next, from Chuck Kaufman:

Scott reminds us of what makes for a great teacher. He is patient and giving of his time. He doesn’t just tell students what to do: he shows them how to do it. He demands hard work from his students and he demands that each student perform to the best of his or her ability. By insisting on excellence, and by his dedication to that principle, he enables students to perform beyond their expectations…. He is also a great leader…. He mastered the trick of achieving both a personal relationship with students and maintaining his professional distance. If he demanded hard work from students, he worked even harder. He set an example for students to live up to. Teachers do God’s work. Scott does it better than most.

Finally, from Sean McCaffity:

Scott instructed me about rhetorical flourishes, the art of cross-examination, and how to speak faster than I ever wanted to. He also taught me how to be clearer, in both word and thought, than I ever thought possible. He is an amazing coach. But he is an even more amazing person. Scott teaches life lessons… what it means to be a compassionate and caring person… what it means to have dignity and class… a tireless work ethic. Scott has been many things to me over the years. He has been an educator. He has been a coach. He has been like family. He is and will remain a constant friend. I would do anything for Scott because he has already done so much for me.

Sean, I think you were stretching it a little bit on the part about Scott teaching anybody how to speak fast.

Everyone in this room has Scott stories to tell. Mine are old, for I first met Scott in the summer of 1981, when I was a student at the Baylor Debate workshop and he was a novice squad leader. Two years later, as an incoming freshman to the Baylor debate team, I got to know Scott as senior teammate and undisputed squad captain, leader, and role model. I even got him on the basketball court with us, one time.

My first college practice debate ever was against Scott on the hazardous waste topic. Scott and Larry ran their atomic veterans affirmative. At that early stage in the year, weeks before the season-opening tournament at Northern Iowa, we had only one well-developed negative argument that applied, and I had written it. It was the Feres doctrine sovereign immunity disadvantage. With only that arrow in my quiver, I spent my entire constructive answering Scott’s 2AC responses to that disad – I think he had made about six (and that had taken him about four minutes) - and extending the argument.

Obviously, in the last rebuttal, that sole position was all I argued. After that round in which I only went for one thing, Robin was convinced that I was the slow one. Scott enjoyed that.

By the way, Robin never really got over thinking that I was slow.

The one tournament where Scott and I were partners was that glorious dinosaur, the Southwest Conference tournament. It involved four-person teams. Scott and I debated on the negative against Texas, Texas A&M, and Texas Tech. That was it – three rounds. Conference champions. Never again would we be partners.

Scott taught me much about debate, but he taught me much more about teaching debate. He explained until the student understood. He had no problem demonstrating an argument to a debater who, Scott knew, would then articulate it better than Scott could have (at least given debate’s time constraints), once Scott had explained all of the ramifications of it. Scott was far less interested in being the best than he was in creating the best.

Since Baylor is over 700 miles from my home in Nashville, I was not able to go home very much. Over the long Easter weekend my freshman year, I went to the beach in Galveston with Scott and Robin. As those of you who know any or all of us will no doubt imagine, this was not a typical college boys’ beach excursion. As I recall, there was a lot of Trivial Pursuit and a lot of arguing over classic rock music. And this was 1984, so it wasn’t WhiteSnake. It was Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd and Robin’s attempted defense of The Captain and Tennile singing “The Wedding Song.”

Over the last weeks, I have read so many of your comments about Scott. I have watched the CSTV productions about the 2004 and 2005 NDTs. Thoughts about college debate that have been long buried have come flooding back. Here and now are not the appropriate venue and time for me to talk about all the wonderful things about debating competitively at the highest levels, except for this: cutting cards and writing innovative arguments and giving great speeches can give a great high, but it is not enough; winning high speaker awards and even the NDT are not worth the hassle unless you combine them with taking advantage of the opportunity to interact with people who combine the intellect and the character and the simple goodness that make you want to stay friends with them for decades afterward… that make you ask them to stand beside you in your wedding… that make you make sure you call them for dinner every time you come to Chicago for the next 20 years. Scott made what is a very grueling and sometimes pitiless activity not simply worthwhile but the best thing we could have done with our time.

So many of you think about The Speech when you think about Scott – about ideas like forced choice and offensive debating and “the debate is about the link.” For us old-timers, especially the ones of us from Baylor, we remember seeing the formulation of what became The Speech in countless squad meetings, practice rounds, and van trips. But there is something else that needs to be remembered. Perhaps a singular event that best describes Scott, one that most of us debate dinosaurs will continue to associate with him, was his publication of the famous “long form judging philosophy.” I did not agree with every word of it. I don’t know how anyone could have agreed with every word of it, since it was about 30,000 words long. But at that time, to state publicly and with conviction that debate was about more than speed and multiplicity of arguments and indeed that unnecessary, incomprehensible speed and multiple arguments were hurting debate, to take to task those who had lost or ignored articulation and meaning in their debating, was a brave and meaningful stance. Scott cared far less about popularity in the moment than he did about contributing what he knew to be right. He cared more about helping than he did about being on the A list. He knew that few would or could say what needed to be said. He could, and he did.

Scott was about more than debate, of course. He was about music and baseball and the Cowboys and the Bulls and Diet Coke. He was about politics – I remember the day he sat in my parents’ den and discussed Reaganomics with my dad for hours. But more than any of that, Scott was about kindness … generosity to those who could not go to an NBA game on their own … reaching out to help an inner city student. Yes, Scott taught me about debate, and Scott taught me about teaching debate, but most of all Scott taught me about being a good person, about doing right.

I know that most of you in this room know Scott as the greatest coach ever. You were his students, his professional colleagues, his confidantes, his rivals. I left the world of college debate – at least in any kind of regular way – in 1990. You have nineteen and a half years of stories that I don’t have, at least first hand.

But you don’t know about The Dash, La Fiesta, Peking, Vitek's, Health Camp milkshakes, the picture that solidified the nickname “The Duck”, “and additionally … or alternatively”, his car that Tim christened “the rolling cat case,” the perils of failing to extend the case in 2AR when all the negative has done is go for topicality, trips to the A&M library, explanations of the Phillips Curve and the concept of the margin, Scott’s health push after his senior NDT (complete with a new haircut and a jogging ritual), sandwiches from Mo’s to Go in San Diego during the Redlands workshop (thank you Professor Southworth for holding it in San Diego instead of Redlands), what it is like to see Scott show up halfway through a seven-hour fantasy baseball draft because he could not find the hotel in Miami Beach, or the joy in his eyes the first time my son sat in his lap.

I am pleased to have been the first of many to call Scott by name and thank him personally in the transcript of a final round of the NDT. I am pleased that I got to have one last dinner with him in October. I am glad to have gone to church with him in the middle of debate workshops where we were teaching together. I am proud to have watched baseball games with him in the snow at Wrigley Field, in the heat in Arlington, in the monstrosity that is the Trop in St. Petersburg, in Chavez Ravine, in Baltimore, in San Diego, in Denver, in the Astrodome, in Miami. I am guessing that not many of the rest of you have discussed jai alai betting strategy with the Duck – talk about the blind leading the blind.

If, like me, you are a devotee of M*A*S*H, you have been reminded of that great and sad episode from 1980 called “Death Takes a Holiday.” It is Christmas, and BJ and Margaret work all day on a patient who is dying. As they sit through the tough times, they look at the pictures of the patient’s children they find in his pocket. Ultimately, the patient dies at about 11:35 at night, more or less. BJ moves the clock forward thirty minutes so that Margaret can mark the time of death on the medical record as after midnight, because, BJ says, he does not want those children to have to remember Christmas as the day their daddy died.

We don’t get to move the clock. For us, Christmas will forevermore be, in part, the day that Scott died.

But Christmas is much more than that. Christmas is the coming of hope, of peace on earth and good will to all. And Scott knew that, because he was about more than even the Bulls and Diet Coke and kindness… Scott was a Christian. Like the Apostle Paul, Scott had a thorn in his flesh; still he had a personal relationship with the one who said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.” I can’t speak for all of you, because I simply don’t know how you approach a day like this, but those of you in the room who – like Mark and me, and like Scott – are also Christians know that while we grieve, we grieve differently from those who have no hope. We know that we shall see Scott again. We know that because of the gift that came to us all – to you and to me and to Scott, at Christmas.

Scott cherished that gift, and he would not want Christmas to remain a time of mourning.

Then pealed the bells, more loud and deep, “God is not dead, nor doth He sleep.
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail, with peace on earth, good will to men.”

Mimi's House Is Gone

2010-01-21T19:32:00.000-08:00

This week, I went to Covington. And Mimi's house is not there anymore.

Covington, Tennessee is my father's home town. It was also the home town of my grandparents, great grandparents, and great great grandparents.

My grandparents were called "Mimi" and "Papa." For whatever reason, and meaning no disrespect to Papa at all, their home was always - to all of us grandchildren - simply known as "Mimi's house."

It was not a large house. I never knew it in its smallest stages, but I do remember when it had only one bathroom. It stood on Highway 51, on the western end of the farm, down a steep hill from the highway and behind the stately old tree. In the summertime, we would sit under that tree in folding chairs. At Christmas time, Papa would string the lights and put those tacky plastic three-foot-high candles on the front porch. We loved that.

Since Mimi was only 16 when my father was born (fourteen months after she was a blushing 15-year-old bride), she was a rather young grandmother. She lived well into my adulthood, dying just months before the birth of my first child in 1993. Papa died eleven months (to the day) later.

My father and his two brothers inherited the property. One of those brothers is gone now, but his children, along with Dad and Uncle Steve, sold some of the real estate - specifically the old house and land along the highway. I heard that the house was torn down, and I had never really wanted to see that. I didn't think I was ready.

Until now. I was in court in Jackson this week, and I flew home out of Memphis, and I had some time to kill in between, so I went to Covington. I went to the cemetery first, visiting the headstones of those great great grandparents and great grandparents and grandparents and uncle and other relatives. I laid flowers on Mimi's grave. I drove by their old church and the house where Gomma, my great grandmother, had lived. Then I headed south down Highway 51 to the intersection of Robbins Road, where the house had been.

I almost missed it. They have filled in the front yard with dirt to bring the land level with the highway. A Burger King stands where the driveway was. There is a Wal-Mart across the street. There are a couple of strip shopping centers - one has a liquor store and a tanning salon and a medical supply; the other has a Shoe Show and a Mexican restaurant. The grand old tree is gone. Were it not for the little road heading down to the (old now) telephone substation (the street sign saying "Robbins Road" is gone), I might not have recognized it at all.

I parked in the Burger King parking lot and walked through what used to be the front yard, trying to find where the front porch used to be. I tried different spots, trying to duplicate the view I remember from my childhood. I don't think I ever really found the exact spot. The only thing I got out of the walk for certain was muddy shoes.

Everything has changed.

And yet...

The memories are still crisp. I remember the smells of Mimi's cooking and the feel of the linoleum in the kitchen. I remember the frustration of trying to beat Papa at checkers (I was 0-for-life). I remember hearing my parents and Mimi and Papa playing pitch (that's a card game for you uninitiated) in the other room after I had been sent to bed on the fold-out couch. I remember how the living room looked. I remember the sounds of Mimi's Elvis records. I remember the closet where my cousin Crystal and I used to scare her little sister. I remember watching Papa and Dad and Uncle Jerry take turns adjusting the color on the big old TV during countless football games. I remember the Easter Egg hunts. I remember the "kids' table" at Thanksgiving. I remember how the phone sounded when it rang. I remember it all, with precision.

Mimi's house is gone, and it turns out that's ok. I don't pretend that it wasn't jarring - weird even - to see things so different. Jarring, but not sad. You see, Mimi and Papa are just where they need to be, and their memories are safe with me. Burger Kings spring up, and front yards turn into muddy fields waiting for something else to be built there. They call that progress. I don't know if it is progress or not, but I know that what that house held is just as real to me as is the Wal-Mart across the highway.

It should not have taken me so long to go back. I was reluctant for no good reason. Mimi's house will always be - as it has always been - a great gift of memory to me. Once I figured that out, I was OK. I went over to the Shoe Show and bought some new shoes, and I threw the muddy ones away.

Talking Publicly about Our Faith - What Christians Can Learn from the Reactions to Brit Hume

2010-01-07T19:37:00.000-08:00

On a FoxNews panel on Sunday, Brit Hume said the following about Tiger Woods: "The extent to which he can recover, it seems to me, depends on his faith. He is said to be a Buddhist. I don't think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith. So, my message to Tiger would be, 'Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world.'"

This is not something we hear often on a television news broadcast, even on Fox.

The reactions have been swift and severe. Jon Stewart was merciless on The Daily Show. In the Washington Post, Tom Shales wrote that Hume's statement "will probably rank ... as one of the most ridiculous of the year." John A. Farrell, one of the contributing editors of US News, writes that Hume's comment was "creepy ... what a stupid thing to think." The blogosphere is full of writers who used the occasion to write about the hypocrisy of Christians in particular and the uselessness of religion in general.

My purpose here is not to defend Hume or to attack his attackers. He is a big boy and can handle that for himself. This blog is also not the place to flyspeck his theology. Instead, I want to take a moment to analyze what this whole tempest-in-a-teapot can teach people like me, Christians who believe that our faith is to be shared and who care about rhetoric and how messages are received.

1. Many people are offended by comparison of religions. What seems to pass muster in society is sincerity, regardless of what is being sincerely felt. If Person A sincerely believes Religion X (or Concept X, or Feeling X), it is impolitic for Person B to suggest that Religion Y is better than Religion X. This may result from a genuine belief that "all ways lead to God" or alternatively from a genuine confusion about whether any religion is worthwhile. It often masquerades as "tolerance," but since the offended are not very "tolerant" of the vocal Christian, surely another explanation lurks beneath the surface.

In any event, those of us who articulate our specific faith need to understand that some of the battle we face is not from those who disbelieve our faith per se but rather from those who hold that we should not argue that we know something that is better than what they - or somebody else - believes.

2. "Proselytizing" has become a dirty word. The word means persuasion. Simply put, to proselytize is to make converts. It should not imply intolerance, meanness, underhanded dealings, or rudeness. It merely means attempting to change the mind of somebody else with regard to faith. Assuming it is done with respect and without forcing the listener to participate unwillingly in the conversation, why is that bad? Jon Stewart and others charge - or at least savagely hint - that proselytizing is something evil, as though it were akin to selling drugs to minors or being a sexual predator.

3. The many, many public failures of high profile Christians, hypocricies of self-proclaimed prophets, and well-known internal disputes within churches and denominations have given Christianity a terrible name and left so many with a bad taste that they think they want nothing to do with our faith.

None of these points is news, of course, but they have bubbled to the surface again this week. If you Google "Brit Hume Tiger Woods", you will see how Christianity is - in circles as diverse as TheHollywoodGossip.com and MSNBC, not to mention The Huffington Post - nothing more than a punch line.

Those of us who are evangelicals (in a New Testament sense, not in the political "religious right" sense) believe that we have something good that would be helpful to everyone. We know someone who offers - to anyone, regardless of what s/he has done - forgiveness, love, and literal salvation. We believe that we are commanded to "teach all nations" and "always to be ready with an answer." If our friends were in a burning house and we knew the way out, we would tell them; to us, this is the same thing.

Style is a concern, of course. Hitting people over the head, shoving a tract into their hand, shouting them down, playing on guilt (real or manufactured), or otherwise forcing our point of view on someone who does not want to hear it or is not ready for it seems fruitless and silly to me. In my own experience, I have found that sharing my beliefs with someone whom I have not first gotten to know pretty well falls flat.

Once again, I turn to my experiences as a debater and a jury lawyer to help. In both of those fora, I could not be successful without remembering the principle of audience adaptation. No matter how good the news we have to share is, if we don't package it appropriately and present it with respect and proper timing, we (and thus Christ) will not be well received. If we are most eloquent but do not act (both when we are sharing our beliefs and every other time) with love, then we are no more than (to quote Paul) resounding gongs and clanging cymbals. I have learned that lesson the hard way more than once - my poor presentations and/or unloving actions toward some have, I fear, made me ineffective in sharing anything about my faith with them. They don't want to hear it from me. I have to hope somebody else who has lived and loved better can talk to them.

"Packaging" and "presentation" as I use them in the preceding paragraph do not mean anything dishonest. They simply are explanations for how we go about sharing our faith. I believe the reason that "proselytizing" has gotten a bad name is related to how it has been done, not to its substance. Those who reject Christ on the merits - and the number who actually hear and consider our faith on the merits and still reject it is pretty low in comparison to those who reject our message out of hand without thoughtfully considering the substance - make their decision for a variety of reasons, but almost never is it because they think that our trying to persuade them with what we believe is an evil thing to do. The secret, then, is to get the conversation to the merits of our faith without offending.

I don't find what Brit Hume said to have been offensive. To state his honest belief that Tiger Woods would find in Christ forgiveness that Buddhism does not even offer is not rude or mean. But it is a stumbling block to many. The New Testament correctly predicts that. We have seen the effects of that stumbling block played out this week. Many in the world hate the name of Christ and any mention of Christ. The New Testament is right about that too.

Our response cannot be anger. It cannot be to give up. It has to be to recognize how our message is often initially received and to understand the prejudices that are in place. I believe we have to be honest in admitting that many of those stumbling blocks and prejudices are the fault of the church and of those who call themselves Christians - we have in many ways created a monster, and we must deal with that.

At the end of the day, though, if we agree with Brit Hume that those who "turn to Jesus Christ" can "make a total recovery," we have no alternative but to share what we know. We must, then, use some sense in how we do it, and we must always do so in love.

A Christmas Thought - To Whom Did the Christ Child Come, and What Earthly Difference Is His Coming Making?

2009-12-16T09:43:00.000-08:00

And there were in the same country shepherds, abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And suddenly, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were sore afraid. But the Angel said, “Fear not, for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people. For unto you in born this day in the city of David a savior, which is Christ the Lord.”

Don’t miss it in its familiarity – “which shall be to all people.” Jesus came to Middle Eastern sheep herders who lived in the desert. He chose to be born to an unmarried pregnant teenager. He spent early years of His life in Egypt, of all places, Arab home of Pharoahs and haters of Israel (both then and now).

I think that is relevant to us this Christmas. This is not a blog about racism, although there may be a point there. This is not a political statement against the war on terrorism, and to hear that message in what I have to say would be a serious misunderstanding. This is not a devotional about classism, although there is certainly inherent in what I have to say a message about humanity’s equality before the throne of God. No, this is a question – For whom, or perhaps I should say to whom, did Jesus come … and to whom does He come today?

I am not trying to be politically correct here. I am asking a serious question. For all of our words about loving everyone and our songs that say
“red and yellow, black and white,” what do we really believe about God’s relationship to humanity? Eight years and three months after September 11,
knowing about the history and claims of what we know to be false religions, in a world where lovers of Jesus are very literally targets, does Christmas mean anything new?

Did Jesus come for Osama bin Laden?
Did Jesus come for Timothy Mc Veigh?
Did angels sing of good tidings of great joy to the World Trade Center terrorists?
Did Mary bear a savior for Adolf Hitler, or Pol Pot, or Stalin, or Manson, or Jack the Ripper, or Slobadon Milosovic?

Let’s move out of the headlines – did Jesus come to the gangbangers of East LA or the slum dwellers of Detroit or the loyal subjects of the Taliban or the cannibals or the communists or the Mafia?

Of course He did. That is not a hard question... at first glance. Some of you are wondering if I have anything deeper to say than simply to recite the obvious – that Jesus came for all. I hope I do. Bear with me.

Let’s get a little more personal. Did Jesus come for that guy who stops you on Sunday mornings when you get off the interstate on your way to church, the one who smells bad and asks for money? Did Jesus come to that woman you have to meet every week in your business, the obnoxious one who has no interest in the things of God but has a great deal of interest in making your life miserable? Were the tidings of great joy for the mugger who took your wallet and for the mechanic who took your money but did not fix your car and then laughed at you when you complained?

Yes.

So what is my point?

If Jesus came to all those people, then what earthly difference is it making to all of those people that Jesus came? And what part are we, the body of Christ, playing in making that difference?

Hear me. I am not here to discount the heavenly difference it makes. Jesus came to earth to bring salvation. We are the bearers of good news, and through our offerings and our prayers and our cooperative ministries, we are striving to make a difference to those people. That is priority one. It always will be. I do not want to be misunderstood.

But it is not the only priority. Jesus called us, and calls us, to follow Him. We sing “Wherever He Leads I’ll Go” and “Footprints of Jesus” beautifully. Do the Pol Pots and the gangbangers and the panhandlers and the cheating mechanics of the world hear us singing? Do they see us following? Does it make a difference to them?

I am not really talking about what used to be called the social gospel. I think that our witness is, ultimately, a verbal thing. I do not think that doing good works and helping the poor and the needy is the best way to share Jesus Christ. I understand the idea of "loving people to Jesus," but I do not think it always works. I think that people are greedy and needy, and they often take what we have to offer without thinking about why we have done it, much less about asking us to tell them why we have done it. Sometimes it leads to that conversation, and praise the Lord when it does, but often, at least in my experience, our random acts of kindness are either taken at face value and appreciated for the momentary relief offered or else ignored altogether.

I certainly do not believe that we should consciously substitute doing good and being nice for giving our personal testimony about the difference Jesus makes in our own life. That is a cop out, and it is contrary to the direct instructions of the Master.

And while I am making disclaimers, let me be clear that doing good works in no way brings about salvation. It works in reverse, or it should. Our salvation should bring about good works that should make a difference in the world. In other words, the coming of the Christ child should be doing a lot of earthly good.

It has to be a priority of people who follow Jesus to be Jesus - to come to the world as Jesus comes – not for any sake other than the cause of doing good because Jesus did good and we are trying to follow Him. And we should do good to others out of love: love for Jesus and love for them.

Steven Vincent Benet’s play “A Child Is Born” tells of the coming of the Christ child through the perspective of the wife of the innkeeper, the one whose stable served as maternity ward for Mary. Through her eyes, and through the eyes of her servant girls (yes, the original Jeannette and Isabella of the carol), we see how the nativity of the Son of God changed one person’s perspective on treating everyone else. Through another character, a common dirty thief named Dismas, we hear of the countless others – called by Dismas "the vast sea of the wretched and the poor" – who wait to be touched by that child.

How can Jesus touch those people? It has to be through us. For whatever reason, He has chosen to work through the church, so much so that we are called His body. For Jesus to have hands to heal and feet to go and tongues to tell and shoulders to comfort, we have to provide freely those hands and feet, tongues and shoulders. For the world to see anything that it can call “Jesus,” it has only the option of looking at us, for we are the only body of Christ to be seen.

“If anyone would be my disciple, he must take up His cross daily and follow me.” I do not think that means simply to be willing to die for those who are already Christians. I do not think it means only sharing the message of the cross, although it assuredly includes that. I think it means that the coming of Christ must make a difference everywhere on earth. If Jesus came to the thieves and the beggars and the bothersome panhandlers and the vast sea of the wretched and the poor - and He certainly did - then we must take up our cross daily and make a difference in the world in which thieves and beggars live. It is not for me to define for you how you do that. I have no planned giving program or soup line for you to join. I write now, at Christmas time, only to ask to whom did Jesus come, and what difference is the fact that He came making to those people? I am here to challenge you to see the celebration of the coming of the Christ child as a motivation to take up your cross for the people to whom the child came.

Not because it is a way for them to become Christians, although it might be.

Not because it will get us to heaven, for it surely will not.

Not because we are secular humanists, although true humanitarians should occasionally cheer our actions.

But because we are Jesus’ church, and He came to bring good tidings of great joy to all people – peace on earth and good will to all.

The children in each diff'rent place will see the baby Jesus' face like theirs, but bright with heav'nly grace, and filled with holy light. Some children see Him lily white. Some children see Him bronzed and brown. Some children see Him almond-eyed. Some children see Him dark as they. And, ah! They love Him, too!

He came to everyone. That is elementary, at least to us. But it will not be elementary to that everyone until we let Him make a difference through us.

Surely He taught us to love one another. His law is love and His gospel is peace. Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother, and in His name all oppression shall cease. May it be so.

Jogging - My New Forbidden Fruit

2009-11-24T17:47:00.000-08:00

I have always hated running. To start with, I am slow. I have always been slow. So running was never about winning. Running was often about embarrassment, just trying hard not to finish dead last.

Then, there was football practice, where running was punishment. I always gravitated toward baseball, where running frankly was not all that important. At school, I was required to run as part of the dreaded "weights and agilities" intramural athletic program that solidified my distaste for running.

I ran a little bit in high school because I decided I needed to, but then I broke my arm and had surgery and got thoroughly out of the habit. I ran a little bit during college when I started feeling really out of shape, but I always hated it and always found excuses to quit pretty quickly.

The only time that running was ever minutely successful for me was the ten months I was engaged. I ran a lot that year with an upcoming wedding on my mind.

Since then, I have worked out off and on, using elliptical machines, stationary bikes, swimming, basketball, and racquetball. Every once in a while, I would take up jogging on a track for a while. But I hated every minute of it.

This spring, my weight was up, I was out of shape, and my knees were hurting. Gena wanted me to see a doctor about my knees, but I knew better. I knew that the pain was just nature's way of telling me that it was time to get back in shape. So, I went on my diet. I lost 25 pounds. And I started exercising again. First, walking two miles a day, then slowly adding running to the mix until I was running about a mile and a half at lunch time every day. And lo and behold, my knee pain went away.

Until it came back. About a month ago, the pain behind my right kneecap came back with a vengeance, and I could not run twenty yards without feeling as though my knee were giving way. I finally took Gena's advice and went to the doctor; several visits, some x-rays, and one MRI later, I have my diagnosis - the beginning stages of arthritis.

And my doctor said these words: "I forbid you from running or jogging again for the rest of your life."

Suddenly, jogging has become the most enticing thing imaginable. I sit on the stationary bike and look outside and envy those lucky ones who get to have the great pleasure of running.

Why is that? What is it about human nature that makes what we cannot have the most desirable thing we can picture, no matter how little we actually care for it?

It is, of course, a story as old as any. The phrase "forbidden fruit" comes from the story of Eve. And it is illustrative to us of the basic concept that much of what we think we want is really nothing more than rebellion, or our innate desire to change what is into what it should not be.

I will try to get over my newfound lust for the jogging that is not allowed to me. And when I have other strange longings, I will try to take a moment to figure out just why they have come to me.

Human Institutions

2009-11-17T19:03:00.001-08:00

An older minister returned to the church he had pastored in his youth. The building had been renovated, a new sanctuary had been built, and the old sanctuary space was now the fellowship hall. Looking around the hall, the old pastor remarked, "I know this was the sanctuary, but now I cannot even tell which end I preached from."

Our human institutions change. What was once special - even sacred - to us can become mundane. It can become unrecognizable. At times, it can lose all appeal, even becoming scandalous. We look at what was once home and find that we cannot even remember where we stood and which direction we faced.

Jesus tells us that the greatest of our institutions will fall so that not even one stone will remain standing on another.

And yet we cling to our institutions ... to our churches, denominations, schools, conventions, alumni associations, clubs, jobs, organizations, teams, rotisserie baseball leagues, and political parties. Whether we are so attached to a memory or a name, or whether we simply do not have the imagination to see what could be for being caught up in what once was, we find ourselves dogpaddling against a current to preserve what we wish still were.

We are proudly pointing out the sanctuary that no longer exists, even when we don't remember which end we preached from.

There are, no doubt, human-created (I am trying, in my newfound gender-sensitivity, not to say "manmade") relationships and institutions worth fighting for. But that does not mean they all are. And just because something is worth fighting for today does not mean it will be worth fighting for tomorrow.

God sometimes takes away our institutions with a violent crash, and great is the fall of them. More often, I think, most of our institutions tend to wither and atrophy as their guardians revel in what used to be, what might have been, and what never was.

The problem is usually not the institutions themselves. The problem is our faith in the institutions. When we begin relying on what a university inherently is instead of working to make it better; when we count on what a denomination can provide instead of using a denomination to serve the Master of that denomination; when an alumni association becomes more important than either the school that granted the degrees or the alumni themselves; when any institution becomes the object of faith and adoration ... then downfall is inevitable.

When spouses pledge allegiance to the marriage instead of each other, trouble is brewing.

A church is not worthy of our worship. A convention made up of churches is not entitled to our fealty.

A teenager may stay in a dating relationship long after there is any real interest in the boyfriend or girlfriend simply out of the comfort of having the relationship. We all know the feeling of "being in love with love." Hopefully, we grow out of that.

But we don't seem to learn that lesson very well. We have a very poor understanding of the shelf life of much of what we have built, hanging on to a name or a tradition or a reputation when its raison d'etre has long past.

I am not suggesting anarchy. Of course we must work to preserve those institutions that are valuable and healthy.

But we must do so with discernment. We must do so with care.

And we absolutely must do so with our eye on the ball. The institution exists for a purpose, and our call is that purpose, not the tool we have crafted.

It is so fortunate that rubble is a raw material for God. When our monuments crumble under their own weight, God takes the broken pieces and fashions something better. The myth of the phoenix rising from the ashes is nothing more than a picture of God's miraculous re-creation that happens when we get out of the way, or when God gets us and our stuff out of the way.

We have to learn to tell the difference between the decaying and the re-created, the work of people and the work of God. Jim Elliot was paraphrasing the words of Paul and the words of Christ when he said, "He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."

As a sermon I heard this week reminded me, the destruction of what we would preserve is often a mercy, for as long as we struggle against the grain, we shut out what would be a work of God.

We must stop clinging to what we cannot keep.

Simple Acts of Grace

2009-11-09T14:52:00.000-08:00

Earthshaking movements of God are hard to miss. We can reject them if we want. We can call them "natural" and choose not to see God's hand in them. We can even claim credit for them ourselves. But we cannot simply miss them.

But for every resurrection and each calming of the storm, I believe there are thousands - if not millions - of discreet acts of grace that God carries out every day, and they indeed can be missed. The writer of Lamentations tells us that they are "new every morning." God often surprises us with apparently small, minor events that we can miss if we are not ready for them... The unborn child's leap of joy inside Elizabeth. Jesus deciding to walk across a lake just as the storm has arisen. More fish than the nets can hold. The decision to look up into a sycamore tree when the short man just happens to be sitting there. The Master's wanting Mary to sit and talk instead of rushing to prepare the meal.

I think that human history's first example of a simple act of grace comes in the third chapter of Genesis. As you know, the first chapter tells the story of creation, and the second chapter tells us of the formation of Eve and the placement of the first humans in the garden.

We generally think of Chapter 3 as the story of the Fall, and indeed it is. It is the story of the first temptation, the first sin, and the first punishment for sin. But buried (to those of us who are not looking for it) in there is also the first act of grace. Verse 7 tells us that Adam and Eve, having sinned, suddenly realized their nakedness. Verse 21, which comes before the banishment from the garden, tells us that God "made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them."

Do you see it? Because sin made them naked, God made them clothes. Our loving God is always on the move to repair the damage that sin has done, usually before we are even aware of it. Where sin makes us naked, God makes us clothes.

Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. Paul said it, but he learned it from Genesis.

How Would the Story End?

2009-11-06T17:39:00.000-08:00

Pastor Charlie asks an interesting question. He wants to know how we think the Prodigal Son parable would end if Jesus had not stopped where he did. Would the older brother have come in to the party? Would the younger brother have come out and joined the father in begging his brother to come in?

The responses have been varied, but most of them have disappointed me. Most have viewed the older brother as a stubborn and jealous prig who would have sat outside and sulked. Many have doubted the sincerity of the younger brother, accusing him of coming home only because he was broke and hungry and intimating that he would have picked up and left again when his belly and his wallet were once more full.

I don't think Jesus told this story in order to demonize either son. I believe He told it to help us identify with both of the father's children. But more than that, I believe He told the story to show how the Father - God - relates to both sons. And I believe that Jesus fully intended a happy ending.

Let's play this out, almost as though we had a "director's cut" DVD of the story with "alternate endings."

Alternate ending #1 - The Father tells the older brother that "all I have is yours, but now we must celebrate because what was lost has been found." The elder brother, in a fit of pique, turns his back on the father and returns to the bunkhouse, where he sulks and plans ways to expose his younger brother as a fraud. Why would Jesus tell this story? Well, perhaps to show that there are many of us who have stayed "in the family" but have never come to understand the love of the Father. Perhaps Jesus is aiming at the pharisees who created rules and waited to point fingers at those who broke them.

Alternate ending #2 - Noticing that neither his brother nor his father is in the party, the younger brother looks out the window to see his father pleading with the older brother to come to the party. Seeing his chance to hog the attention at the party and relishing being, for once, the only brother on his father's good side, the young recently-prodigal son turns on his brother as he self-righteously slaps the backs of the party-goers and accepts still more well wishes from those ranch hands who are genuinely glad he is back. Why would Jesus tell this story? Perhaps he would be emphasizing that while some of us will go to heaven and enjoy the fruits of the Father's house, others - by their own choice - will not. Maybe Jesus was emphasizing that we are only responsible for own decisions, and if others who have known the Father's love for years choose not to respond, that is beyond our control. Or maybe Jesus was in fact pointing out that simply returning from the pig sty when you are hungry is not a real repentence, that the prodigal son has far to go before he really understands what it means to love as his father loves.

Alternate ending #3 - Hearing his father say "all that I have is yours, just as it always has been," the elder brother is brought to his knees, seeing in his father's eyes the depth of love that has always been available to him. Hearing the father say that the celebration has broken out because "what was lost has been found" reminds the brother of how he has come through his own kind of lostness; even if he never physically left the estate, he has wandered in his mind and in his desires, and his father has never stopped loving him even when he did not love his father. The older brother understands the need for celebration; indeed, he needs to celebrate maybe more than anybody else in the house (including his brother) does, and he runs in before his brother ever even notices that he was late to the party.

I think Jesus had something like ending #3 in mind. I think the point of the story is that the love of the Father is transforming, whether we are derelicts who have wasted what we were given on prostitutes and "riotous living" or we are the seemingly upright who jealously guard our position and trumpet our own righteousness. I think Jesus' point is that the Father, just like the woman with the lost coin and the shepherd with the lost sheep, rejoices over each of us and expects us to join in the celebration, just as we would rejoice with the woman and as the angels rejoice with the shepherd.

Yes, Jesus did not end the story. He left it hanging. And yes, that leaves us the freedom to imagine alternate endings.

But surely Jesus did not tell the story as a downer, a finger-pointer, an indictment. This is a parable about the loving father, the father who has different kinds of children who squander what they have been given in different ways, a father who keeps his eyes open at all times for any chance to run to his children.

Just as the father runs down the road to the younger son, he comes out to the older son. He leaves His own house to welcome in the penitent and leaves His own party to plead with the impenitent.

The alternate endings really apply to us. Many of us are older brothers, and we certainly can eschew the open door of our Father and return to sulk in our bunkhouses. Some of us are riotous livers who may only temporarily come to our senses when our bellies are empty and growling. By leaving the story unfinished, Jesus gives us the chance to end it badly.

But I don't think that is Jesus' intention for us, nor is it the point of his story. The story is about a party awaiting both brothers.

The story is about the Father throwing the party.

Running with the Horses

2009-11-03T17:03:00.000-08:00

My favorite hymn - one that I want sung at my funeral, among other places - is “It Is Well.” Perhaps you know the story of its composition, of a man's discovery that his wife and child have drowned while crossing the ocean to meet him... of his own struggle with grief and anger and all of the emotions that must come with a moment like that... of his ability to understand the comfort of God enough to say "Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, let this blest assurance control: that Christ has regarded my helpless estate.... It is well."

I think that an experience with the comfort of God has to be a part, if not the central tenet, of the testimony that most of us have to offer.

That does not mean that all of us have faced the tragic death of an infant child. Thankfully, I have not had to face that pain.

It does mean that we live in a world where bad things happen. God's comfort is only necessary because we are uncomfortable, battered, sick, sore, grieved, alone, abandoned, or desperate. I have seen clients go bankrupt. I have seen partners, clients, and my own company lose trials worth millions of dollars. I have seen colleagues belittled to their face.

But what I have seen as a lawyer pales in comparison to what life has shown me elsewhere. I have sat in the hospital with my very sick child. I have seen my own dreams dashed. I have waited through my mother’s cancer surgery. I have attended my father-in-law’s funeral.

And I am one of the lucky ones. I have not had to face a fraction of what many of you are facing right now.

I do not think there is a person on this earth who has not grappled with the questions that arise when we see reality - OK, God is all-powerful, so He could have stopped that bad thing. God is all-loving, so He must have wanted to stop that bad thing. God is all-knowing, so He must have known that the bad thing was happening. Yet, despite His knowledge and His love and His power, the bad thing still happens... and we cry, and maybe we get mad and shake a fist at heaven, or maybe we just shrug our shoulders and decide that God is not nearly as interested as He was back in Biblical days, when He always seemed to be appearing to folks and healing their leprosy.

Since people a lot smarter than I have turned this question around every possible way for centuries, my thoughts on it are unlikely to shed much new light. Still, they work for me. They may not work while I am at the funeral, or in the hospital, or struggling to pay the bills. But when I take a step two back, these thoughts make sense to me.

To start with, we live in a world where bad things undeniably happen, so the question “Why do bad things happen to good Christians?” assumes that Christians are entitled to some special shield from the rain and the shipwrecks. I choose to look at the question of “Why?” this way - Why not? Who better to receive and endure what life has to offer than those who are gifted with the Holy Spirit and who know the comfort of God? Now, I know that does not provide much of an answer to you when it is your child lying under the oxygen tent - believe me, Gena and I were there in the fall of 1996 while our 4-month-old Carolyn struggled to breathe under the watchful eyes of the Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital staff. I think it is part of God's answer nonetheless to know that we Christians are the ones best equipped to handle life’s dangers and struggles.

If our world contained no pain, no evil, no suffering - if there were no opportunities for sin and no storms - how much less valuable would the comfort of God be. How cheap would be the free will given us. What a waste would be the peace that passes all understanding, and the incredible fellowship of the believers would never find a place. It is the black in the picture that makes the colors brighter, the rest in the symphony that makes the crescendos more musical, the choice to take the wide road that makes the narrow way more victorious. God is a brilliant craftsman, artist, composer, and director; His gifts are perfect. The phrase “no pain, no gain” is ridiculously overused, but it is true; there is a reason that we honor those who conquer Mount Everest more than those who can climb the hill around the corner. In facing, enduring, and conquering the challenges - the storms - we prove how much we have been given and what our true worth is.

If that is the world God has created for us in His love and omniscience, why should good Christians be, or even want to be, exempt from all it has to offer?

Additionally, I believe in a real, active Satan who is working evil in this world. One reason that bad things happen is because there is powerful bad that has a foothold in our world. Jesus discusses him throughout the gospels, and the prince of this world is still possessing, foiling, seducing, and corrupting God’s creations. I am in the middle of teaching a six-seek Sunday School series out of Job. Whether the Book of Job is a myth or a symbol or accurate history, the Satan it describes represents a palpable force in this world. You know the story... Satan shows up at a heavenly roll call, and God offers up Job. Satan is not allowed to kill him but is allowed to do pretty much whatever else he wants. As Job loses his livelihood, his family, and his health, his friends show up and tell him that all of this must have happened because of his deep-seated sin. Since we have read the first two chapters of the book, we know that Job is not being punished for sin but rather is being afflicted by a dark spiritual attacker.

Next, we may not always know what is bad. This is a hard lesson for litigators like me to learn - too often we are sure what a case is “worth,” and then a jury surprises us by bringing back a verdict that is a small fraction of what we predicted or that is orders of magnitude greater than the worst we feared. What that tells us lawyers is that we have become arrogant and lost perspective on what the real world thinks is good and bad and valuable and worthless.

It is the same thing with our human perspective of what is good and bad. We do not have the eyes of God or the perspective of the Everlasting One; and it borders on arrogant for us puny humans to declare that we know everything about what is good. I believe that there are things that happen that are absolutely for the best in the big picture. The problem is that we have no concept of the big picture. To use the words of a wise member of my Sunday School class, God is continually creating and painting and perfecting a huge mosaic, and even with scripture and prayer and experience, we see only a small corner. Or, to paraphrase a song from “The Prince of Egypt,” one thread has no idea of how the whole tapestry will look. Our view makes certain things appear certain ways, and we call them “good” or “bad”; from a heavenly viewpoint, those events may be good, bad, or neither.

I know that still does not answer many of the questions, and there are some things that are bound to be bad from any perspective: I do not believe that God thinks it is good when the four-year-old is killed by a drunk driver. Still, I do think that there are many times that we have no idea what the “good” result is.

A point that we cannot overlook is that sometimes God sends, or allows, calamity because we deserve it. I am not a proponent of the theory that we serve a wrathful, vengeful God hurling thunderbolts and conjuring up new diseases to punish the popular sin of the week; on the other hand, I do not believe you can read scripture honestly without recognizing that God often disciplines those He loves and that He sometimes punishes the evil.

Perhaps the toughest to accept but the deepest and most meaningful of the responses to our struggles is found in God's response to the complaining of Jeremiah: “If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, then how can you compete with horses? If you fall down in a land of peace, How will you do in the thicket of the Jordan?"

If you have been wearied running with the footmen, then how will you ever run with the horses? You have to face and conquer the problems that come to you now, in a land of peace, so that you have some chance of victory when you face the swelling of the Jordan. If you did not recognize it, Jeremiah's words are Hebrew for “when the going gets tough, the tough get going.” The phrase “no pain, no gain” is ridiculously overused, but it is true; there is a reason that we honor those who conquer Mount Everest more than those who can climb the hill around the corner. In facing, enduring, and conquering the challenges - the storms - we prove how much we have been given and what our true worth is.

Don't you see? God wants us to run with the horses. He desires for us to mount up with wings as eagles. His plan is for us to walk on water.

We cannot automatically and immediately run with the horses. We are not the gold that we need to be until we have first gone through a refiner's fire, where impurities and weaknesses are removed and only the finest and most valuable to the Kingdom remains.

It was the Apostle Paul who wrote that we all must suffer if we are to be joint heirs with Christ. We join in His suffering so that we can be glorified together with Him. I do not understand that, and I do not welcome it, but I believe it. You may well know real suffering right now. Maybe it is in your body or in your family. Perhaps your business or your farm is in such a state that you are truly experiencing travail. If not now, you will know it in your life, if you are lucky enough to live that long.

That is where the comfort of God comes in. There is no question that bad things happen. At least they are bad as far as we can figure. The fact that those happenings may be coloring our world so that tomorrow will be brighter does not help, for the moment. The idea that an evil person is being punished or a good person is being disciplined is irrelevant to us as we experience what seems like yet another crushing blow. As even more lightning seems to strike us, the thought of being able to run with the horses sometime in the future could not matter less to us.

How fortunate that we serve a God who does not leave us there! God, like God always does, seeks us out. He comes to us. At Christmas time, we call His coming “advent.” In truth, advent happens repeatedly - our God seeks us and finds us and comes to us.

Before we can run with the horses, we need once again to welcome and to wait upon Him.

It is then that the comfort of God takes over. We stop asking why bad things happen and start resolving to move forward despite the bad things. Then the colors of the great mosaic sparkle brightly around the black that has been recently painted.

Then, when we have waited for the Lord and been renewed with His strength, we are ready to run with the horses.

Lint and Apartments

2009-10-20T20:04:00.000-07:00

We start in apartments, and we end in apartments, and along the way we leave lint.

Lint is one of those things I never thought about much. It just is. You have to get rid of it, especially from the dryer.

Doing laundry this week, I noticed - as if for the first time - that lint is not random. If you are doing a load of whites, the lint will be white. If you are doing a load of jeans, the lint is blue. I know ... not very profound.

But to me, it was jarring to realize that lint is not simply dust and junk from the air - lint is actually a little bit of the clothes that is a lost during the drying process. I suppose, if I dried my jeans enough times, there would be nothing left but the button and the zipper.

If you have been reading my blog, you know that my Uncle Charles died a couple of weeks ago. For the last few years of his life, he lived in a two bedroom apartment. Come to think of it, he lived much of his life in an apartment - they call it a "flat" in London - but the last one was smaller than where I lived during law school. He had sold much of his stuff and moved into a small place that he could manage in his advancing years.

I remember how proud I was of the first apartment Gena and I lived in as a married couple. It was just a two-bedroom apartment, but it had big closets and a "dining room," and we thought it was cool.

We start in apartments, and we end in apartments, and along the way we leave lint. Here is what I mean. Since that apartment, Gena and I have lived in a couple of houses. They hold more stuff, more people, more memories. Along the way, we have left little bits of ourselves in neighborhoods, in towns, in jobs, in churches, hopefully in friends. While we have no plans to do so now, we may well end up in an apartment again some day, just enough for us to manage in our advancing years. Between now and then, we will leave a lot more of ourselves around. Some of our lint will be white, some blue, some dusty, all of it a part of ourselves.

There has been some great lint left in my life. Uncle Jerry left a wry wit mixed with a love of writing. Granddaddy left his smell when I hugged him. Great Uncle Sam left the joy of giving small treasures. Mavis left the model of what a friend is. Della left her song. Jenny left her resolute goodness. Jimmy left the sparkle in his eye. My father-in-law left a quick smile at a quiet joke.

Many of you, still living, have left your lint with me too, little parts of you that stay with me even when you are far away.

I think ending up in an apartment is the right thing to do. I think that means that you don't carry all your stuff with you. It means you have left things as you have gone. It means you have focused on leaving little bits of yourself in your world.

We start in apartments, and we end in apartments, and in between we leave lint.

Father, Pastor, Teacher, Friend... and Uncle

2009-10-10T20:34:00.001-07:00

My Uncle Charles Wellborn died on October 1, and his funeral was today. What a man.

The short version - national champion debater, decorated ski troop soldier, featured presenter/personality on "The Baptist Hour" radio program, leader of Texas youth revival movement, pastor of Seventh & James Baptist in Waco, the "most outstanding graduate student ever" at Duke University, university chaplain and religion department chair at Florida State, director of FSU overseas programs, multiple-publication author, actor/director, preacher, teacher, speaker, football fan, joke teller, world traveler, philanthropist, Christian, father, brother, uncle.

His last book is called Grits, Grace, and Goodness. It is primarily a collection of some of his previously-published essays and sermons, but the last section, called "Credo," is a combination personal testimony/autobiography that is one of the most transparent and inspiring pieces I have ever read.

He asked that his tombstone bear the words "Father, Pastor, Teacher, Friend." His pastor used those words today as the basis for the memorial message in Uncle Charles' honor. I will not try here to duplicate that sermon. Suffice it to say that those words - and many more - cannot do justice in trying to encapsulate Uncle Charles.

As is often true for me at funerals, I found myself wishing that I had taken more advantage of the days - in scriptural language, I would say that I should have better "redeemed the time" - that I had with him. Our relationship was largely one of typing - letters, emails, reading things that each other had written. I should have called him more often. I particularly should have called him more during his last months when he was sick. Hearing from his best friends today what he thought of me made me wish all the more that I had called him more often.

And yet, I am happy with the relationship we had. Of course I wish I had known him better. Of course it is my fault that I did not know him more. Still, I knew him, and I think I understood him.

Our politics were not identical - often not even closely related - but I believe we both brought the same idea from our debate lives to our politics. That is, he modeled for me how to listen to the opposition with all the kindness in the world without sacrificing personal conviction.

Our religion was - I hope - very close to identical. There is very little of what I know of his spiritual life to which I do not ascribe or hope I follow. He lived his life in certainty of the victory that was gained on the cross.

These words of his, from his last book, are a challenge to me: "Wherever the church is, there is love. Precisely to the extent that the church does not live by love, it misses the mark of authenticity. The early church made no claims to out-organize, out-promote, out-build, out-manipulate, or even out-think anyone else. It did promise to out-love everybody else. The hostile world in which if found itself marveled that these women and men of faith out-loved the pagan world. Their love reached out to embrace those who did not accept the church's doctrinal teaching, as well as to human beings of both genders, all races, and every economic or social status."

I encourage you to read his stuff. I was lucky to know him as well as I did, even recognizing that through my own fault I did not know him better.

Rest in peace Uncle Charles. Heaven is a better place because you are there. Our lives are certainly better because you were here.

Hospitality

2009-10-01T07:23:00.000-07:00

I have a friend who is a recent college graduate with a degree in "hospitality." That means she has learned how to run a hotel or a restaurant.

It can be tempting for us Christians to think of hospitality as a limited thing like that – you know, something like having a friend over to lunch. While opening our homes and our churches to others is without doubt a part of it, I think Christian hospitality is so much more than that – it is opening our hearts. Our word hospitality comes from the Latin word that derives from hospes - "guest." The New Testament Greek word for it - philoxenia - literally means “love of strangers.” It is extending welcome to one - anyone - who does not have what we have and inviting him or her to join us and share in what we have. The next step, then, is to invite the one who is now sharing what we have to join in what we are doing.

I have the blessing, or the curse, to be able to remember random details. Along with batting averages and the capitals of all the countries of Central America, I can recite the lyrics of way too many songs. I can wade through my memories of the Eagles and the Gatlin Brothers and the Who to find a host of songs I learned in youth choir. One song we sang on a choir tour where we did mission work among the homeless of Chicago includes these words: “Give a cup of water in the master’s name, feed the poor and needy, comfort those in pain. Clothe the naked millions, touch the sick and lame. Welcome in the stranger knocking at your door. Go to all the lonely where few have been before. Help the poor lost sinner, tell him Jesus came. Give a cup of water in the master’s name.”

Fast forward from that Chicago trip of 1978 to a moment in November of 1992 that seems to be appropriate as I ponder the virtue of hospitality – it was the night I was ordained as a deacon.

My current church, Broadway Baptist, enjoys great tradition and standing in the Baptist world. Perhaps the only church with more tradition is the First Baptist Church of Nashville, site of the founding of the Baptist Sunday School Board and widely recognized as the “mother church of the Southern Baptist Convention,” back when that was a good thing.

That description would not lead many to believe that FBC would be open to variations from the stereotypes that many who like to toss labels around would expect. Yet even that bastion of tradition and Baptist history welcomed an amazingly diverse group to its deacon body that Sunday night when five of us were ordained. Fred was the poster child for Baptist deacons – a middle-aged white man who had raised a couple of sons through the youth group of the church. But the rest of us… well, I was 27, young and brash and wet behind the ears. David was single. Danny was Hispanic. And Mavis was single and female.

And yet that high holy Baptist church welcomed us and ordained us and charged us with serving the community of grace that is that great church. We did not need to look alike or be of similar status.

I read a wonderful quote from Dieter Zander. Although I do not agree with him on everything, I think he shows great insight when it comes to hospitality: “When we moved to San Francisco, we lived on a street where our neighbors included an atheist Jewish family, a Buddhist family, an Irish Catholic family, a gay family, and a Hindu family. There was no sense of community, so we decided to become conduits of the kingdom by practicing the discipline of hospitality. We learned people's names and used them. We introduced neighbors to each other. And something began to happen. My atheist Jewish neighbor came into my kitchen once and said, ‘You know, something has happened since you all moved to this neighborhood. It's hard to describe, but it's like an enzyme has been added. Where once there was no life, now there's life. What is that?’ And I said, ‘That's the gospel of Jesus being lived out in our lives.’ "

I heard another great illustration just last night. A yourg woman meeting her future in-laws for the first time felt their love and embrace, not because they knew her well yet, but simply because she was special to their son.

I am a very “churchy” person. I take the New Testament language that the church is the body of Christ very seriously and very personally. I believe that the way Christ most often works in the world is through the church - He hugs with our arms, speaks with our voices, feeds with our hands - and I intend to be an integral part of that. My understanding of that role was heightened, if not started, by a rudimentary understanding of hospitality, in singing about the importance of a cup of cold water and an offering of welcome. My faith was heightened again, if not confirmed, by the welcome I received as a church laid hands on me as I knelt between an Hispanic man and a single woman.

There is nothing wrong with running a hotel and inviting someone in for a meal, but we Christians cannot stop there. We open our hearts to the stranger, just as God open His heart to all of us who are special to His son.

The Little Red Wagon

2009-09-27T17:46:00.000-07:00

Our sixteen-year-old needs a place to park his new (OK, new to him) car, so we spent the weekend cleaning out the garage, re-organizing, and getting rid of stuff we don't need/use/want anymore.

We are getting rid of the little red wagon.

I had a red wagon when I was small. I have a few memories of it. Dad used to pull me to the store to buy candy. I remember riding downhill in it as though it were a sled on wheels, using the handle in a vain attempt to steer.

So, sixteen years ago when we had a son, I bought a little red wagon. My father once again was in charge of pulling my children in it through the neighborhood. My main use of it was to pull them to school on the first day of kindergarten.

It is not something that we used a lot, obviously. For the last years, it is has been a makeshift storage bin in the garage for extension cords, gas cans, and most recently seashells that the girls picked up last March on the beach and have been meaning to clean for the last six months.

Clearly, there is no reason to keep it. We don't use it. The kids are too big for it. It is old. It is taking up needed space.

But it pains me to give it away.

I expect that we all have little red wagons in our lives. We don't have a good reason for keeping them around, but they make us smile. They evoke memories. We just know that if we keep them around, we will find a use for them sometime.

Then keener minds prevail, and the wagon goes on the pickup, headed for Goodwill.

That's ok. I would rather use the garage space for Trey's 2003 blue Mustang than for the 1993 red Radio Flyer. The very new memory of seeing his face when he got the keys will not be erased either.

They can take my wagon away, but they cannot erase the memory of seeing my kids pulled by their grandfather. They cannot make me forget the walk from our house to the new Harpeth Valley Elementary School for Trey's first day of kindergarten.

Value your wagons. Value more the kids you pull in them. One is a symbol for the other, and symbols can be discarded while the symbolism remains.

If you see me smiling this week, I might just be remembering the little red wagon.

A Week of Memories

2009-09-13T19:34:00.000-07:00

I write this on September 13. I expect many of us have spent the last week living with memories, as have I. But before I get to the obvious nighmarish memories that we have all shared from that day eight years ago, let me start with two other memories that make this week quite special for me.

September 9, twenty years ago: Gena said "Yes." I became a fiance'. The idea that someone would agree to spend the rest of her life with me - would commit her very life to mine - is still hard for me to comprehend. The idea that that person would be the one who continues to bewitch and amaze me is quite breathtaking. That she would love me remains a mystery and a gift.

September 10, sixteen years ago: Trey breathed his first breath. I became a father. More mystery - that I could participate in the creation of life. That love could result in this incredible gift is beyond what any of us really understands. Now I watch him drive, interact with his peers, discover life and love, lead, and continue to learn to follow Christ. Amazing.

September 11, eight years ago: I was leaving my Tuesday morning Bible study group that met (and still meets without me) at Belmont University in Nashville. I turned on my radio at about 8:05 central time and - like you and everyone else - was shocked and saddened and concerned by the news. In fact, I was so taken that I drove absently through a school zone and got pulled over. Fortunately, no one was hurt. (The judge let me out of the ticket - a testament to the universal recognition of the effects of the news of that morning on all of us.) We still fight battles across the world that are at least tangentially related to that event. We live a little more carefully, take more time being cleared to get on airplanes, wonder a little more about the events of racial profiling we see around us, and pray more about our immediate futures than we did before. We see that void on the NYC skyline and remember. We visit a field in Pennsylvania or the side of the Pentagon and remember.

I am glad that this week - a week of most horrid memories for us all - is also one with memories for me that are transcendent. There is a lesson here, even if you did not get engaged or have a child born this week: God's gifts can be found through the smoke. He truly gives more grace.

God Is Love - A Lesson from a Funeral

2009-09-07T19:32:00.000-07:00

It is the most basic of Christian ideas. It is what we have heard so often that many of us are no longer moved by it. God is Love.

I have heard more than one churchgoer say something along the lines of "I hope this sermon tells us something deeper than just God is love."

I don't think there is anything deeper than that.

I was a part of an event - a funeral, of all things - several years ago that has left images indelibly imprinted on my mind. I have told the story often, and I want to tell it here.

One of my very favorite verses comes from the little book of Zephaniah. “The Lord your God is with you; He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love; He will rejoice over you with singing.” That does not say that God rejoices when we do things well, when we sing just the right notes. He rejoices over us, period. We are His.

This point was brought home to me a few years ago at that funeral. Grant Cunningham was my age. We met the first day of Welcome Week at Baylor. You could not miss his absurdly curly red hair or his infectious grin. Seven years later, we found ourselves, both married by now, as members of the same church in Nashville. I had gone to Nashville to practice law. Grant had gone there, like so many others, to write music.

Unlike so many others, Grant was good at it. He was real good. He won Dove Awards. You may know Point of Grace's song called “The Great Divide.” Grant wrote that one.

And then, at the age of 38, with twin two year old boys, in a recreational soccer game of all things, Grant died in a freak accident.

I will never, ever forget Grant’s funeral. The music scene in Nashville can produce much in the way of cynicism and me-first oneupsmanship, but there was none of that to be seen that day, as an outpouring of love and respect could not be contained. The biggest names in contemporary Christian music were there; some, like Michael W. Smith and Nicole Nordeman, sang in the service because Kristen asked them to. Others were simply crying and worshiping in a memorial for their friend.

But then something happened that I had never seen before in a funeral service. After Pastor Scotty Smith finished preaching a powerful, evangelistic message that Grant would have “Amen”ed, Scotty moved to the side, the lights dimmed, and a screen descended from the ceiling. The projector came on, and we saw Grant’s face. It was a videotape of Grant singing – apparently at a writer’s night showcasing some new material – the song that turned out to be his last #1 hit. You may know the song “Blue Skies.”

I know it sounds hokey, but you will have to trust me when I tell you that it was heart-rending to see Grant’s face and hear his voice sing his words from a screen suspended over his closed casket.

When the song was over and the screen went dark, the room sat in hushed reverence. Then, without a script or a prompting, I saw Grant’s father stand up on the front row and begin to clap. Just standing there, back to the thousand or so people in the room, looking at … what: – the casket?, the blank screen?, his own tears?, I am not sure – and standing alone and clapping. I was devastated – it was a father’s applause for the life’s work of his son. We in the room were transfixed, for this was not an ovation for a great singing job – I promise you that Point of Grace sings “Blue Skies” far better than Grant could ever have hoped to sing it. Instead, we were witnessing a father watching his son’s last performance and showing his unashamed approval.

Don’t miss the message. God is rejoicing over us. When we come to the end and the tape of our life’s accomplishments is played, it will not matter how well we sang. What matters is that we are His. God will review the tape and stand and applaud and hand us our crown of glory and honor.

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are. He is everlasting God, and we are His.

And God is love.