Life is not a Game of Perfect

I played golf today. As usually happens, my play was erratic. I played from the tips, the tees farthest back from the hole, which significantly increased the difficulty of the holes. The front nine was rough; faced with challenging shots and lengthier approaches to the green, I played decently but not well.

The second nine was a different story. I shot 2 over par, a great score for me.

C. S. Lewis, in his book The Screwtape Letters, refers to the Law of Undulation. Everything has peaks and troughs, high points and low points. It is a fact of life that sometimes you’re up, and sometimes you’re down. Boethius called it the wheel of fortune, where the downtrodden can rise and the privileged can tumble.

Golf is a game of undulation. In the span of a single hole, you can hit a terrific shot, followed by a terrible shot, followed by a great shot. Or any permutation thereof. What’s great about golf, and here is where the game parallels life in general and Christianity in particular, is that there’s always another shot. If you botch a hole good and proper, the next hole offers a chance at redemption. Conversely, if you do well, you can build on that and string together a good round, as I did on the back nine.

I sinned pretty badly today. I won’t bore you with details, but it’s nothing new and it depressed me. Not so much that I sinned; that’s old hat by now. But rather that I failed to live the life of Christ in me. I believe that I am cleansed from all sin, that I have the capacity to live a sinless life in me (if, that is, I allow the Spirit to live His life in me), so when I sin it means that I failed to do that, the most fundamental principle of Christianity. It’s sad. I feel like God would be disappointed in me, that one of these times He’ll turn in disgust and write me off as a wasted investment. This is definitely a valley.

Golf requires an even keel. You can’t let the good shots take you too high, or else the bad shots will shatter you completely. You can’t let the bad shots take you too low, or else even good shots won’t counteract that loss of confidence. Enjoy the good shots and forget the bad shots, realizing that we all make bad shots, even pros. The pros just do it less frequently and their bad shots aren’t as detrimental as ours; plus, they have the ability to recover from bad shots easier and better than us. That’s what makes them pros. Simultaneously, and this may seem contradictory, it helps to feel confident and positive every time you stand over a shot. When putting, the only thought that should be in your head is, I’m going to make this. If you’re thinking about how you’re probably going to miss the putt, how you are terrible at these putts, then the likelihood of you making that putt isn’t great to begin with. But if you believe that you will make the putt, if you don’t allow doubt to creep in, you’ll perform better, strike the ball with a more confident stroke, and make more putts. I’ve tried this, and it works. Expect success and success is more likely, if not sure, to follow. 

I think I set myself up for failure whenever I take my spiritual eyes off Jesus. Because He is my confidence. When it comes to living the Christian life, there’s no doubt whatsoever as to not only the best (and only) method of doing so, but also that it will happen if I put the method into practice. So when I approach a situation or a temptation that I struggle with, I can either rely on my own sinful patterns, which is akin to thinking about how horribly I handle these situations, how I always miss these three foot putts; or I can believe that I will handle the situation because I don’t have to handle the situation. I know the putt’s going in; I know that Jesus can handle the situation. Moreover, He promised that He would.  

And yet I still sin. Some worse than others, at least in how they make me feel. All are equally abhorrent in God’s eyes. I am keenly aware of the disgusting nature of sin, and so sin has a devastating effect. Like an errant tee shot, it can set up a chain reaction that ruins the whole day, or week. Heck, it can even have lifelong ramifications! Even saints redeemed by the blood of Jesus, declared to be the righteousness of God, united with the Living Spirit, can suffer under a spirit of condemnation and depression. The troughs look so dire and deep that we despair of ever coming out. So the first principle is to recognize the isolated nature of sin. It happened. Turn to God, renounce your fleshly desires, and cover yourself with His righteousness which is ever available. Don’t let the bad wrap chains around you and prolong your spiral. Remember, every shot is a brand new opportunity, and we get numerous shots per day. 

At this point you might be thinking, that’s all well and good but it’s hardly the things Jesus referenced during his stint on earth, the “life and that life more abundant” he promised, that “it is for freedom that you have been set free.” Sin, repent, repeat. What is this, the old covenant? Are we doomed to continually struggle with sin? To always fail and shuffle to the throne of Grace in need of a fresh cleansing? Doesn’t sound very appealing to me. Well, here’s where the second principle comes into play. If you believe that you’re doomed to sin, like being doomed to miss those six foot putts or mishit the 7-iron because you always do, then what are you more likely to do? Miss the putts! Sin! 

And similarly, just as you are more likely to make the putts or put a good stroke on the ball with that pesky driver if you feel confidence and tell yourself positive things, you will find that when a temptation or trial crops up you can overcome it if you trust in the indwelling Spirit of God to handle that situation, to reject and resist that temptation, to speak words of life and encouragement instead of worldly words. Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Or Romans 6: 1-14. Tell yourself that Christ lives in you, that He provides the holiness, the strength, the self-control, the patience, or whatever attribute and virtue you require for the situation in which you find yourself. And the putts will start to sink.

Holmes Sweet Holmes

I’ve just watched the first episode of the BBC series Sherlock, a modern reimagination of the classic detective stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I’m hooked.

First, the dialogue is fantastic. Say what you will about the British, but they can write dialogue that far surpasses 80% of stuff you find across the pond. At one point, in reference to being a sounding board for Holmes, Watson remarks, “So I’m replacing a skull.” “Oh, don’t worry, you’re doing fine,” Holmes replies. I was in stitches. Why are the British so good at writing witty remarks that just roll off the tongue? If I had to hazard a guess (and by gum I do; it’s my blog), I’d reference the stereotype of the stoic repressed nature of Brits, who find it necessary to express themselves with words rather than facial expressions and wild gesticulations, the way Americans tend to. When Anthony Hopkins loses his temper and barks, it’s much more impactful given the quiet and controlled nature of the characters he invariably depicts. Contrast that with the likes of Tom Cruise or Al Pacino, who seem incapable of conveying great depths of emotion and intensity without raising their voices a few hundred decibels or so. When everything’s exaggerated and loud, the occasional outburst packs much less of a dramatic punch. So in lieu of relying on very expressive body language and vocal modulations, the British convey their inner thoughts through words. How droll.

Quite apart from the actual storyline, which was brilliant and literally had me on the edge of my seat, I find myself irresistibly drawn to Sherlock Holmes and his faithful cohort Dr. John Watson. I’ve read the stories many times; in fact, I once wrote a paper for an Agriculture class using a Sherlock Holmes story as the illustration, so deep were the tales permeating my psyche. I’ve seen several film adaptations; my favorite, of course, being the spoof Without  A Clue with Michael Caine and Sir Ben Kingsley, which cleverly inverts the classic tale by portraying Holmes as a stumblebum drunk womanizer incapable of the slightest deduction, and Watson as the longsuffering criminologist who endures Holmes due to public demand. I thoroughly enjoyed the recent film Sherlock Holmes with Robert Downy Jr. as the detective, and Jude Law as Watson; the film portrayed Holmes as a borderline autistic savant full of bohemian frivolity and Watson as the straight-backed foil who cannot resist the thrill of the hunt.

Perhaps the best recent adaptation of the original stories’ dynamic is found in the medical show House, in which the title character is a brilliant yet caustic doctor who diagnoses mysterious diseases that have baffled every other medical mind. Wilson is his only friend and acts as the counter to House’s misanthropy, providing that all-important banter. After seven seasons, the show has evolved away from the original concept of a new medical mystery each week to focus more on the interpersonal relationships that revolve around the center character and his team of doctors who work with him. A medical drama, it has nonetheless provided me with more hilarity than any comedy this side of Seinfeld or Arrested Development, as House levels his sarcasm and bile at ordinary people and their quirks.

This show promises (dare I say) to surpass even the transcendence of House, if the pilot is any indication. It helps that it’s being written by Brits (he is, after all, an Englishman originally), and transpires in the original context of solving crimes in the bustling metropolis of London. Holmes is once again a manic-depressive social recluse who mocks the police and pierces through the ordinary to notice the seemingly mundane yet essential details that lead to the mystery’s unraveling. And Watson is a war veteran who craves something out of the ordinary, seeking adventure and the unusual. The actors acquit themselves excellently, delivering dialogue and action with distinction and realism. I could rave on, but you really should see for yourself.

What prompted this entry, however, is something that I’ve recognized in my tastes for a while now: some really good banter. My favorite scenes in House are when House and someone (usually Wilson) are going at it hammer and tongs. Another of my favorite movies is Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, a somewhat recent movie with the aforementioned Downy and Val Kilmer, two men trying to solve a mystery that falls into the pulp noire genre. They bicker and discuss the ins and outs of the case, among other things, with great relish; Downy thrives with biting exchanges, as seen in his own take on Holmes. Other examples include Lethal Weapon, written by the same screenwriter as KK,BB. Even The Princess Bride features some smashing good banter, as well as other of Bill Goldman’s movies like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid or Maverick. It’s the wordsmith in me that delights in a great comeback or a clever turn of the phrase. Heck, to complete my anglophile profile, I admit that my most beloved passages of the Harry Potter series are when Ron and Hermione are going back and forth; Ron in particular has some riotous one-liners that are sadly lacking from the film adaptations.

One theme that resonates with me deeply is the notion of a loner, misunderstood and despised by most, who finds a companion who can understand him or at least appreciate him (or her, I suppose, though I can’t think off-hand of female characters that fit this bill). Holmes has perennially been such a one, the genius at deduction and observation impatient with those who fail to see and grasp the revelations hidden within minutiae. Most of us have come across such a one sometime in our lives; a person who offers a different perspective on life than virtually everyone else, and who consequently suffers because of it. One of my favorite moments on House occurs when a prolific musician confronts House, noting that most people don’t have that “one thing” that elevates their hearts and minds to great heights, at the cost of being “normal” and enjoying the everyday elements of life. The very thing that distinguishes them from the masses isolates them from the masses; they cannot participate in life as we do. So when they can find someone who will put up with or appreciate their genius, it makes it that much sweeter than if they had lots of friends and raised a pint at the local pub regularly. When you don’t have very much of something, you appreciate what little you do have more than if you enjoyed bounty in that area.

I am no genius, but I am abnormal. (And don’t start on that vein of “what is normal?”; I know it’s mostly a social construct, but the reality is that the vast majority of people in a society behave in similar ways). I have always fancied, during bouts of self-pity, that I am actually in a worse state than those tortured geniuses who produce greatness at a high price, since I don’t even have the consolation of being a great artist or athlete or arithmetician to go along with my loneliness. I just find it difficult to make friends, to find people who appreciate me. Which means that when I do, I tend to be overeager to spend time with them, like a thirsty man in the desert gulping water at the first oasis he happens upon. The Lord has been working on that with me, and I am leagues beyond where I was 8 years ago in this area, but it’s still a struggle not to call up my few friends on a daily basis to hang out with them. Man is a social beast; one of the first conclusions God drew from His observation of Adam was that it wasn’t good from him to be on his own. We need companionship; not just in the physical sense, but even more so the friendships, the relationships that are built not upon common need and desire, but upon common interest and enthusiasm. (I merely repeat what C. S. Lewis posited in The Four Loves, but we all mostly repeat Jack when we discuss a practical truth about humans).

It is, in essence, the greatest testament of genuine affection found on earth, the true friend. For a lover, spouse, parent, or child all love and are loved with ulterior motives. The lover craves physical satisfaction, the experience of ecstasy and affection for themselves as well as the beloved. The spouse wants the same, as well as companionship and stability, a fellow traveler on the road of life and a helper in domestic matters. The parent and child are two sides of the same coin; the parent loves the child, but also takes solace in the continuation of the human race and the satisfaction of creation from their offspring. The child appreciates parents for providing affection and protection during early childhood, as well as guidance and counsel throughout their lives. There is no disinterested affection in life, save the Friend.

The Friend does not appreciate you for anything you can provide to them. I am referring to the ideal of a Friend, as Plato would have it. If two people are friends because one has money or access to luxuries and the other appreciates that access, then they are not true Friends; their friendship is contingent. An ideal Friend does not care what the other person has to offer, but rather that the other person is willing to offer it to them. I enjoy golf, and when I was friends with Johnny Vines, it didn’t matter what golf course we played at or whether he paid for my round or I for his; we enjoyed each other’s company and the common interest that united our hearts and minds. Gloriously, we shared many common interests, and as our friendship deepened, it expanded to encompass these other things. But I wasn’t friends with him because he had cable TV, which I would take advantage of; were that the case, we would not have been true friends.

If you have never had a true Friend who asks nothing from you and from whom you hope to gain nothing, then you are truly missing out. For a friend like that will truly stick closer than a brother; brothers and sisters, after all, are accidents of birth. We don’t choose our family; we do choose our friends, and our friends choose us.

And by the way, what a Friend we have in Jesus.

Friday Night at Ruby Tuesdays

It’s amazing how God drops something or someone in your life when you’re least expecting it. My good friend Nathan Boen and I decided to hang out last Friday. We played some pool, got some food, meandered around looking for someplace to sit and talk. Eventually we wandered into a Ruby Tuesday’s after 9, ordering a dessert and chatting. The waitress was an older woman, mid to late forties I’d guess, and cheerful in the manner and facade that waitresses are supposed to maintain whether or not they actually were; we would learn that her manner was not a façade.

After we’d received the check, the place almost empty, the waitress, Michelle, came up and we engaged her in polite chitchat. Instantly she revealed that she’d recently returned from living two years in Mexico. Intrigued, we pressed for details. Here is what she told us:

(I have organized the narrative in a somewhat clearer fashion. And let me just bewail up front the fact that no matter how impressed or awed or impacted you are by this story, the fact that you didn’t hear it from her leaves so much to be desired. I’ll explain later.)

Her husband was in a car accident several years ago. A drunk driver, uninsured, hit him on New Year’s Eve. As a result he was paralyzed and his face was completely destroyed. After a quarter million dollars in surgery bills, he was stable and apparently returned to Mexico, his homeland, where the cost of health care is sufficiently cheaper that it was possible to afford continuing his rehabilitation and reconstruction. After working here for six month and sending money down there, Michelle packed up her things and moved down to be with him and help nurse him back to health.

(Aside: as she recounted his injuries, she batted not an eyelash, maintaining her poise and upbeat demeanor the entire time. This was every bit as impressive as the account itself, in my book.)

She regaled us with stories of life in Mexico. For example, she loathes the smell and taste of beans anymore, since at least 2 of 3 meals featured this staple. Simply put, they were affordable and not much else was. She told of the increasingly remote and tiny villages she passed through until she came to her husband’s family’s residence, far from the metropolitan centers of Mexico. The houses had no running water, and people generally survived on 100 pesos a week; about 8 American dollars. She hauled water from wells and rode burros to town and her other jobs. She trained and raced horses, a lucrative job comparatively, but still worked in the fields. The days were long and hard. 

She recounted the extreme stratification between the rich drug lords and the poor serfs subsisting on pennies a day while the rich luxuriated in mansions. If a drug lord told you that you were on their payroll, you accepted or you didn’t survive. Which made her story of standing up to a drug lord that much more impressive. She bluffed him, challenging his willingness to kill an American citizen and thus incur the wrath of an international incident. Apparently the obvious retort, that her body could be buried in the desert and never found, never occurred to the gangster, and though her heart was pounding, her face was calm and hard and she politely declined to work for him. This in addition to the story about the job she quit after three of her bosses were murdered. I think she said that they were killed in front of her, but I might have that wrong. The police were no help; corruption runs rampant in Mexico. She told an amusing story about a race day when she came upon a pile of cocaine in a common area. She was aghast, but the others there assured her there was nothing amiss. However, when someone pulled out some marijuana to smoke, everyone urgently and immediately ordered him to conceal it. It seems that the only people allowed to grow and distribute marijuana are the police, and if you don’t buy it from them, they’ll lock you up for a good long while!

Her husband, meanwhile, had surgery to repair some 48 fractures on his spine, and had his face entirely reconstructed using cartilage and bone from his hips and buttocks. Once paralyzed, he can now walk and talk, lift 25 lbs and ride a horse. He lost some language ability, especially English, and Michelle, who didn’t speak a lick of Spanish when she moved to Mexico, had to learn in order to communicate.

Eventually she came to the realization that if she stayed in Mexico, she would end up dead; in a chauvinistic society where men are killed willy-nilly, a blond foreign woman was in real danger. She was too radical and refused to play along with the powerful, so she decided that she would return to Kansas City. She journeyed to the border, bullied the border guards to let her across instead of spending the night in Tijuana alone and penniless (almost certainly a fatal move), and entered the US with a couple bucks in her pocket. Somehow she made it to Kansas City with basically no money, and within twenty-four hours had contacted her old boss and scored some work with horses, called in a favor with a friend to stay with, and landed a job at Ruby Tuesday’s, even though they weren’t hiring and she didn’t have any waitressing experience, a prerequisite to work there. This is not a woman to be denied or discouraged.

(Aside: she said several times how much she changed from her sojourn in Mexico. She was harder and stronger and more capable than she ever imagined, because she had to be in Mexico or else she would have been dead and her husband soon to follow. She was profoundly thankful for the experience in that way, as well as many others.)

Now, the friend with whom she’d been staying had told her that her favorite horse had died, and that her car had been stolen while she was in Mexico. She had no cause to doubt her friend, and accepted this as true. A few days ago, another friend called her about a horse he’d found that he wanted her to have. She could keep it or sell it for a down payment on her truck, he said, and urged her to come look at it. The horse was in a wretched state, starved and diseased, gelded but wild. She decided to sell it and took it to a dealer. As she was unloading it, she and the horse made eye contact. Instantly she thought, I’ve owned this horse before. This was unlikely, as the man had found it in Oklahoma, bedraggled and apparently even more emaciated than when she saw him. A friend who was accompanying her advised her to sell it, and the dealer offered her $300, but she insisted that she knew this horse and took it home, whereupon she discovered, after examining it, that it was the horse she had been told had died. This made her suspicious and she checked the story about the stolen car, to see whether a police report had been filed. None. She called another friend and asked about it; he replied that her friend had enlisted his help in selling the car.  

(Aside: at this point I am mesmerized and astounded. Again, she’s not brooding or angry, or filled with self-pity and despair. The recitation of events is lively and chipper. Though there was a bit of an edge at this point in the story. Little wonder.)

Upon hearing this, she returned to the house, packed her things and demanded her rent back, which she had recently paid. The pernicious two-face took one look at her and reimbursed her. She calmly told her friend that if she ever saw the other walking down the street, it would be better to cross to the other side of the road. Two years in Mexico had put a glint in her eye apparently, and the friend meekly promised so to do. This was the day before we walked into the restaurant. 

Boen and I looked at each other in amazement. Mostly we’d been silent, listening to this remarkable tale. You might wonder at its veracity, but I myself have absolutely no doubt as to the truth of what she said. She did give credit to God, though I rather felt like her conception of God was a bit karmic: if she keeps her end of a bargain, He’ll keep His (which He did in healing her husband). 

There were other elements to the story, like the notion of working three jobs, which she does here in KC, and how the work ethic of most Americans, and nearly all teenagers, is pathetically abysmal compared to that of the people she saw in Mexico. Indeed, it made her understand why immigrants here work as hard as they do; they can actually make money here to send home to their families. She showed us the calluses on her hands and the cords in her arms that came from backbreaking work in the fields and constant toil with the horses, frequently doing the work of a whole team of ferriers herself. She remarked on the incredible bounty that we have here in the United States, and how we take it so much for granted. She commented on the reverence the people have for Holy Week, Good Friday, and Easter, which are celebrated as religious observances and not as egg hunts.

But I’m less interested in that than the amazing saga she recounted, the hardships and trials she and her family endured (her husband’s father is a paraplegic, and his mother has lung cancer). The determination and will she demonstrated was remarkable; early on in the story, when we’d only heard about a third of it, I commented that it was more inspiring than 80% of the stories that come out of Hollywood. In fact, I’d recommended to Boen the novel Peace Like a River by Leif Enger earlier that evening, and afterwards I mentioned that the book also tells of a family’s trials and triumphs; it is one of the best and most moving books I’ve ever read. I also said that Michelle’s tale was more incredible! And true!

We thanked her profoundly and invited her to attend church on Sunday. Typically, she replied that she works twelve hours on Sundays. Go figure. We were effusive in our praise and thankfulness, and left the place marveling to each other about what we had just experienced. Hitherto it had been a relatively uneventful evening of wandering around, enjoying each other’s company, but nothing special, nothing spectacular. This, now, this was spectacular.

What does it mean? you ask. God knows. Ask Him; I know I will. If nothing else it reminded me of my trip to Nigeria, where I experienced some of the same events and emotions and witnessed similar things from impoverished people with joy in their hearts and fellowship with their neighbors. Will the Lord use it to teach me anything, or direct my life? I know not. As I sit and muse on this, I’m convinced that it might have just been a rainbow. By this I mean it was a gift from the Father to be enjoyed and appreciated and marveled at, nothing more. I tend to over-analyze things, look for meanings or applications too often; somehow, I think this was mainly God sharing His life and stories of His work with us.

Does this mean I can’t take anything away from it? By no means! First, I am awed by the provision of God. I’ve seen this in my own life, but hearing about Michelle’s saga made me realize how insignificant my own struggles have actually been in comparison. I’ve been slogging away at my new job, studying dry financial concepts and feeling woebegone, when probably 2 billion people around the world will never have the opportunity to work and live such a life that the income from that job will afford. How much I take for granted! And Michelle said that about herself! Working 3 jobs, caring for a disabled husband (by the way, I haven’t even thought about the depths of love and dedication she must have to go through what she did for her husband!), and she still thinks she’s taking things for granted! Amazing!

Second, I am struck by the fact that God works in so many more varied ways than we think He does. We think He has to work through us, through Christians, through Christians who believe and live the way we do. If I sat down and talked with Michelle, I’d probably find that her theological concepts of God and salvation and sanctification and the Christian life would be different from mine, and I could probably correct her by referencing the Bible and C. S. Lewis and so on. And you know what? God is not impressed. He wants us to have right notions about Him, true, but He also doesn’t want us to limit what He can do by what we disregard as impossible. “Not that God couldn’t do it, but that He wouldn’t do it that way.” Because we know God! We’ve read the Bible and commentaries and go to church and listen to sermons! And if it’s not covered by one of those mediums, then by Golly it’s not possible that God would do something that way! It all comes back to Humility. Will we allow God to work out things His way? Accept what He does how He does it when He does it where He does it and why He does it? I don’t think that’s too deep a thought to ponder. It’s actually essential. Everything else hinges upon it, doesn’t it? 

Mainly, however, what I marvel at is the utter coincidence, the complete inability to dictate events. We’d gone to a bookstore and an ice cream shoppe looking for someplace to sit and talk. If we’d stayed at either place, we would have missed out on this woman’s amazing and inspiring story. But God wanted to share it with us, and He guided us there, to be at that place, at that time when the joint was empty enough that she could stand and talk for 20 minutes without ignoring customers, and to have that particular waitress serving us and willing to share these deeply personal stories with us. I could never have orchestrated it, nor even imagined it. Indeed, Boen and I wished we could have her speak at New Day or at our small group. We suggested that we might take the group here one evening and have her recount the narrative for everyone in it. But the spontenaity would not be there, and the divine appointment element would be missing. It would still probably be fruitful, but it’s so much more meaningful when you know that only the Lord could have orchestrated circumstances. May you have such appointments.

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow!

Praise Him, all creatures here below!

Praise Him, above you Heavenly Host!

Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!

Amen.

Who Will Save Us? Part II

To see my discussion of the documentary Waiting for "Superman" click here. 

I began with the quote which bemoans the fact that "no one was coming with enough power to save me," given by one of the leading education reformers in the country. And by "leading" I don't mean on Capitol Hill; I mean someone who runs a school in Harlem and has effected actual and meaningful improvement. I've discussed the idea behind this quote as it pertains to the question of educational reform, which was the original context in which it occurred. But the quote really struck a deeper chord in me, an eternal chord.

The documentary ended with a clip from the old Superman TV series in which Superman, played by George Reeves, rescues a school bus full of children from going over a cliff. "The children are safe," declared the Man of Steel before flying off. Superman has always held a special place in my heart. As a comic book nut I love heroes like Batman, Spiderman, the Green Lantern, the Hulk, and even the Flash. Batman in particular is compelling because unlike most of the other heroes, he has no special powers. He's a billionaire, true, with marvelous gadgets and martial arts abilities, but he's not bullet-proof, doesn't have a ring of power or a spider bite from a radioactive spider. He's an ordinary man doing extraordinary things, one reason why he's so popular these days. It seems to offend us when the hero is too strong; we want to see him struggle, to wonder how he's going to pull out the victory.

And Superman is the most powerful being on earth, impervious to anything and everything except Kryptonite. No matter the challenge, no matter the threat, it's hard for us to imagine someone who can fly, lift entire buildings, go faster than bullets, and withstand nuclear blasts, not prevailing eventually. Superman is also irresistibly good, well-mannered, considerate, and humble. He's perfect. And perfection is boring.

Until, however, the earth is threatened by a stray meteor or a giant robot. Then, of course, he's our only hope, our greatest hero. Because he's the only one with the power, the knowledge, and the will to save us. Batman would be willing to save us, and since he's the world's greatest detective he's probably got the brainpower for it. But the power? He's just a man. Spiderman has some power; he can lift cars and punch through brick walls. But enough power to stop a meteor?

The correlation between Christ and Superman has been well-documented throughout the years since the rise of comic book heroes. The latest cinematic adaptation of Superman was positively dripping with allusions to Jesus. Take this line for instance, spoken to Kal-El by his father: "Even though you were raised as a human you are not one of them. They can be a great people if they choose to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason, above all, I have sent you to them, my only son." Pretty glaring, isn't it? And from Hollywood too! I was flabbergasted when I saw that, even more so that it was dialogue recorded 25 years earlier from the first Superman film.

This is Holy Week. Today is Thursday, the day of the week when Christ was crucified. (I know, tradition holds that he was crucified on Friday; however, Matthew 12:40 suggests that Jesus spent 3 days and nights in the tomb, which would mean he was crucified on Thursday if he rose again on Sunday.) Regardless, it is at this time of year that we celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, a process by which Christians believe they are saved. Jesus is the Savior of the world, paying the blood price for humanity's sins to reconcile them to God.

Every human born of a man and a woman is born in sin. We aren't sinners because we sin; rather, we sin because we are sinners. Our sins and sinful nature separate us from God and consequently the spiritual life that is only to be found in Him. The wages of sin is death, which means we are born spiritually dead. And since God is perfectly holy and righteous, unable to tolerate sin, we as sinners cannot please Him or share His life. This is our plight. This is why we need a savior.

Thus we find ourselves in the same condition earlier discussed. We need someone who has the power, knowledge, and desire to save us. We believe that God sent His Son, born of a virgin which bypasses the sinful nature which natural birth leads to. He was perfect from birth, which gave him the power and ability to die for the sins of all, instead of for his own sins. He knew that salvation for humanity could only be accomplished if a sinless man laid down his life on the altar of God for the sins of the world. Not only that, he knew that if someone put their faith in his sacrifice, God would forgive their sins and declare them righteousness, joining their spirit with His and restoring them to life. So he had the power and the knowledge to save us. Which brings us to the greatest thing of all.

Christians are rather hung up on the love of God. The majority of praise and worship songs make some allusion to the vast and gracious love God demonstrated to us through His Son Jesus. Even more than His holiness, righteousness, omnipotence, and eternal nature, we dwell on the grace, mercy, and patience of God, all of which are manifestations of His love. For this reason; since God is perfection, holiness, righteousness, He cannot stand sin. It is anathema to Him. And the idea that He would be so bent on saving humanity that He would sacrifice His one and only Son is so mind boggling that we can only weep for joy and gratitude. Because He loves us! He wants us! He desires to spend eternity with us! With me!

If there was ever someone who could legitimately turn away in disgust, to throw up his hands and say, "They're a write off," and scrap the whole thing, God had that right when He saw how perfidious and persistent mankind is on defying Him. Not only did He not give up on us, however, but He and His Son, who shared His deity, agreed that Jesus would put off His deity and throne, and condescend to be a human, to humble himself even to the point of being killed on a cross, paying for the very sins that ended his life. And what's more, God raised Jesus from the dead and beckoned to humans to share his death and resurrection, that they might share his life, the life of God.

We see, therefore, that in Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection the power, knowledge, and will of a Savior was joined in a glorious symphony. There are many more elements of the Passion of Jesus Christ that could be discussed, but for this week, this celebration, the basics are too glorious to be fully comprehended.

How great a salvation!

Who Will Save Us?

I recently watched a documentary about the public school crisis in the United States. Called Waiting for "Superman", it was a very excellent documentary that detailed the crippling problems that confront our country, the root causes (some of them, anyway), and a few possible solutions. At the beginning of the documentary, one of the revolutionaries of the reform movement said this: "One of the saddest days of my life was when my mother told me "Superman" did not exist. Cause even in the depths of the ghetto you just thought he was coming...She thought I was crying because it's like Santa Claus is not real. I was crying because no one was coming with enough power to save us."

That line jumped out at me. "No one was coming with enough power to save us." When you're in desperate straights, when everything seems to be falling apart, when the odds are overwhelmingly against you, you need salvation. And the savior has to have three qualities: he has to want to save you; he has to know how to save you; and he has to have enough strength to save you.

The comic book industry has always captivated the hearts and minds of people. The concept of someone who has all three necessary requirements of a savior resonates strongly with us. Which is odd, because not many of us find ourselves trapped in a stricken airplane that's plummeting toward earth, or threatened by a giant mutated insect, or captured by an evil mastermind armed with laser guns and a fortress riddled with traps. I daresay that none of us have ever been confronted with evil masterminds or giant insects, and air travel is statistically the safest form of travel; rationally it would make more sense to pray for salvation from other drivers than from a downed aircraft.

In other situations the need for a savior is much more relevant. I enjoy the television series House a great deal, mostly because of the dialogue and Hugh Laurie's portrayal of the brilliant doctor with the acerbic wit. But the patients on the show are in need of a savior; a disease strikes and House must solve the mystery before time runs out. It's a comic book disguised as a medical drama. However, even if the show exaggerates certain diseases for the sake of effect, there are countless real medical ailments that plague mankind. Cancer is the big gun, the Lex Luthor of the medical world, although even viruses like the common cold have no cure. People cry out for saviors from the sickness they face, another reason why medical shows are so popular. We get to see the diseases beaten more often than not; we get to see doctors save people. It's hardwired in us.

And then there are more amorphous issues that we need saving from. Things that can't be directly confronted or dealt with. Things like climate change, religious hostility, political adversaries, unemployment, illegal immigration. Things that people argue about, that they come up with good reasons for or against, where there is no agreed, objective standard of measurement. We may all agree that unemployment is a bad thing, but how to rectify the solution, well, that's a hotbed of dispute, with many sides shouting their own views are the best and only salvation. Then there are the issues that we don't even agree upon the problem. Climate change? That's a terrific imbroglio. Illegal immigration? Oil exploration? Global conflicts? How can we be saved when we don't even know if we need to be saved, let alone the form of that salvation?

Which brings me back to the original excuse for this article: education. Another issue similar to unemployment. Tests scores put us near the bottom of developed countries in academic achievement. Dropout rates are staggering, and those who do muddle through public schools are rarely prepared for college, let alone the high end jobs that are on the rise as technology continues to advance. For more information about this, watch the documentary. But how to change the situation is where the road trails off into a morass of political posturing and turf wars. And the victims are the children.

The document follows five different children all struggling in schools, and all submit their names into lotteries to be admitted into better schools: prep schools, charter schools, boarding schools. Not all of them get in. It's heartbreaking to see the despair on their faces, and on the faces of their parents, who fight and scrape and bend themselves into pretzels so their kids can get a decent education. I was moved to tears by the end of the documentary. My soul was crying out, "Who can save these kids? How can the problems be fixed?" And by the way, there are millions more just like them, suffering through poor education and destined to failure. Most don't even care that much about education, for numerous reasons, but a big one is that they've never seen it done well. If education was fun and effective, even those who aren't naturally inclined toward it would be much more open to it. These kids need salvation.

Who can save them? Not their parents, by and large. Their parents are low to middle income, without the resources and power to enroll them in private schools where effective teachers are unleashed and well-compensated to be excellent. Politicians? How many billions, perhaps trillions, have we spent on public policy? The doc covers this well, outlining the US presidents all promising change and salvation. Democrat or Republican, it makes no difference: all have failed. State and local governments have fared little better. They may have the power, but they haven't the foggiest notion of how to save education.

Teachers' unions? If anyone would have both the power and the knowledge to rescue education it would have to be them, right? Maybe, but they seem to be more the roadblock to any legitimate and fundamental change, as the doc makes abundantly clear. As incredible as it sounds, they lack the will or desire to save salvation, preferring to guard their own territory and cater to their members and to the politicians with whom they have cozy relationships. This is perhaps the worst revelation from the doc, the appalling hypocrisy of the AFT and the NEA who claim to be solely dedicated to fighting for education but when real reform is proffered lambaste the legislation and prevent their members from even voting on it.

Who's left? Teachers. Some of whom are legitimately competent and care about their jobs, but far too many of whom are unmotivated and unwilling to push themselves to reach their students. Tenure in public schools is the main cause of this, as the doc delves into.

By now you should have a sense of the enormity of the problem facing the United States. And while the doc does outline a few solutions and potential avenues of reform that might reverse the trend, the obstacles are significant. Which brings me back once again to that quote, that idea: Who has the power to save the children?

Pivot Point

What a week it’s been. Eventful and seismic, yet strangely disconnected. Let me explain.

Last Sunday, after church, my car broke down. This led to my good uncle graciously assisting me in diagnosing the problem (dead battery) and locating a remedy (Wal-Mart), resulting in a two hour wait while the car was being fixed. After two hours, I swiped my debit card, only to discover that I had no money with which to pay for the repairs. I was forced to call my dear friend Walker, who came and not only paid the bill, but also gave me a wad of cash to help meet my needs. 

As I watched him and his wife drive off, I was overcome with emotion. Have you ever felt like vomiting your feelings? Like you need to upchuck, but it is your heart that feels fit to burst, not your stomach? It’s difficult to describe. Needless to say, I required a moment to gather myself before I could be trusted on the road. 

Now, at this time, I had had two interviews for jobs the prior week, one at a company called ScriptPro, and another at JP Morgan. The ScriptPro job sounded much more appealing and I rather liked the feel of the place, seemingly relaxed and comfortable. The job itself required travel and instructing people on the use of a machine that dispensed pills for pharmacies. The JP Morgan position was less appealing, frankly; the pay was slightly less than the other job, at least from what I could gather, and the atmosphere was very formal and professional, strict and straight-laced, an environment I have never relished. I’m sure you can all see where this is going. JP Morgan offered me the job, and ScriptPro didn’t. By Wednesday I had accepted the job. 

Let’s back up a moment. I mentioned that I discovered that I was significantly in debt. Significantly, that is, as it pertains to me, not as it pertains to the national average. But a debt of over $450 when I had sporadic and ancillary pay from my teaching gig, in addition to the bills I already struggled to pay, plus the fact that my next paycheck from teaching wouldn’t come for another 3 weeks, was quite the pickle. Additionally, I hadn’t had a full time job in almost 3 years, so my track record of steady income was rather stale by this point. The interviews had gone well; ScriptPro had invited me for a follow up and I was optimistic, but I’d had several interviews that I thought had gone well and no dice. I wasn’t elevating my hopes too high. 

Strangely enough, however, on Monday morning I was serene and sanguine. When my parents called and offered to restore my account to solvency, I demurred the necessity. I truly felt no urgency or panic, even if they hadn’t gone ahead and done so. I believe that the moment of catharsis after Walker’s intervention had purged all the worry and grief from my system, at least for the moment. When the Lord provides for you like He did with Walker and my parents, it’s hard to bite your nails in anxiety. 

So within the span of 3 days, I’d gone from penniless and in debt, with a broken down car and insufficient funds to pay my bills, to having my financial needs met, and a job that will pay me more than I have ever made. 

I posted the following on my small group’s Facebook page: “Hardship is more interesting than prosperity.” It’s funny how God works things out. If I hadn’t broken down, I would not have realized the financial hole I was in, I wouldn’t have needed to be bailed out, and I wouldn’t have seen the provision of the Lord through Walker and my parents, which led to my moment of catharsis and subsequent tranquility. Am I cured of all anxiety and worry? Probably not. Am I going to panic less the next time? Absolutely. 

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When JP Morgan offered me the job, I didn’t immediately take it. I held out hope that ScriptPro would hire me, since I was more inclined and interested in working there. I told JP Morgan I would let them know by the deadline and then contacted ScriptPro to see if I had a shot. The next morning they turned me down. I told the Lord that if ScriptPro said No I would understand that His will was to work at JP Morgan, even if I didn’t want to. So I accepted the job as a discipline from the Lord. 

You see, I bought the notion that Rush Limbaugh, among others, has always touted: Find what you love to do, what you would do for free, and figure out how to get paid for it. That way you’ll never “work” again. In other words, if you discover your passion in life, from a vocational standpoint, you can get up every morning eager to go to work without viewing it as the drudgery of a regular job. That made a great deal of sense to me and I set out to both discover my passion and see if I could make it profitable. 

Well, easier said than done. I have lots of interests, like reading, writing, golf, movies, theological pondering, teaching, etc. However, I couldn’t and didn’t make that particularly profitable; other than the part time teaching, I couldn’t make any of that into a job. I’d disdained the standard office job, staring at computers all day, preferring a diverse environment and varied stimuli in my work. So I view this job at JP Morgan to be a sacrifice of my own desires and preferences, a kind of self-death. I know not how long Jesus wants me at JP Morgan; perhaps only for a year, or six months. But He opened up the door, after years of pleading on my end, and I would be both foolish and ungrateful to refuse it simply because it wasn’t exactly what I wanted. 

Am I going to stop looking for that passion, that thing that I can enthusiastically do for the next forty years of my life? By no means. But I am going to subjugate my desires to the Father’s will, to go where He sends me, stay where He puts me, and give what He gives me.

Priorities

My brother Caleb and I were sitting in church after having prayed for each other and with each other. And I think we were both a bit dazed at the emotions and fervor that swept over us as we clasped our heads together and interceded for one another; I know I was. And as is the want of humans when they have experienced a great and precious thing, that should reduce them to holy, reverent silence, I began to babble. It was truly like I'd had my eyes closed for hours or days on end, only to open them and be confronted with dizzying and brilliant colors; to see, as it were, the world again in a whole new way. 

So there I sat, my mind swimming with all that Jesus had said to me and through me, His embrace that Caleb got to act as His bit of body to give to me. And I began to marvel at the sheer joy and life that we as believers are now a part of, and have access to if we would only let go and abandon ourselves to His Spirit. I was amazed at the total bankruptcy of life without God, and how the world hadn't just killed itself in sheer despair and hopelessness. Caleb mused on his co-workers and their preoccupation with the details of this world, TV, movies, etc. when something so much better is literally a sentence away. And to say that sharing the life of Christ is so much better than the things of this world is such a infinite understatement that I can barely write the words. But you know what I mean (I hope).

I jumped in and drew the analogy to Plato's Allegory of the Cave, in which men are chained in a deep, dark underground chamber, chained hand and foot with their heads rendered immovable. They watch shadows on the wall in front of them, since other men are acting out scenes with puppets in front of a fire behind them. And the story is of the one man's release from his captivity, his discovery that the shadows aren't real, his discovery that the men playing with puppets aren't real, his ascension up to the top of the cave and out into the real world, and experiencing what is most real in this world. He'd seen a representation of a tree, but never the real thing. He'd heard tales of the sun, but never been blinded by its radiance. And the tale ends with him descending into the gloom to try to free his fellow captives. They, however, refuse to believe his stories of "real" trees and lakes and the sun, preferring their comfortable imprisonment. And that is what people in this world are like, prisoners who watch shadows of puppets on the wall and imagine that it's real. We are to be the fellow captives now free imploring them to come up into reality, the life of Christ.

And what's really sad is if those who have gone up and experienced reality come back down and get caught up in shadow puppets. All too often I find myself preoccupied with the things of this world instead of the things of Heaven, and sit back and argue with the other prisoners about the scene being acted out on the wall. It's ludicrous. And silly. And tragic. And far too prevalent in the modern Church.

But hearing about an African village in Swaziland, where the number of people with AIDS is 40% of the entire population, where women are sexually assaulted more often than not, where a pastor has to live on $100 a month and have his parishioners donate to him, and where a Canadian entrepreneur and believer began to rehabilitate a mining village and together with his team are beating back the forces of hunger, despair, death, witchcraft, and poverty, puts my recent woes of finding a job into a little more perspective. Which is ultimately more important: my inability to find a job that pays me what I think I need to subsist in the richest country on earth, or that a woman with no health care, no medicine, and severe pain and ailments in her leg gets healed and screams her praise and thankfulness to High Heaven while running laps down the aisle?

Thank you, Jesus, for the gentle humbling. May I never forget.

Cross Road

I feel like something’s going to happen soon. In my life. I’ve just about nailed the final nail into the coffin of my dream of higher education, which was always my backup plan, to be broken in case of emergency. It never seriously occurred to me that all my applications would be denied, but now that it’s happened I feel like I can finally lay it down. 

In a bizarre twist (or at least bizarre in any sense other than an omniscient, omnipotent God guiding my life), I had two separate confirmations of this feeling. My uncle came and worked on the basement of my house with me this week, the same day my top two choices rejected me. We had a long lunch and discussed the crossroads of life at which we both find ourselves, and he regaled me with tales of his own discovery of the passion of his life. Not God; that is his life, not his passion. His passion for Christian education came out of left field, and only after he had been rejected similarly from his ambitions, holy though he thought them to be. But it happened during his twenty-ninth year, the same age I am.

On Sunday, the pastor’s wife gave the message and talked about a crossroads in her life when she finally reached the point where she could say honestly, “Not my will but Yours be done” to the Father. It changed the trajectory of her life, and allowed God to give her the passion that would drive her forward into deeper walks with Him. She was around thirty years old.

This is significant because I’ve always struggled with my passion. I said the other day to a friend of mine who works as a software developer that I envied his knowledge of what he was, who he was. That is, what his job, his career, his vocation on earth is. Because that’s part of what defines us. We certainly must look first to our walk with the Lord for our sense of identity, but practically speaking we all must do something. And those who know what they were meant to do gain in that knowledge a sense of who they are. My uncle claimed to be a Christian school administrator: “I’m a leader! That’s who I am!” His gifts and talents are tied into his identity, and when God runs the show, He can harmonize everything into a beautiful symphony through which He can impact this world. 

That’s what this is all about. I don’t know who I am. In relation to this world, that is. I know I’m God’s son, His bondslave, His precious one. The desire of His heart, as wonderfully frightening as that is. But who I am on earth, what I was meant for…I’m still working on that. I don’t know. And once you know that, once that surety has rooted itself in your heart, you can pursue that wholeheartedly. 

Wholeheartedly. It’s a word thrown around without much meditation. To do something, to be something with your whole heart. That’s what appeals to me about characters like William Wallace in Braveheart. Nothing, but nothing was more important that his mission: to free Scotland from the evil English. Freedom from tyranny is an admirable goal, and the things humans can accomplish when they pursue something wholeheartedly can be remarkable. But imagine how much greater if our human nature was in tune with God’s will! The possibilities are literally endless, and we as humans can participate in God’s will while doing something that pops us out of bed each morning wildly enthusiastic about the day. 

It must begin with God, however. As Brenda said, I must come to the place where I let go and let God, give up and give in. And once the last school rejects me, that’s where I’m at. I looked in the mirror and said, “Well, God, I’m out of ideas.” Which was mostly true; I have ideas but they are pipe dreams, like being a professional golfer. But ideas, plans that I can produce on my own? Nope. I’ve failed at most things I’ve done in my life, and mostly because I’ve done them, not Him.

So God, help me. I’m ready to give up and give in. I’ve been saying this for a while now, ever since I discovered Ian Thomas’ sermons, but this affair with the doctorate programs was kind of my final crutch, and it’s been kicked away. I’m ready. I pray.