Day 9: Lila (or Being a Beginner Part 2)

Tonight, Lila and I have martial arts.  We’ve been training under Master Mark in the discipline of Hapkido.  It is seriously the best thing ever.

Both of us are white belts, which means we’ve paid for the class.  You don’t earn a white belt.  It is given to you.  But we’ve progressed since then.  We are about to test for our yellow belts.  I’m not sure I’m ready, but Lila is.

Lila is fierce like her mom.  You should see her front kick, double punch.  She isn’t messing around.  I can’t help but smile inside as she practices her moves.  That is until my hands are twisted and I’m going down on the mat as she reverses my hold and throws her weight.  I must outweigh the girl by 150 lbs, but one of the coolest things about Hapkido is that it doesn’t require size or strength.  It is fluid.  It is all about deflections and using your opponent’s momentum.  It is beautiful.  And a tiny little 8 year old can easily block an adult kick through proper body rotation and balance.  And then respond with a kick to the groin.  Hyah!

I guess it could be a little embarrassing to have to tap my leg when the pain from Lila’s hold becomes unbearable.  But mostly I’m just proud.  I love her soul!  She is so fearless.  She has such a big heart.

I love taking this class with her.  I love her gentle encouragements.  I love how hard she kicks the bag.  And I love how her joy is uncontainable.  She is such a gift to our family.  I’m so proud of my little white ninja.  Just don’t lower your guard.  You might get an elbow to the face.

Day 8: Being a Beginner (Part 1)

Last fall I took a drawing class from my friend, Gil.  He’s a brilliant plein air painter…one of the very best.  Just so happens he attends my church.  Lucky us!

A handful of us signed up for the class, all different levels.  Some were dusting off their sketch books from years past.  Some were polishing their skills.  Others, like me, were still learning how to sharpen a pencil properly.  Needless to say, it was humbling.

I’m at that stage of life where I’ve figured out what I’m good at.  It would seem like wisdom to remain right there.  I've found my wheelhouse.  I should just keep perfecting my gifts.  That sounds nice and efficient and productive.

Except that part of me wilts.  I can get stuck in the familiar.  My mind gets locked into its rote responses.  The neurological grooves in my brain get deeper.  I get bored.

Being a beginner is so good for the mind!  In the awkward strokes, or the uneven lines, the lack of confidence in my shading, I find myself so immersed and engaged.  It takes everything I’ve got.

Others look over and glance at my paper.  I’m tempted to throw my arms over it.  To crumple it up and pretend I’m over it.  But I’m not.  Deep down, passions are stirring that I’ve always carried with me.  I've always wanted to do this.

There is a part of all of us that longs to create.  It’s in our very souls.  It is part of the image of God in our lives.  We are artists.  When we create, the deepest part of our spirit is engaged.  We are operating in the divine.  Even when we are scribbling with crayons. 

After my third lesson, I drew a shoe.  I looked at the smudged shading and imperfections and thought, today this is my best.  Gil looked at it and said, you’re done.  Sign it!  I beamed.  It won’t go on the wall at home. It could maybe go on the fridge.  But I signed my name with a feeling of joy.  What a wonderful experience to create! 

I’ve mentioned that sometimes during Lent we can add something to our life instead of removing or abstaining.  My encouragement:  Add something you’ve never tried or have only just begun.  There is such joy in being a beginner!

Day 7: Patty

Can I tell you something about my wife?  She’s fierce.  Almost a year ago she turned 40 and at her birthday toast I mentioned that you have to be brave to be friends with her.  Patty isn’t merciful.  She doesn’t suffer fools.

I can still remember the fear I felt the first time I asked her out.  And the second.  She isn’t safe.  A relationship with her takes courage.  It makes you feel vulnerable. 

And yet I pursued her, and continue to pursue her, because I want to see myself the way that she sees me…she sees my potential.  She sees the good things in me and draws them out.  She doesn’t coddle or comfort, she speaks right to the fears and affirms that I’m bigger than them.

What she does is push you to be your very best.  It isn’t her shtick, it is who she is.  She only speaks truth.  More than anyone I know.

Which is why her opinion is the only one I truly trust.  “How was that sermon?”  “What do you think of this post?”  “How was that talk?”

Sometimes her words are the last thing I want to hear, but already know deep down to be true.  That pause and then, “it was good.”  Meaning, “not your best.”  Or, “I think this part could use some work.”  Because she’s right. 

I wish I could just get it the first time.  But first attempts are almost never my best.  They are simply a first draft.  It requires so much energy to go back in and pull it apart again, and again.  So much effort.  So much courage.  It can be so tedious and humbling.

But it is worth it.  Because there is nothing better than that flash of her smile as she says, “this is so good!”  It isn’t that I’m becoming who she wants me to be.  I’m being who I want me to be.  And that is what lights her up.  She’s a coach, through and through.  She’s a leader.  She’s my inspiration.

Today is National Women’s Day.  I am so grateful for this beautiful, strong, fierce woman in my life.  I love the example she sets for our girls on who to be.  I love the example she sets for our son on how to value and respect women.  And I love the example she sets for me, to be the very best version of myself.  She’s not just my wife, but my coach.  I love you, babe!

Day 6: Temperance

I’ve been eating clean for the last few weeks.  It is my wife’s doing.  Patty has me stuffing food into little containers all day long.  Green for veggies, red for protein, yellow for carbs.  Everything is measured out, proportioned just right.  No more randomly grabbing a handful of something whenever I feel like it.

And so much water!  All day long I’m drinking.

At first it felt like a constant slap on the wrist.  So often I reach for some little comfort food.  A little more cream in my coffee, a handful of chips, a glass of wine at the end of the day.  All that is gone. 

You’d think I’d be struggling, but I’m not. Soon you realize don’t need all that sugar.  Your body starts burning food like fuel.  It feels really, really good.

It takes work.  It requires a bit more prep time.  It takes self-control.  It takes vision.  Vision to be healthier, leaner, stronger.  But even that isn’t really it.  It is something deeper.

Classically, it has been called temperance.  It means “going the right amount and no further.”  At first all those containers can appear confining or restricting.  They tell me I can’t have whatever I want whenever I want it.  But the truth is, I don’t really want it. Those foods make me slow. They hold me back. They make me tired.  They definitely aren’t what I need.  Temperance draws a line and says, “this much and no more.”

Our bodies know this already.  We’ve been designed.  We know what we actually need.  I read that our taste buds lessen in sensitivity as we near that point of being full.  It is the rule of diminishing returns.  Gluttonous eating means we’re stuffing ourselves with food that has lost its flavor.  Yet we keep on eating.

Temperance is knowing when to quit.  It sees past the illusion that if some is good then more is better.  Saying no can be so empowering.

Eating right is a window into abundant living.  When I eat right I feel alert.  My attitude is more positive.  I feel more active, creative, inspired.

No, food isn’t some sort of cure all.  And yes, you can become way too legalistic about this stuff.  But temperance is something that our world is in desperate need of.  Now if we could just find containers for social media, politics, entertainment, news, work, sports…

Day 5: Quiet Days

Mondays are my quiet days.  At least that is the goal.  And by “day”, I actually mean about a 3-4 hour window.  My favorite thing to do on Monday is to throw my board in my truck and head down to Trestles to surf.

Surfing at Trestles requires a bit of effort.  The walk alone takes about 30 minutes.  You can choose to take the trail that crosses under the freeway or follow a paved bike path, but both end up at the same place.  I’ve skated down a few times, but speed wobbles with a surfboard under your arm can be unnerving.

Besides, I like the walk.  Especially alone.  Especially on quiet days.  The introvert in me craves the silence.

Because so much of my life involves words.  Words to my kids, my wife, my friends, my church.  I love words, I love teaching, I love communicating.  But after too many words I feel empty.  Henri Nouwen compares speaking to leaving the sauna door open.  After a while, the temperature inside is the same as it is outside.  The heat has left.

Silence is like shutting the door to our sauna.  Allowing the temperature to rise again.

As I get to the sand my phone rings, followed by a text from the same number.  It says 911.  I check the message.  A first name only…who is this?  Then I remember the man I talked with yesterday at church.  I feel his expectations rising and the increasing need behind the request as the responsibility shifts to my plate.  But this isn’t a crisis.  This can wait.

Something starts to rise in me emotionally.  What is it?  Panic? Anxiety? Claustrophobia? I’m clearly overwhelmed. But I’m learning to recognize the emotions before they have a hold on me.  I carefully text back, politely but with strength, “I’m not available.  I’ll talk with you tomorrow.”

The fact is, I hate saying no.  It makes me feel selfish.  It makes me feel like a fraud.

As I sit discouraged on the beach I feel a nudge.  It’s as if God is saying, “time to surf.” 

There is a fun crossed up wind swell and only a couple guys out.  A few waves into it and I’m finding my rhythm. I keep splitting peaks with the guy next to me.  I surf until my arms ache.

As I change out of my wetsuit on the beach, waiting for the feeling to come back to my icy feet, I feel the warmth of the sun and the familiar smells of the beach.  My heart feels warm and full.  I feel joy, and with the joy, strength.  I savor this moment.

Sundays are a Mini-Easter: Enjoy!

Did you know that Sundays don’t count for the forty days of Lent?  Sundays are for joyful anticipation. Enjoy, rest, partake, and celebrate the good gifts!  Easter is coming.  See you guys tomorrow!

Day 4: Community

            Today is parade day in Laguna!  Every year the city hosts the Patriot’s Day Parade which begins at the high school and ends in front of city hall.  It just to so happens to conveniently pass by the end of our street.  We’ve lived here 16 years and have been almost every year. 

            It is your classic small town parade where there are more participants than spectators.  Practically every group or organization from town participates from the Sawdust Festival to the Laughing Yoga crew.  It includes the little leaguers, the Indian Princesses, the Pageant of the Masters people, and, of course, our local middle and high school bands.

            Gabe and Mia both marched today.  I was the embarrassing dad running alongside them with my phone, recording.  I may have accidentally yelled out, “smash those cymbals, baby!” to my daughter as she passed by, red faced.

            This year Lila chose not to march.  She could have gone with her tennis team or with her dance class, but instead she wisely chose to catch the candy that gets thrown to the spectators.  I mean, someone’s gotta do it.  She came home with more candy than she gets at Halloween.

            As I watch the parade I am reminded of how much time we’ve invested here in this community.  I am reminded by each familiar face that passes by, waving and bursting into smile at that moment of recognition.  I am reminded what a gift each of them is to me.  Every face reminds me of a story.  Every face has added to my journey, to who I am, and to who I am becoming.

            I am also reminded of those who have moved on.  The parade will never be quite as good as when we used to sit with Brad and Margy Coleman.  Margy is one of the best hecklers I know, but also one of the very best encouragers, applauding every obscure marching band that passed by. 

            The fact is, relationships are what gives our life its depth and its meaning.  They are the greatest gifts.  Friendships are a reason to stay where you are.

             I want to savor these moments, knowing that each one marks my life like the ring of a tree.  Community is an intentional gift from God.  Relationships are messy, create friction, and yet are ultimately the thing that matters most.  Happy parade day, my friends!  I sure love you guys!

Day 3: Pace

             I love coffee.  It is what gets me up early, when it is still dark outside.  I love the aroma, the warmth, the dark bitterness of the beans and the richness of the cream.  Until recently, my prep time has been right before I go to bed.  Grind the beans, pour the water, set the timer.  I wake up and there, magically, is a full pot of coffee.

            That is until a couple weeks ago, when Patty bought me a beautiful Chemex coffee maker for Valentine’s day.  Now, I know pour over coffee is all the hipster rage…but seriously, it makes the most amazing cup of coffee!  Everything about it is richer and deeper.  So much more aroma, flavor, aesthetic.  It just takes way longer and is much less convenient. 

            Instead of waking up to a fresh pot of coffee, I must begin by first boiling the water, followed by measuring and grinding beans. Then I wait, and wait, until that little thermometer hits the red zone.  And then I pour.  Slowly.  Patiently.  Swirling the beans.  Pouring again.

            Sometimes impatiently.  This is taking too long!  I’m barely awake!  Suddenly my Cuisinart 12 cup drip maker sounds wonderfully convenient.

            But the aroma pulls me back in.  It smells so rich.  It builds anticipation.  And as I wait, I find myself with moments to breath, to pray, to be pulled into the present instead of rushing ahead to the fury of the day.

            It has become a bit of a calm within the storm.  Soon my kids are swirling around me, getting ready for school, packing lunches, stuffing backpacks, munching cereal.  The slow pace of my morning allows for gentler responses, non-anxious presence, and peace.

            The slow cup of coffee has become a wonderful metaphor for the contemplative pace of life.  There is an invitation in the slowness.  The moments I so quickly rush through each day become some of the deepest and most meaningful. 

            Lent invites us to slow down.  We enter into the desert, which is the time for listening, for reflecting, for looking inward.  It is in the desert that we hear the still, small voice of God.  As the pace of our life slows, there is an increase in clarity, in sensitivity, and in presence.  We begin to notice, to savor, and to cherish the goodness of what we have and the anticipation of what is to come.

Day 2: The Wonder of Reading

           Today is one of my favorite days of the year.  Dr. Seuss’s birthday!  Not that I am such a huge fan of the doctor, but it happens to be the day where our elementary school celebrates reading.  For the last 9 years, my wife and I have participated in going to a classroom at El Morro and reading a favorite story for the kids.  We get asked because one of my favorite people in the world, Mary Blanton, hosts the event and does a fabulous job in celebrating the wonder of reading.

            I read today in my daughter Lila’s classroom.  That girl!  She is one of the warmest and friendliest people I know.  I love seeing her interact with her friends and teacher.  She loves to be involved and helped me hold up the book so her classmates could see the illustrations.

            I read Finding Winnie, which is one of our favorites.  It is the true story of the bear that inspired Christopher Robin Milne’s father to write his endearing childrens books.  Not that the Winnie the Pooh books are strictly for children.  His books and poetry are so brilliant and delightful and at the top of my favorites list.

            Today, amidst the goodness and delight of the classroom, I saw that glimmer that is so close to the heart of God.  I saw wonder in the eyes of these wonderful children.  I loved their fascinated questions, their wide eyes (“You mean he was a real bear?!), their desire to share their own stories, and especially the little girl that came up afterward and proudly, but shyly, showed me her Winnie the Pooh shoes that she just happened to wear that day.

            Childlike wonder!  It is one of the most beautiful gifts.  Our world is filled with it, if we have the eyes to see.  During this Lenten season, I hope that we can create the space for it, to read books to our children, to remember those moments where our own hearts were filled with delight, and to discover new glimpses of God in the brilliant and creative world around us.  Go read something today that delights your heart.  It is Dr. Seuss’s birthday, after all!

Lenten Glimpses

            Often for Lent I give something up.  It is a way of creating space in my life.  It is a way of restraining impulses, learning temperance, and practicing freedom.  I’ll often choose that thing that is becoming larger than it should be and lay it aside.  Comforts that have become too comfortable, too familiar, and too important.  Laying aside dessert or coffee or wine for 40 days has that perfect blend of difficulty and do ability. 

            Sometimes I add something that I wish did more of.  Letter writing, for instance.  One year I hand wrote a letter to a friend for each day of Lent.  Not simply for the sake of self-improvement.  It is practicing those deeper passions of the heart.  Things that have become stifled, or that the stresses of life are choking out.  These additions to my life during the Lenten season have proven so life giving. 

            Many people I know are fasting from social media.  I love this idea. What a wise way to protect the heart from anxiety and the dreaded fear of missing out.  To replace social media with prayer sounds brilliant.

            But not me.  This year, for Lent, I’m going to increase my social media presence.  Why?  Because it terrifies me.  I’m going to do my best to blog something for each day, a simple glimpse of a holy moment.  Something sacred in the midst of the ordinary. 

            It is my way of exercising that shadow side of myself.  That part of me that loves to design and create is so often overruled by the insecure critic; the one who tries too hard to sound profound.  I’ll do my best to offer a glimpse of where I see God shining through the cracks.  And I invite you to join me.  Unless of course you’re fasting from social media for Lent.  If that’s the case, let me tell you, you’re going to miss out.

Defying Gravity

            Today I feel such hope.   The feeling caught me off guard.  It appeared in the most unlikely of places.  I was reading an article on Russian Orthodox ministers who were martyred under Stalin.  I know, right?  The title of the article was ‘Spiritual Freedom’ (from First Things) and it included two photographs, mugshots, of a man and woman moments before their execution.  The expressions on their faces are profound.  The author, John Burgess, writes,

“I stop and contemplate their faces.  They seem to look through and beyond this world into eternity.  I see terror yet peace, exhaustion yet ecstatic anticipation of another life.  And there is spiritual defiance.  These men and women had been stripped of every legal and political right, yet are strangely confident that a righteous God holds them safely in his hands.  Under the most awful circumstances of persecution, Butovo’s victims discovered what Christians really mean by freedom.”

            It is such an odd paradox in Christianity that somehow, through the giving up of one’s rights and freedoms, we are set free.  In the laying down of life, we gain life.  This isn’t to dismiss the significance of civil liberties, nor is it to suggest that the defense of them isn’t biblical.  It just means that, at our core, liberation isn’t ultimately something that happens outwardly, but inwardly.  The freedoms of the heart cannot be restrained by any form of external control, nor can their allowance by government provide any sort of guarantee of a heart truly free.

Burgess writes,

“When the church is socially acceptable and when religious affiliation is more a matter of custom than faith, those who call themselves Christians are easily tempted to sell their inheritance of spiritual freedom for the pottage of social privilege and material wealth.  This temptation is, perhaps, also ours in America today.  A legally guaranteed right to religious freedom may too easily be mistaken for true Christian freedom.”

            This is comforting, because I’m afraid right now for our country and world.  I’m afraid for us and for my children’s future. I used to say, “Don’t worry, that will never happen.”  It was usually followed by a justifying statement like “People are smarter than this.”  “People are better than this.”  “We’ve grown.”  “We’ve progressed.” 

            It isn’t the loss of religious freedoms that I fear.  It is the loss of human decency.  We have lost sight of the ends and have become entangled in the means.  The optimism I once felt has been replaced by a weight; a heaviness of inevitability.  There are forces at work in the world that feel beyond our ability to restrain.  Selfishness, deception, violence, fear, discrimination, greed.  I feel weighed down by their gravity. 

            Newton’s second law of thermodynamics seems to have a moral corollary.  As our universe expands and grows more cold and less complex, so our morality seems to be degenerating, becoming more and more base. We are sliding backwards and losing ground. How will this story end?

            One of my favorite philosophers, Simone Weil, writes, “All the natural movements of the soul are controlled by laws analogous to those of physical gravity.  Grace is the only exception.  We must always expect things to happen in conformity with the laws of gravity unless there is supernatural intervention.”

            This intervention is what gives me hope. Without this injection of grace into our system our plight is desperate.  But with it…with it our fear and anxiety can be transformed.  There is still a card that hasn’t yet been played.

            Many of you are familiar with the revelation received by Julian of Norwich when Christ told her again and again ‘All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.’  Julian cautiously questioned this reality.  And Christ’s response?  “all that (her concern) is true, but the secret grand deed will make even that ‘very well’.  ‘With you this is impossible, but not with Me.’”

            The secret grand deed.  That phrase makes my heart lift.  I don’t even know what that deed is.  We’re not supposed to.  But what I hear God saying is, “trust me.” Those words speak to my dismay and despair.  They tell me not to give up.  Those words give me hope and break me free from this downward spiral of hopelessness.

            Julian was shown a tiny hazelnut in the palm of God’s hand and was told that ‘this is all that is made.’  She feared that ‘it might suddenly have fallen to naught for littleness.’  This little world where we live can feel so immense, incomprehensible, overwhelming.  I draw such comfort from the picture of this little nut resting in the palm of a strong hand.

            It gives me courage to push against darkness.  To fight back with selflessness and generosity instead of clutching and hiding.  To respond with soft words to others’ wrath.  To speak truth.  To love my enemies. To seek out the ones in need.

            This is what freedom feels like.  True spiritual freedom is freedom of the heart.  Freedom to be my true self.  Freedom to live a life of grace.  It must first be received.  I can’t muster it on my own.  Like Simone said, it requires intervention.

            And this means humility.  It means sacrifice.  It requires me to trust and accept.  It means laying down my rights instead of insisting on them.  It stands strong against oppression, but by turning the other cheek, not by striking back.  It requires restraint.

            Simone says, “I must necessarily turn to something other than myself since it is a question of being delivered from self.”

            Because my heart, like all the rest of my brothers and sisters, is still broken and in need of healing.  I need you and you need me.  As we receive this intervening grace from heaven, we share it.  We give it away.  And the effect is contagious.  It grows.  It spreads like a fire. Once lit, it becomes impossible to contain.   

WHAT WOULD JESUS POST?

“An emotional triangle is any three members of any relationship system or any two members plus an issue or symptom.”  Edwin Friedman

I’ve felt such a hesitation to write recently.   Anything I consider posting feels like either reactionary political commentary or, on the opposite extreme, complete avoidance of reality. How do you comment on anything without some response to what is happening daily in Washington DC? It feels like there are only two options; to add to the enflamed, anxious political discourse, or to pretend it doesn’t exist.  Both feel terrible. 

My heart is heavy over the effects of this past election, over the building confusion and despair, over the lack of predictability for what tomorrow’s news will bring.  But deeper still, I feel a deep worry about the emotional state of our own hearts as we lose ourselves in the angry responses, the vitriol, and the accusations.  We’ve stopped listening to ourselves, let alone each other.  There is an energy behind the issues we type, post, or share that we are not paying attention to.  We get numb to it.  Soon it is like the air we breathe.  If we don’t pay attention to it, I fear, we will be incapable of responding intelligently and with wisdom to the deep concerns of our day.

One of my favorite stories in scripture is Jesus with the woman caught in adultery.  It isn’t in the earliest manuscripts of John’s gospel, but it sure sounds like him.  We need to study more than just what he said.  We can learn from what he did. I’m reminded of Dallas Willard’s statement that Jesus was the most intelligent man that ever lived.

In this case, he is being tested by his opponents, the Pharisees, who have caught a couple in the act of adultery but have dragged only the female before the mob.  Interesting. They are ready with rocks to carry out the law themselves.  Jesus is asked what to do, not because they need his insight, but because there is no response he can make to the angry masses that won’t backfire on him.  Either he condemns the girl to death to the satisfaction of the mob, or he extends mercy and grace and trivializes not only her sin, but the law itself.

During the chaotic scene, Jesus pulls out his phone and starts texting somebody.  Or maybe he is just looking something up on Wikipedia. Scripture isn’t clear. Actually he bends down and writes in the sand…but same thing.  Whatever the case, it isn’t what they’re expecting.  They start fidgeting.  What’s he doing? The energy starts to dissipate.  Jesus, subtly, refuses to be pulled into the anxiety of the mob.

In his timing, without looking up, he simply states, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”  Do you see what he’s doing? He is, step by step, defusing a bomb.  He begins with the environment itself.  It is triage.  There is an order to this.  The sin is not trivial, and yet, in this story, it is the least of his concerns.

The energy behind the mob is his chief concern.  He pauses to disarm the false urgency. To take a breath. To allow for actual reflection.  Only then does he proceed to the next level… to their own pride.  He states, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone…”  In the quiet space Jesus has created, he unleashes a bomb.  It is too much for the mob.  One by one they leave.

Sometimes it feels like our computer screens create a similar environment to that of our cars.  The distance or space allows for the ugliest sides of us to slip out like road rage.  Someone cuts us off and we react with anger and profanity.  Someone types something that hits a nerve and we immediately lash out.  We strike back. 

As our anger flares, our egos take over.  We feel righteous.  To condemn creates a false sense of virtuosity.  The problem is them.  They are the enemy.  They are the one to be feared.  If I can identify the sinner, then suddenly I am without sin.

This is why scripture tells us not to judge.  Because we are so bad at it.  We can’t help but make it about us.  Subjectivity almost always overrides our objectivity.  It feels so good to condemn.

Jesus pauses to create some space to breath.  He confronts the self-righteousness and the mob dissipates.  He is finally ready to talk to the accused.  He asks, “where are your accusers?” 

“They’ve gone.”

“Then I don’t accuse you either.  Go and sin no more.”

This is how sin is dealt with.  Jesus so wisely separates the behavior from the person.  It isn’t she that is condemned, but the action itself.  It is beneath her.  It is harmful to her.  “You are better than this.”

The fact is, Jesus loves her.  Not in a way that trivializes sin, but in a way that brings hope.  It doesn’t condemn, but points to a greater good.  That is the way of peace.

As my mouse pointer wavers over the post button, I remind myself to do a little reflection.  To ask a couple of questions.

First, is this a reaction?  If so, wait.  Wait a day.  At least wait til the morning.  See if it still feels the same. 

If it does, then secondly, what is driving my response?  Am I trying to fit into the inner circle? Am I trying to prove my own innocence or superiority over another?  In other words, where are my attachments?  What is the thing behind the thing? 

And lastly, am I speaking truth in love?  Either extreme falls short.  Truth without love causes such deep harm.  Love without truth is…as Lewis puts it, soft soap.  But speaking truth gently and courageously brings healing.  It brings life.  It sets before the other a greater vision.  This is what draws us forward…a greater conception of the good and the offer to step further into the love and vision God has for every single person on earth.

What would Jesus post?  Words that heal.  Words that build up.  Words that refuse to puff up the self.  Words that cut to the heart, but in a way that affirms God’s loving vision and purpose. These aren’t simply words to follow, but a character for us to imitate.  Maybe it isn’t that complicated after all. 

Navigating Murky Waters

I love just after it rains.  The hills in Laguna rebound immediately to a vivid green.  The sun is so bright you can’t help but squint.  The dust of the drought feels rinsed away and everything smells clean.

Except the ocean.  In stark contrast to the gleaming landscape, the water is murky and brown.  As inviting as today is to being outdoors, the sea holds up its hands and says stay out. 

It isn’t just that it’s dirty.  Its contaminated.  The bacteria levels skyrocket after a rain.  Surfers are warned to stay out of the water for 72 hours, especially when near drain pipes and river mouths.

As I stand at the outlook staring into the opaque water I can’t help but see it as a metaphor.  2016 was such a murky year.  It felt impossible to make a good decision.  Everything felt like damage control.  News felt untrustworthy. Subjective interpretations felt unrestrained. Civil conversations would quickly degenerate into entrenched, unresolvable disputes.

It wasn’t just that the issues felt cloudy.  The whole environment felt toxic and polluted.  It was affecting my heart.  I felt myself disengaging from those that disagreed with me.  I couldn’t last in a political conversation for more than five minutes without accusing the other side of being obtuse at best, and moronic when I’d finally had enough.

Everything felt so polarized. It still does.  Days later, you start to wonder if the water will ever clear. 

And not just politically.  The either/or dichotomy seems to find its way into every aspect of our lives.  It isn’t just republican or democrat anymore.  There is a conservative and progressive side to just about every discussion, be it spirituality and religion, vaccinations, eating habits, child rearing, healthcare, gender, education, you name it.  Are you this or are you that?  Pick a side.  No one is known for what they’re for, but instead for the worst elements of what the other side is against.  No one wins.

We are beginning a new year.  This is the time for resolutions.  For new goals, dreams, and ambitions to once again return with a freshness.  We are given a blank slate or canvas.  But this year I can’t do it.  I can’t keep paddling through all this sewage.  We need to clean this up.

But what do you do when you find all your options dissatisfying?  What do you do when you find both sides equally cloudy and toxic?  How do you take a step forward when it feels like there are no realistic options?

As a pastor, I’m particularly burdened by how complicit and intertwined my own evangelical faith has become with the systemic problems we face in America and the world.  We have embraced power that stands in sharp contrast with our very essence of humility, gentleness and love.  We have drunk deep from the power and ambition of the world and become intoxicated with it.  We’ve lost our way.  Both sides.  Right and left.  We’ve all lost our way.

James writes at the end of chapter 3 of his cautionary letter that “where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.  But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.”

How I long for this clean water!  Wisdom from above is known by its texture and clarity.  Integrity is not clinging to one isolated principle above all others.  It is open to reason.  It is known by its gentleness and mercy, by the taste of its fruit.

But if I’m honest, a quick look inward reveals the cloudiness of my own heart.  So much of what I do merits praise and approval from others.  How pure are my own motives?  What would I do if they didn’t bring with them the privileges I enjoy?  How willing am I to pray David’s prayer that God would search my heart and cleanse it?  To go after the wickedness that lies deep in my own motives, that lurks in the shadows?

James says that pure religion begins by bridling the tongue.  He follows it up by saying that it is followed by visiting widows and orphans and keeping oneself unstained by the world.

It makes me think of that statement attributed to St. Francis that we would “preach the gospel at all times and if necessary use words.”  Today I believe that our words are doing more harm than good. The church needs instead to practice goodness in secret.  We need to stop waving the triumphal banner of some exclusive right to eternal hope and start actually living in such a way that hope is the natural and contagious effect.

This year is the 500th birthday of the reformation.  It feels like we’re due for another one.

We desperately need to get back to the center.  To rediscover the heart of our faith.  To rekindle that first love.  At least I know that I do.

So here are my resolutions for this year.

I’m resolving to talk less and do more. 

To remember that without love, the most eloquent words are noise. 

To invest the gifts I’ve received in the lives of those in need.

To not waste emotional and spiritual energy entangling myself in disputes without end.

To instead allow my own soul to be open and laid bare before God that He would do his work of creating in me a clean and new heart. 

And to place my hope in the reality that this isn’t the first time this has happened.  That things can die and be reborn.  That Jesus is still making all things new.  For His way is the way of true hope. 

May we, in 2017, have the confidence to “walk in love, as Christ loved us.”  Amen.

Rediscovering the Story

Last Sunday was our Children’s Christmas Pageant and it just might have been my favorite one yet.  Pageants are filled with so much delight; from the bright eyes of the angel choir to the voice squawks on the vocal solos to the lisps in the prophetic readings… “he shall be called, Printh of Peath!”.

There were so many tender and sweet moments this year!

One little angel, before the choir went up to sing, asked my friend Loretta if she thought you would have to pay for donuts in heaven?  Loretta thought about it and carefully said, no, I think they would be free.  The little angel’s eyes lit up and she exclaimed, “That sounds wonderful!”

Baby Jesus got fidgety in the first service and her big sister angel came over and took the baby from Mary and bounced her (yes, Jesus was a girl this year) until she was consoled.

One of my best friends, David, had a son in the pageant who refused to wear the sheep costume but instead wore his black power ranger suit.  Personally, it made me feel a little more secure, and I’m sure Joseph and Mary did as well.  I also found it inspiring.  That is exactly what I would have wanted to wear at his age, I’m just not sure I would have had the guts to insist on it.  Well done, Jude!

David used to be in my youth group over twenty years ago!  Boy does time fly.  It is that whole cliché about it feeling “just like yesterday.”  It does.  That is one of the weirdest things about aging…the way we feel time.  Years get shorter and shorter.  Reoccurring separate events start morphing into one.

I’ve watched this same pageant sixteen years now.  I’ve seen my kids take various roles, from wise man, to angel, to inn keeper’s wife.  Even my own daughter got to be Jesus one year.  Such a blur.  Details and specifics fade and we find ourselves holding on to a more nostalgic feeling of joy mixed with some sadness.

If we’re not careful, we can lose the magic and wonder in the familiarity of it all.  We lose our imaginative hearts, the ones that dream about free donuts in heaven.  We turn back to real life and there we find a much different story.  Our news consists of catastrophe after catastrophe; either man’s doing or nature’s doing, or some combination of the two.  We see hopeless politics, deep suffering, gross injustice.  The temptation is to grow up, to leave behind our childlike optimism.  To accept reality. To forget.

In an essay titled “On Three Ways of Writing for Children”, C.S. Lewis argues that this doesn’t have to be the case.  We can grow without changing.  Instead of leaving behind the wonder, our growth can embrace it, like the expanding rings of a tree.  He writes, “When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”  Our appetites do change, but just because we now like mushrooms or a glass of red wine doesn’t mean we won’t devour a bowl of peppermint ice-cream from time to time.  We grow and change, but we also cherish who we were, and who we still are.

Lewis writes, “when we read a good fairy tale we are obeying the old precept ‘Know thyself.’”  Fairy tales remind us of who we truly are and who we long to be.  They speak to us of adventure, of mystery, of vision, and a life of deep meaning.

But Lewis didn’t always believe in the truthfulness of myth.   In fact, to his friend Tolkien, he once called them “lies breathed through silver.”  As a result of that interaction Tolkien went home and wrote a poem and coined the term Mythopoeia.  A new word was born to the English language, a distinct genre of writing fairytales to reveal deeper truths of reality. To reawaken our wonder.  To help us remember the childlike magic which is the right response to reality.

Lewis was not just inspired by Tolkien’s views on mythopoeia, he would later make his own contributions to it.  He would ultimately commit his life to this greater “myth.” Not only would he write the brilliant Chronicles of Narnia, but he would surrender his own life to the service of the lion, Aslan. Lewis knew and was inspired by all of the beautiful myths that have existed throughout history that push us further in, revealing deeper truths and currents in our reality, reminding us of what we’ve forgotten.  But in the end, it was the reality that this one, this Christmas story, was unique.  As Tolkien told him, this time the myth became fact.

Lewis would later write, “We trust, not because a God exists, but because thisGod exists.”

One of my very favorite children’s authors is A.A. Milne.    He writes in the introduction to one of my favorite children’s books, The Wind in the Willows, “I must give you one word of warning.  When you sit down to read this book, don’t be so ridiculous as to suppose that you are sitting in judgment on my taste, or on the taste of the author.  You are merely sitting in judgment on yourself.  You may be worthy: I don’t know.  But it is you who are on trial.”

I love that so much!  The story itself is so objectively true and beautiful that it is a test of our own hearts. The story holds us accountable.  Do we have eyes to see?

In a Christmas pageant, we see the story through the fresh eyes of joy and delight in the children performing the various roles, but we’re also reminded to remember the story itself.  It is a message of profound love, that comes in meekness and humility, that suffers innocently and without retaliation, that pours out everything in the name of love, not just for the unlovely, but for its enemies.  It is a story of radical grace, love, and inclusion.  It invites us in.  It reminds us of who we truly are.  It empowers us to live our lives in such a way.

Which is why our hearts spring to life when we see the pure joy in the hearts of our kids at Christmas.  We remember.  We see not just with the eyes of our mind but the eyes of the heart.  We rediscover the story.

The Magi, the Star, and the Wonders of Astrophysics

“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”  Einstein…maybe

 “People who do not believe in miracles never experience miracles.”  Richard Rohr

One of the most interesting facts about the advent story is that practically everyone missed it.  The scribes, kings, Pharisees, religious leaders; none of them had any idea what had just taken place that Christmas night.  Mary and Joseph enter Bethlehem in disgrace, shamed and shunned by both family and faith.  Shepherds, unworthy of being counted in the census, are the ones that the angels sing to.  It is the pagan magi from the east that discover the star, read the signs, and make the long journey to bear gifts for the newborn king.

The only ones who receive the good news are the ones who have forfeited their rights to it.  They no longer fit in the inner circles.  They are sitting on the outside.  The outer ring turns out to be God’s inner circle.

Not that the message of peace on earth had an exclusive audience.  Everyone just happened to be too busy or they were looking in the wrong places.  The assumption was that any new truth or revelation would be even more orthodox, even more secure, even more validating of their current beliefs, not less.  They were looking for revelation to match their existing categories, not redefine them.

Comfort and certainty have a way of narrowing us.  They can blind us to receiving new revelation.  We stop seeing.  We become myopic.  We stop searching.  We lose that childlike wonder.

Which is why God writes stories like these.  They are intentionally subversive, disruptive, and even deconstructive.  All our assumptions are turned on their head.  Because this is the only way we learn anything new.  Suddenly we’re paying attention again.

I just read a statement from Richard Rohr where he writes, “There are basically two paths that allow people to have a genuinely new experience: the path of wonder and the path of suffering.”

Now, I know what you’re thinking…I’ll take wonder, please.  Me too.  But this is easier said than done.  Wonder must be willing to be proven wrong, open to being converted, to compromise or being corrected.  Too often our pursuit of our “faith” is really just seeking after the answers that make us “right.”  We stop exploring.  We stop questioning.  We settle in and stop seeking.  But when we do, we stop seeing, noticing, discovering.

I think that if the Messiah came to earth today, it would be the physicists that find him first.  I say this because this is where I hear the most wonder being spoken today.  It isn’t even what is being said, as much as how it is being said.  It is the physicists that are searching, carefully, and even cautiously, and are discovering elegance, beauty and mystery.

Look at this for example from the renowned theoretical physicists, Frank Wilczek,

“Paradoxically, there’s a word to describe beauty that can’t be described in words—‘ineffable.’  Having experienced the ineffable beauty of Maxwell’s equations, one would be disappointed if they were wrong.  As Einstein said in a similar context, when asked his general theory of relativity might be proved wrong, ‘Then I would feel sorry for the good Lord.’”

Don’t you love that?  Maybe you don’t, but I sure do. These brilliant scientific minds have discovered something so beautiful that they can’t put it into words, elegance that leaves them breathless, speechless.  Something that holds even our spiritual beliefs accountable.  If our beliefs aren’t big enough to contain the cosmos, then so much for our beliefs.

Often we see science as the enemy of faith, but I think this is nonsense.  Certainly it can be misused in such a way, like any tool.  But when our faith causes us to put up blinders, to cling to our small stories and see ideas and forward thinking as necessarily harmful, we cost ourselves not just our intellectual credibility.  We lose out on the wonder of new discovery, of expanding beauty, of the kingdom of heaven growing from that mustard seed into a massive and expanding tree in which the birds take rest.

When we cut ourselves off from the wonder, we do more than stop growing. We wither.  Our faith becomes dulled, threatened, too small.  When the wonder goes, so goes the revelation, and with it, our joy.

In classical philosophy there are three transcendentals or properties of being.  Three absolutes that all men long for and long for absolutely.  They are truth, goodness, and beauty.  We are drawn to truth by its goodness, and we are drawn to goodness by its beauty.

One of my favorite scientists turned philosopher was Michael Polanyi.  Polanyi believed that the inspiration of the artist and the scientist were one and the same.  His friend and peer, Einstein, concurred.

Truth seekers are artists.  They aren’t afraid of ideas or questions.  Like the magi, they will follow the stars.  Because this wonder, this childlike faith can be trusted.  It yields the right kind of fruit.  It is beautiful.

Why do I say all this?  Because it is at this time of year, the season of advent, where we let this story of the coming of the Messiah continue to do its work.  To disrupt us.  To overturn the tables of our complacency and comfortability, and to see again with new eyes.  What we see is a story of such beauty and simplicity, where the very nature of God’s heart is revealed.  The Truth comes in meekness.  It empties itself and doesn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped.  It humbles itself by becoming obedient, even to the point of death on a cross.

The beauty of this story speaks for itself.  What we must do is let this beautiful story change our own hearts.  We can sit in this story and let the mystery do its work. Chesterton said, “The world will never starve for want of wonders, only want of wonder.”

This third week of advent, this week of joy, may our eyes be opened to the wonder of the world and the cosmos around us.  May the story of the incarnation work its mystery in our own hearts, and may our lives reveal the beauty of the goodness of the Truth, the miracle of Emmanuel, God with us.  Amen.

The Costliness of Peace

“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”  Blaise Pascal

It is the second week of advent and this week’s theme is on Peace.

I’m struggling for a good definition of peace.  Most of the places I’ve looked define peace by what it’s not.  It is the absence of conflict, the freedom from disturbance, a lack of worry or contention, or the cessation of war. A peaceful environment is one free from threats or the things that trigger our anxieties.  If we’re safe, secure, and in control we’re at peace.

Except that we aren’t.  At least I’m not.

I’d like to think that the external things that threaten my peace are like germs and if I can sterilize my environment from disturbances, then my heart will be calm.  If I could just remove the irritants, I’d go back to my normal place of rest.  If my kids would just do their homework without needing constant reminders, I would be able to relax and not stress.  If the guy not letting me merge in on PCH would just be cool, I wouldn’t have to mumble bad words under my breath.  If the guy that just paddled into my wave hadn’t dropped in on me, I’d be having the best surf session of my life.  And on and on.

If only this was true.  But it isn’t. The worry and fear isn’t out there.  It’s in here.  And it goes deep.

Often it is in moments of quiet that I become aware of just how troubled the waters of my soul truly are.  My natural state of rest is anything but restful.  It is uneasy.  It is insecure.  It longs for distraction, for diversion.  Anything will do…endless Instagram scrolling, bored Facebook meandering.  Videos of cats and cucumbers.

Pascal writes this about diversion.  He says,

“What people want is not the easy peaceful life that allows us to think of our unhappy condition, nor the dangers of war, nor the burdens of office, but the agitation that takes our mind off it and diverts us.  That is why we prefer the hunt to the capture.”

That last line is so convicting.  It isn’t the prize we’re after, it is the thought of the prize.  Most of us know by now that the new thing we’re saving to buy won’t deliver the satisfaction we hope for, but we’ll keep playing that game.  Why?  Because it is what we like.  Even if the process is broken.  Even if it is hopeless.  Any time those piercing thoughts pass by we pull out our phones.  We pull out our credit cards.  Peace is just one purchase away.

Of course, it isn’t actually.  We already know this.  But the hunt is often enough to divert our attention away from this reality.  Diversion is just another form of self-medication.

True peace is costly.  It is painful.  It requires us pressing further into the anxiety.  It requires an uncomfortable amount of vulnerability. It is humbling, even humiliating.  We are letting light shine into our closets and exposing the shadow sides of ourselves.  The road to peace is anything but peaceful.

Merton says that what we find, when we remain in this honest place without diversion, is “the one truth that can help us solve our ethical and political problems: that we are all more or less wrong, that we are all at fault, all limited and obstructed by our mixed motives, our self-deception, our greed, our self-righteousness and our tendency to aggressivity and hypocrisy.”

It reminds me of that story about G.K. Chesterton being asked the question by the London Times, “What is wrong with the world?”  Chesterton’s response: “I am.”

This is the birthplace of peace.  It begins with the painful dying of the ego and the humiliating admission of our own insufficiency.  We can’t do it alone.  This is the beginning of hope.

Because as our hands open in helplessness, we realize that the God of peace is always already there. Richard Rohr writes, “This doesn’t take a lot of thinking.  It doesn’t take a lot of theology.  It doesn’t take a lot of education.  It doesn’t even take a lot of morality.  You just have to walk and breathe and receive and give, and –voila!- you’re in the flow.”

This is one of the most beautiful reminders of advent.  Emmanuel means God with us.  As Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” (John 14:27)

The key is not in us avoiding conflict, nor is it us detaching from pain, but moving through it with humility and accepting the gift of peace that has already been given.  If it sounds too simple, I would just say, give it a try.

This sort of peace can’t be hoarded.  When we accept this peace, we realize that all those around us are equally as deserving.  We are empowered to forgive by the forgiveness we’ve received.  We extend mercy because we’ve been shown mercy.

Merton writes, “If we can love the men we cannot trust (without trusting them foolishly) and if we can to some extent share the burden of their sin by identifying ourselves with them, then perhaps there is some hope of a kind of peace on earth, based not on the wisdom and the manipulations of men but on the inscrutable mercy of God.”

Amen to that!

My prayer for this week is that we would allow the light of God’s truth to illuminate our hearts, and that, in this place of humility, we would accept the tremendous gift of God’s love and mercy, and allow the peace of God to fill us and flow through us to a world in such desperate need.

Hope in the Tension

The advent season has officially begun.  Advent, in Latin, means coming, and at Christmas time we celebrate the reality that we live in the space between the first and second advent.   We celebrate the coming of the divine to earth in the birth of Jesus, and we look forward with anticipation for the coming day when all things will be made new.

The advent season is a place of tension.  It is a liminal space.  Our hearts are lifted with joy at the remembrance of Christ’s birth, death and resurrection, and yet they groan with the weight of suffering and pain that continues in our world today.

It is in this place of tension that the true depth and reality of our hope are seen and felt.  Christ comes not with sentimental assurances and easy answers.  He comes with the kind of love that seeks after the broken hearted, that extends grace to one’s enemies, that endures hardship and enters into the sufferings of others.

This kind of love requires a gaze that is fixed ahead of itself.  Dallas Willard defines hope as the joyous anticipation of the good.  This is how Christ endured the cross…it was the joy set before him.  The joy of a world set right and intimacy with mankind restored.  This reality is what allows us to enter in to the brokenness and mess of our world without avoiding the pain.  Our hope is fixed on what lies beyond.  The difficulties, in light of eternity, become light and momentary.

Our hope is fixed on the second advent.  As C.S. Lewis writes,

“Hope is one of the Theological virtues. This means that a continual looking forward to the eternal world is not (as some modern people think) a form of escapism or wishful thinking, but one of the things a Christian is meant to do. It does not mean that we are to leave the present world as it is. If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next. The Apostles themselves, who set on foot the conversion of the Roman Empire, the great men who built up the Middle Ages, the English Evangelicals who abolished the Slave Trade, all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth “thrown in”: aim at earth and you will get neither.”

To live in this middle place, between advents, is to experience the kingdom of heaven on earth.  It isn’t simply remembering, nor anticipating, but being caught up in this moment of God with us.  Jesus continues to enter in to our broken hearts, and through the joy of that reality, extend hope to a world that is in such need.

As Meister Eckart wrote,

“What good is it that Christ was born 2,000 years ago if he is not born now in your heart?”

” Lord, we do far too much celebrating your actual coming. I believe in God, but do I believe in God-in-me? I believe in God in heaven, but do I believe in God-on-earth? I believe in God out there, but do I believe in God-with-us?”

“Lord, be born in my heart. Come alive in me this Christmas! Amen.”