Conflicting Idea

Here's another way communication technology is hindering communication — it makes it easier for us to demonize our opponents.


This week I have had disagreements with political opponents and with my homeowners association. Neither disagreement happened in person. Neither included a handshake or a cup of coffee. And both have led to significant stress and tension. I just can't help but think that those discussions would have gone better if I could have sat down with the other party and looked them in the eye. It's easy to deny requests, suspect motives, and even call names when there's no relational impact to those actions, when you don't have to face the person you're insulting. Facebook, email, telephones, even postal mail are all poor forums for conflict.

So are passing lanes. I know a young man who lost his sight and almost lost his life because of the road rage of someone he had never met. Would that angry driver have shot someone who cut in line at Starbucks instead of on an exit ramp? Probably not. Like communications media, cars make us anonymous and therefore more easily "othered".

Maybe Jesus had it right when he said, “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you."

Resting

I love this description of Sabbath so I'm going to write it again: Sabbath is a reminder that we are human. Psalm 121:4 says that God never sleeps. But we do. We have to. Have you ever known anyone who never slept? I have. They were called architecture majors. They weren't human. But for the rest of us, we have to rest. Every night we get this reminder that we aren't God. And once a week we need to purposefully rest.

That's harder than it sounds. The age-old temptation — the one that tempted Eve in the garden — is to pretend that we are God, to behave like we don't have those limitations. So we work seven days a week. We work nights. We refuse to be quiet. We think, "I'll just get through this busy time and then take a break" while we ingrain the habit of ignoring our nature and God's design.

Sabbath is a discipline that saves us from that. Sabbath is codified humility.

What about you? Are you practicing sane rhythms or work and rest?

Underground, Overcrowded

My friend Shawn Small is a master traveler. He's so savvy, in fact, other people pay him to help them travel well. Last week, a shortened version of my most feeble travel story appeared on his blog. If you want insightful thoughts on God, travel and culture, you should follow Shawn. If you want an extended laugh at a travel novice, read on.

Some lessons are best learned in solitude. Some are best learned through failure. And some come most clearly while stranded in a dark subway tunnel under Paris. 

When Christine and I were 25 — still acting like kids and newlyweds — we made our first visit to Europe. We had a friend, Selena, doing graduate work at the University of Liverpool and we decided that was as good an excuse as any to visit the UK. Selena was also friends with Christine's sister Ellen, so we decided to take her along. Of the many mistakes that colored this trip, that was among the biggest. Do not go to Europe with your sister-in-law; I don't care how nice she is. You will find yourself watching other couples stroll romantic cobblestone streets in the City of Light while you eat at Chili's and carry extra bags. 

The second mistake we made on this trip was to overbook it. We should have been content with Liverpool and London. Instead, we crammed in Scotland and Paris. I would have traded all of the latter for more of the former, but it's the latter that taught me the lesson of this story.

A third mistake (the list of mistakes could go on for pages but I'll stop at three for now) was that none of us spoke French. Christine's French was the best among us but it was still shaky. We were staking our travel on the language skills of a 25-year-old who, when worried about making a flight on time, asked a cabbie, "How many minutes does the airport have?" 

On the penultimate day of our trip, a Sunday, Christine, Ellen and I awoke in the center of Paris, two blocks from the Champs-Elysees. Thirty-six hours later, we were supposed to be resting on our own beds. Between Sunday morning and Monday afternoon, we were scheduled to catch a subway train out of city center to a station named Laplace, transfer to an airport shuttle in the suburbs (we weren't flying from de Gaulle, of course, because we were 25 and trying to pinch every penny possible), catch a flight to London, ride a bus back to Liverpool where we could stay with Selena for free, and get up early for our low-fare-no-refund flight back to the states. If any of those transportation dominoes failed to fall in line, we would be stranded in Europe. Stranded in Europe with your vivacious young wife isn't a bad prospect. Stranded in Europe with your wife and her sister is completely different. 

Ellen has severe allergies and asthma, so Paris was hard on her. Our Sunday had an ominous beginning when she threw up in a subway concourse and had to explain it to police. We hadn't even touched the first domino in our journey home when we found ourselves huddled around a garbage can in an empty subway corridor, patting Ellen on the back and hoping not to be delayed too long. Just then, three men in fatigues and berets walked around the corner. Two of them were carrying assault rifles. I still don't know if they were police, military, or terrorists but they seemed to think we were a threat to public safety, or just Americans which, I came to believe, were synonyms to most Parisians. They asked us, "Is there a problem here?" We did our best to make them understand that we were only sick and weary travelers, a communication that failed until Christine, our language expert, used the universal sound and sign language for vomit, at which point they retreated. We managed to buy train tickets and hop aboard just in time. We were headed home. 

The streets and subway in Paris are largely vacant early on Sunday mornings. There was little conversation as our train clattered through its tunnel. Ellen was still feeling sick and the rocking of the train didn't help. There were only two other people on the train with us. At one stop, two stations ahead of Laplace, the doors opened, a voice made an announcement in French which we did not understand, both of our fellow travelers got off, and the train sped away again. It seemed like every other stop along the line. But then our train halted. Suddenly. Unexpectedly. In the tunnel. In the dark. Not at a platform. Turns out, that announcement we didn't understand was explaining that we had reached the end of the line for shortened Sunday service. Our train and its conductor were ending their shifts and we were stranded somewhere under Paris contemplating the very real possibility of hiking through dark subway tunnels in search of escape. Ellen barfed again. 

Apparently, thanks to previous traveling American idiots like us, or due to admirable French foresight, there is a rule in place for Parisian train conductors that they have to sweep their train for stowaways before they park it for good. We were in the last car and, eventually, the conductor found us, fidgeting and worrying next to our puddle of American vomit. He was unhappy. We got a tongue-lashing that I'm certain would have been offensive if we knew what he was saying, and eventually understood from him that we should not exit the train and walk aimlessly through the tunnels under Paris. We should stay put. He would take us back to the last stop. 

That was a help but not as much help as we needed. We were still two stops away from our transfer point at Laplace and time was ticking. In a mad rush, we read time tables to find another route to Laplace, dashed up and down stairs to the designated platform, jumped aboard, and hoped that this line, too, wasn't shortened for Sunday service. This was the long way — it would require an extra transfer — but we were back on our way to Laplace, and to Texas.

Our train was now above ground and we were happy to see the warm, golden hue of sunlight splashed against the graffiti-ridden sound walls that lined our new route. We made several stops, inching closer to Laplace and hoping to fell all the dominoes just in time. And that's when Christine's French kicked in again. We stopped at a station called Maison Lafitte. An announcement came on and Christine shot up from her chair. With a look of terror in her eyes she gasped, "He said…he said…it's-a-no-good!" Then she grabbed her bag and bounded off the train.

Christine had recognized an important word in the announcement; something that sounded like "terminus". Her communique, "It's-a-no-good!" was meant to convey that we had to get off the train or risk another delay and another tongue-lashing from an angry conductor. Ellen and I didn't interpret as quickly as we should have. We did our best to follow Christine's lead but Ellen was groggy from nausea and I was carrying my bags as well as hers. By the time we gathered ourselves and moved toward the exit, the doors were closing. There was a moment, forever seared in my memory, when I lunged my luggage-laden hands toward the doors, seeing my young wife on the platform outside, still with terror in her eyes, mouthing the word, "Noooooo!" 

Too late. The train was moving, leaving Christine behind. Through the windows, I managed to send her one final message. I pointed to the platform and shouted, "Stay here!" 

Ellen and I sped away toward the "terminus" which, this time, was an enormous train yard above ground. We knew the drill. The train stopped. The conductor ambled aft. We stood in the doorway of our car, rather proud this time to know our way around "terminus" and not to have soiled his train with the waning contents of Ellen's stomach. We had the pleasure of meeting two conductors this time — one ending his shift and another beginning his. The two stood on the ground next to the train and spoke in angry tones while making animated gestures toward us. Then they shook hands, said good-bye, and the new conductor mounted his train and drove us back to town. 

On the ride back in, Ellen and I did some math. We expected to get back to Maison Lafitte just four minutes before another train that could still deliver us to Laplace in time to catch the shuttle in time to catch our flight to London. From here on out, we needed everything to go right or all was lost. I gave something of a pep-talk, encouraging Ellen to fight through her nausea. 

We arrived at Maison Lafitte and saw Christine across the station. Now that we were in-bound, our train was on a different set of tracks, one removed from the platform where we left Christine. To get to her, we had to race up stairs, across a street, and back down to ground level. We had no time to spare. We shot up the steps and raced to the turnstile that guarded the steps down to Christine. This particular turnstile wasn't just the people-counter version you cross to get on roller coasters. It was a fortified gate built into a chain link fence. I slid my paper train pass into the automated turnstile, and it popped back out at me. The gate stayed closed. I tried again. Nothing. Ellen tried. Same result. Then it occurred to me that our tickets wouldn't work at Maison Lafitte because we were never supposed to catch a train here. Just then I looked down the tracks to see our train chugging into view. I grabbed Ellen's bag and threw it over the fence. I shouted, "Climb!" and started to hoist my sister-in-law over a chain-link fence in an effort to trespass on French mass transit. 

It didn't work. Ellen couldn't make the climb and I realized we were too late anyway. We watched the train pull to a stop and load several passengers who would have preferred to stay and watch the desperate American sideshow. Christine came to the turnstile, eyes red with tears, grabbed the bag I had thrown over the fence, and exited the Parisian train system for the last time, defeated. 

We had one final course of action and we took it. There was a cab stand outside Maison Lafitte and, even though we were far from the airport, we asked a cabbie if he could get us there in time for our flight. He saw it as both a challenge and an opportunity. I am certain of two things about that cab ride: we did not pay the standard fare, and we got to the airport in time. Thirty-five hours later, we were home. 

There are a lot of lessons to be learned from my experience in Paris. Probably the most obvious is this: Don't go to Paris. They speak another language there. Also, sister-in-law-vomit isn't charming even in the most romantic city in the world.

But the more subtle and more personal lesson for me had to do with my heritage. I grew up in a rural Texas town of 1,200 people. I like to visit cities and I can make a living in suburbs, but I am most deeply at home in locales where people are sparse. A week before the debacle at Maison Lafitte, Christine and I had enjoyed a lovely, relaxing overnight in Fort William, Scotland. We met some locals who did us a favor. We explored a highland walk dotted with sheep. We sampled haggis. It was quaint and pastoral with no drama and no angry train conductors. I'm not sure that the difference between our Scottish and French experiences can be attributed entirely to language (some of the brogue spoken is Scotland was as hard to understand as French). In France I realized my fluency in a language whose alphabet is solitude and whose grammar is neighborliness. In the immortal words of John Denver, "I'm just a country boy." It took being stranded in the Paris underground to learn that. 

SportsCenter Losing Center

SportsCenter has jumped the shark. I hate to say that; SC has been a part of my life since high school when it looked like this:

SportsCenter was a groundbreaking program then and has continued to be the worldwide leader in sports journalism for more than 30 years. These days, my SC viewing is less frequent than it used to be, but I still tune in regularly to keep up-to-date with Stuart Scott's wardrobe and the latest SC anchor catch phrases (Yahtzee!) But my two most recent virtual visits to Bristol left me disappointed, not at the quality of the prose or presentation (I still love to hear Scott Van Pelt intone "useful"), but with shifting SC journalistic standards. I think SportsCenter is failing in two areas: hard work and fairness.

Work Ethic

I tuned in SC one weekday morning several days ago expecting to see an hour's worth of game recaps, highlights, trend stories and maybe some colorful commentary from irate sports figures. Instead, I watched at least 15 solid minutes of Robert Griffin III stretching at Redskins OTAs. Stretching! While I watched RGIII touch his toes, I listened to a team of "experts" talk about the physical, mental and relational aspects of his return to action which is expected to happen in August. I was watching in May.

I realize the NFL is the biggest of big sports and that RGIII's injury is a big story on a big stage, but I couldn't help but wonder, "Weren't there any baseball games last night? Aren't NBA and NHL playoffs going on? Wasn't there tennis or cycling or curling or cheese-wheel-chasing to discuss? And even if there aren't game stories, wouldn't this be a good time to unveil some stellar reporting from some of the best and highest-paid sports journalists on the planet? Instead of any of those options, SC is giving way to Pundits-On-Parade and I think the reason is simple: it's easier. It's much cheaper and faster to bring an "expert" in studio and let him blather on for five minutes over B-roll of stretching exercises than it is to send a reporter into the field to conduct interviews, research information, gather quotes, look for themes, and dig out real stories. I think we're seeing ESPN's journalism getting soft.

Fair Play

And now SportsCenter is choosing sides. One of the most important and nuanced responsibilities of any news outlet is gatekeeping. Fair and balanced reporting isn't just about how stories are reported, it's about which stories are reported. The second discouraging experience I had with SportsCenter happened yesterday when I watched a six-minute segment in which SC anchor Hannah Storm interviewed Baltimore Ravens linebacker Brandon Ayanbadejo about his political views. The news peg for this interview was that Ayanbadejo and his teammates visited the White House this week to be congratulated by the president on their Super Bowl victory. It's a time-honored tradition and a worthy news story. I broke down the interview topics below:

• Ravens visit to the White House - one question, 30 seconds
• Ravens receiving Super Bowl rings - one question, 15 seconds
• Ayanbadejo's career - one question, 45 seconds 
• Gay rights - six questions, four minutes

In fairness, I will point out that this turn of events may have caught my attention because I happen to disagree with Ayanbadejo. I like to think that I would see the bias in SC's approach even if I agreed with the agenda they were promoting, but I will acknowledge that I'm human and less prone to cry "foul" when the foul supports my position.

But my beef with SC isn't which political agenda they are pushing, it's that they are pushing one at all. By any journalistic standard, this was ideological gatekeeping. Here's why: Google "Ravens visit White House" and eight of the top nine results will be about the team's starting center. Matt Birk declined the White House invitation as an act of protest against the administration's support of state-funded abortion. That's news. When a prominent sports figure (the starting center for the Super Bowl champion team certainly qualifies) declines an invitation to the White House as an act of civil resistance, it's worth covering. Every major news outlet in the country agreed. They all covered Birk's absence: CBS Sports, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Times, Yahoo! Sports, Baltimore Sun, USA Today, MSN, Sporting News, and dozens more. But in an hour-long program whose purpose is to cover the major sports news of the day, ESPN couldn't find the time.

And this wasn't an accident. There was a conversation somewhere in the Bristol newsroom to highlight the gay marriage issue instead of the abortion issue. How do I know? Because those are exactly the conversations that happen in every newsroom. It's what newsrooms are for. To suggest that such a conversation never happened is to suggest that SportsCenter producers are completely inept. There are two scenarios here: In the first, ESPN hadn't heard about the Birk boycott, or didn't grasp its news peg that every other major news outlet acknowledged. In this scenario, SC journalists are just bad at their jobs. The second scenario is that they had the conversation and decided to ignore the Birk story and replace it with manufactured news - a four-minute segment about a political position completely unrelated to any news peg. In this scenario, SC journalists are putting their own politics ahead of the news. As the old saying goes, "never let the facts get in the way of a good story."

Of course, this isn't new. For years now, news organizations across the country have been fleeing the fair-and-balanced center in a race to political extremes. It's nearly impossible to find journalists making an honest effort at balanced coverage whether they work at Fox News, CNN, major networks, or - sadly now - the worldwide leader in sports.

I'll still watch SportsCenter occasionally. I like to watch the Top 10 and roll my eyes at Steven A. Smith. But I'm afraid the Halcyon Days of Bob Ley and balanced reporting are fading like Joe Theismann's memory. If they can just get Jon Anderson on waterskis, SportsCenter might actually jump the shark soon. For now, I guess we'll have to tune in to Wipeout for that.

Following Fairness

In 2006, writer A.J. Jacobs endeavored to spend a year following every rule he could find in the Bible. Yes, even the Old Testament rules about sacrificing pigeons and stoning adulterers. He wrote a book about his experience called The Year of Living Biblically. My friend Julie gave it to me and said, "You have to read this." So I am.

I'm only a third of the way through but I can already recommend this book. It's clever, funny, thoughtful, and honest. Jacobs is an unbeliever from a Jewish family and he approaches his project with no little skepticism and misunderstanding of religious traditions. I find myself reading about his experiences in month three of his experiment and hoping desperately that he'll see the truth of the gospel by month twelve. I have even considered praying for such an outcome, but then I get bogged down in mental back-and-forth about praying for something in the past and God being outside of time and yadda yadda. It's hard to keep from skipping ahead. But the thing I like most about Jacobs and his book isn't his appreciation or affirmation of my beliefs. It's his fairness.

When he's not writing books about self-imposed herculean projects (his first book was about his experience of reading the entire Encyclopedia Britannica) Jacobs writes for Esquire magazine. He's a journalist, even if his current employer is as much a purveyor of entertainment as reporting. His treatment of the biblical texts shows that he's capable of appreciating and presenting disparate beliefs without espousing them. He can think critically without criticizing. He can suspend judgement long enough to research an opposing viewpoint; in this case, an entire year.

It's refreshing and rare to find that quality in today's media. And it's ironic, I think, to find qualities in a writer for a lifestyle magazine that are often lacking in reporters attending "hard news" beats.

But this isn't an article about journalism. A.J. Jacobs isn't just an anomaly in his field, but in his culture. We seem to be losing our ability to weigh arguments objectively.

Donald Miller wrote about this recently.

A few little buttons on the internet have created an entire new way of seeing the world...These days, you can opt in or opt out, agree or disagree, be a follower or an unfollower, a friend or foe. But what gets lost is something dramatic: nuanced thought. We are no longer able to separate the baby from the bathwater. If I write a blog that has one point people disagree with, they unfollow, they are against. It seems in our rush to create tribes, we’ve created exactly that, tribes. But sadly, we’ve created tribes at war with each other.

I think this dynamic was at play in the recent testimony of a Planned Parenthood spokesperson against a proposed Florida statute that would require health care for any infant delivered as the result of a botched abortion. I do not believe that Planned Parenthood is an evil army of Satan bent on killing newborns. But I suspect that Planned Parenthood is an organization so defined by opposition (we will oppose anything proposed by pro-life organizations) that they are willing to literally throw babies out with bathwater. Ask any Planned Parenthood staffer whether it should be legal to kill Americans without a trial and they'll likely say no. Ask them whether they oppose a bill supported by pro-lifers to that effect and they're much more likely to say yes.

The difference is about tribes, and what's missing is fairness.

But before we start to feel too "holier-than-thou" about Planned Parenthood, maybe we Christians should take a look at our own fairness. Do we engage in knee-jerk opposition to anyone not affiliated with our tribe? Do we believe they're not trustworthy if they're not Christian? evangelical? conservative? pro-life? pro-gun? Are we willing to grant that those with whom we disagree can make valid, even strong, arguments? Are we willing to suspend our judgement long enough to explore issues from their worldview? And to do so long enough and with an open mind rather than just as an exercise in rooting out the weakest links in their position? Are Christians known for walking a mile in others' shoes the way A.J. Jacobs did in 2006?

Too often we reflect the culture of the "unfollow generation" when we value tribe over truth.

Sears, Roebuck and King David

My dad hates Sears. I don't remember why. He once got a bad product or bad service there and now he refuses to shop there. I do remember the first time he told me that, though. I'm pretty sure his exact words were, "We don't shop at Sears," as if this was a family dictum passed down from father to son since the days of Roebuck. If I asked him about it now, he probably wouldn't remember his vendetta against Sears, but it made an impression on me years ago.

I remembered the Sanders / Sears Feud this morning when I read King David's dying words to his son Solomon in 1 Kings 2. In just of 12 verses, as David feels the pull of eternity and struggles to deliver one last admonition to his beloved son and heir, the Great King of Israel, the man after God's own heart leaves Solomon with two important tasks:

• Kill Joab.
• Kill Shimei.

Seriously, that's it. Verse 1 says, "When the time drew near for David to die, he gave a charge to Solomon his son." Then he tells him who to bump off. I had to double-check to see if I was reading out of the Martin Scorsese-edited version (The Freakin' Message). Suddenly, I pictured David with an Italian accent and Solomon in a double breasted suit and fedora.

"Hey, Sol. Come over here. I got a job for ya. I got two wise guys I need yous to whack."

There are probably lessons here about Machiavellian power struggles or just getting bitter in our old age, but the question I landed on had to do with Sears. While I was patting myself on the back, ("At least my family isn't that bad") I wondered, "What vendettas am I leaving to my son?" What subtle messages am I sending? We don't associate with those people. We don't behave like those people. We make fun of these other people.

Mind you, I don't think that's all bad. I don't think it's immoral for me to inherit my dad's disdain for Sears. I'm sure my son will inherit some of my biases as well as some of my good qualities. I just want to be careful. I just want to be aware of which family feuds I'm fueling.

"See how these people oppress others and violate human rights? We don't approve of that, son."
"See how these people celebrate sin? That's a shame, son."
"See how these people wear saggy pants? They are evil and stupid, son."

It may be harder than we think to edit our parenting messages and deliver them clearly. Somewhere between my dad and king David, there's a balance to strike. I hope I'm finding the right center point.

What about you? What biases did your parents pass on to you—good or bad? What vendettas are you passing on to your kids?

Painkillers

My life has been focused on pain recently. Pain pills. Pain management. Pain reporting. I had surgery a week ago that left me with a healthy amount of pain. A significant portion of my waking hours is dedicated to preventing, avoiding, chronicling and treating that pain. And although the pain medication keeps my thoughts in a bit of a knot, here are some things I've been able to tease out of the experience.

Pain Consumes. It eats up everything around it. When you're in pain, the pain becomes the most important thing in your world. Pain is always urgent. It demands your attention. And in doing so, it consumes hopes, comforting thoughts, relational connections, and faith. I know many great heroes of our faith have encountered God most intimately in their suffering, but I seem to find only one thing in pain — a desire to escape pain. Pain makes it hard to plan ahead, to enjoy beauty, or to listen or empathize with others. Pain is the ultimate trigger for selfishness.

Pain Gets Lonely. It wants to spread. It longs to be shared with others. When we hurt, something in us longs for someone else to recognize our hurting. I don't know if this is primarily about our selfishness or about our deep need for connection, but I think we all instinctively understand that enduring pain alone is pitiful. That's why pastors make hospital visits. It's an act of compassion and sacrifice to expose yourself to someone else's pain.

If Treated, Pain Is Temporary. My pain is an effect of my treatment. Actually, my ailment (papillary thyroid carcinoma) didn't cause any pain at all; it's the treatment that brought me pain. But my pain is temporary. Eventually, the wound will heal and I'll be better off for having endured the pain. In other cases, the ailment causes pain and the treatment relieves it. It occurs to me that the only pain that endures is pain that is ignored. Pain that's being treated (assuming a treatment exists) or pain caused by treatment are temporary. They are hopeful. Pain that is ignored continues to hurt precisely because of its hopelessness.

You may not know anyone recovering from surgery, but these pain points are worth noting anyway. The pain I'm dealing with is physical, but these axioms apply to all pain — emotional, relational, psychological, physical. If there are people in your life, your family, or your workplace who seem to always be focused on themselves, who complain a lot, or who have a nagging negativity that won't go away, it's likely because of pain in their lives. People in pain are hard to deal with (just ask my wife!) The question is: how can we help relieve, share and treat their pain? How can you, as an ambassador of Jesus, help people experience pain in heathy, hopeful ways?

The Church of Cultural Interpreters

I recently heard journalist Cathleen Falsani speak. Penning under the nickname "The God Girl", Falsani is possibly the most successful religion reporter of our time. Now on staff at the Orange County Register, she was the lead (read: "only") religion reporter at the Chicago Sun-Times from 2000 to 2010. In 2004, she conducted an interview with then-senator Barack Obama that remains the most in-depth audience the president has ever granted regarding matters of faith and belief. She has written four books, the most recent one — Belieber! — about the faith of Justin Beiber, and one I'm dying to read called The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Cohen Brothers.

So I was eager to hear her speak. Unfortunately, to be honest, I wasn't impressed. She seemed self-conscious, distracted, and maybe even a little pandering to the audience. But this article isn't about Cathleen Falsani's speaking abilities, nor even her writing. It's about her title. As a Christian in a staunchly secular business, Falsani has carved a niche for herself as a "cultural interpreter" — a translator in the halting conversation between Christians and American pop culture. When I first heard her say that, I thought, "How cool is that? What a great gig!" And Falsani certainly seems to be doing a good job with it. But the more I considered her self-proclaimed office, the less I liked it. It represents, I think, a failure on the part of the church.

Have we really become so insulated from our culture as to need a translator? I imagine a sort-of tour guide for Christians in years to come...

"Howdy Christians! Welcome to the Secular America Tour! I'm Simon and I'll be your guide. Glad to see so many of you coming out of the church building to see more of the sights today! Now, a few ground rules before we get started: here in secular America, we drive on the right side of the road and we all watch cable TV. Also, please refrain from any laying-on-of-hands while we're together. That's cause for a lawsuit out here."

I guess we're not that bad yet, but the need for a "cultural interpreter" seems to have us pointing in that direction.

Decades ago, Christians started to retreat from politics because of the corruption and excess there. Then there was a swing back toward involvement in an effort to bring a "Christian voice" to the political square. Something similar has been happening with pop culture, specifically the arts.

I read a quote somewhere that I can't seem to find again so I'm going to give you the meaning but butcher the prose. It was about how to conquer a culture, sort-of an apolitical Machiavellian scheme, and the author, the would-be conquerer, said "If you want me to change a nation, you can keep its politicians. Give me its songwriters." If the soul of our nation is going to change, it will happen because it has been captured by the beauty of the gospel. It will happen as we reach the songwriters and storytellers of our age. And I doubt that will happen if we can't speak their language.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get to work finding a way to keep my nine-year-old daughter from knowing that Belieber! exists.

Fighting For A Good Story

I remember a Saturday Night Live sketch from years ago. It was an Irish talk show co-hosted by two guys named Patrick Fitzwilliam and William Fitzpatrick who did nothing but drink, then fight, then hug and make up in an endless loop. I searched for it online and couldn't find a trace which means either a) it has been scrubbed from the web because it was offensive to Irish, or b) I never saw it but only dreamed I did, in which case I should stop writing this blog and call Lorne Michaels right away. In any case, it was a funny premise — the prototypical Irishmen drinking, fighting and remaining best friends. I wonder if there's a lesson in that as well as a laugh.

I spent most of last week at the Storyline Conference in San Diego. Storyline is hosted by author Donald Miller and it's about the story God is writing with each of our lives. Miller walked us through a process of identifying their own character and ambitions in an effort to help us live a better story. It's really a terrific exercise. I recommend the conference. I also recommend hanging out in San Diego, but that's a different story.

A big part of the conference was about conflict because, frankly, that's a big part of any interesting story. Miller asked us to think of our lives as a movie. If the highest ambition of our lives is to make a comfortable living, send our kids to college, and buy a Volvo, that doesn't make for a very good movie. When the hero drives off the Volvo lot in his new ride, having achieved his ambition, and the credits roll, no one is reaching for the Kleenex. Too often, our lives get hijacked by small stories. And the reason that's true is that we tend to avoid conflict. We want a story where everyone gets along, but that's not a very interesting story, so it's not a very ambitious life.

Imagine your friends at your funeral one day. What eulogy would you like them to give?

"Ryan was a swell guy. We hung out a lot and had lots of laughs. We never disagreed and never failed at anything. I never saw him tested or stirred. Just calm and comfortable, just the way we wanted it."

or

"Ryan and I laughed, cried, prayed, confessed, fought, and served together. We sweat and bled together. Sometimes we disagreed but the disagreement made us better. I always knew he wanted the best for me. I always knew he had my back. And that was good because we tried some pretty impossible things together — some might say foolish things."

I'd take the latter any day. We have to learn to love one another, but not for the sake of loving one another. Our purpose is that the world will know us by our love, that we will unveil the kingdom reign of God by our community. Sometimes that means persevering through conflict. Sometimes that means fighting fair with your brother and then making up, instead of choosing to be martyred for your convictions and giving up on the relationship.

What story is your life writing? What story is your church writing? Is it a story about making schedules work and figuring out what to do with the kids? Is it a story about Bible knowledge? Or is it a story about transforming lives, bringing shalom, iron sharpening iron? The best way to write a good story is to imagine the climactic scene — the consummation of the story just before the credits roll — and then address every decision along the way through that filter. Is this a scene that fits with the end of the story I want to tell?

Cancer & Community

I have cancer. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to tell people that. There probably isn't a good way. But there it is. As cancers go, I got a good one: Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma. It's very treatable. I should be fine in a few months without ever sniffing a chemo needle. Last week, I visited MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston where I met Dr. Perrier who talked about my upcoming surgery like it was the oncological equivalent of removing a splinter.

"We'll remove the thyroid and several lymph nodes," she said. "You'll be released the next day. You'll be right as rain in no time."

"Right as rain" is officially termed "cancer survivorship" by MD Anderson and it's at least six months away at this point. But it certainly sounds like a wonderful place. I'm hoping to get there as quickly as possible.

If you want to gauge the sincerity of your friendships, get a dread disease. There's something about hardship that brings out the better angels of our nature. Like a big kid plopped in the middle of a trampoline that brings other kids rolling in toward him, the heavy stuff of life draws friends closer. Christine and I have never felt more loved and supported by our church family than we do now.

Recently, Jen Hatmaker blogged about taking a meal to one of her hurting friends. In her own pithy way, she expressed a profound truth about caring relationships: "When you can't fix a thing, you can show up. And bring good food."

It really is just that simple. My friends know they can't fix this, so they've decided to show up. They are calling and texting. They are praying their knees off. We've gotten offers for meals from church friends, college friends, old bosses and PTO moms. We're getting offers to watch the kids, mow the lawn, and nab free Rapid Rewards flights. I'm pretty sure we almost crashed Facebook when I first posted a photo of my hospital wrist band. None of this is about me or Christine; it's about the good people we've been blessed to know. They haven't jumped off the trampoline; they're rolling in close.

I've always felt that a big part of the reason God called me to this job was my community. We were part of a small group before small groups were an "official" IBC ministry, and our small group has banded together through some pretty tough stuff. Now I wonder if God is allowing me to experience illness so I can better identify with other hurting members of our congregation. After all, I know IBCers who are enduring hardships much worse than mine: terminal illness, death, divorce, grief, betrayal, addiction, abuse. For those members of our body, nothing — no sermon, no song, no class, no program — will ease the burden like a friend.

Christine and I have started a list of "blessings of cancer" — things we would not have gotten to experience if not for this trial. The most important entry on that list is the care of our friends and family. Not only do I have an easy cancer burden, I have great friends to help me carry the load. I'm grateful for both.

More Newtown Musings

It's amazing how quickly we forget. In my last post about the Newtown, Connecticut massacre, I promised a few more articles. I had a lot to write back then — a lot of angles and ideas about evil and society and gun control and culture. There seemed to be too much to write; too many thoughts too deeply disturbing to sort them all out in one or two blog posts. We probably all felt that way. I would stand in the shower (read: writer's refuge) and bullet point the issues.

Now I've forgotten them.

But here are the last two things that stand out about those musings.

First, I wonder if America has just proven that we're no longer mature enough for guns, like a child given a new responsibility for which he isn't ready, except that rather than growing up, we seem to be pooling down, regressing to the lowest, basest, most animalistic forms. It seems pretty clear that our nation is regressing in terms of good behavior. Remember, the trigger for these ideas was a mass murder of children. We certainly aren't advancing virtue. And as important as the Second Amendment has been in the founding and flourishing of our democracy, I wonder now if we're regressing to the point where we can no longer handle either privilege. Charles Colson, who understood both government and human nature, used to say that people must be controlled, either by self or by force. If we're losing our capacity for self-control, then we are necessarily abdicating that control to government. As our second president famously said, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

Again, I'm not opening the gun control debate here. I'm not proposing any new restrictions on guns. I am pointing out that gun ownership is as much as privilege as a right and that the best argument for removing that privilege is the one no one is making: namely that we can't handle our guns. We seem to believe that responsible and well-trained individuals can be trusted with firearms (police, military, hunters) but that those are exceptions, and gun ownership is an entirely individual status. That brings me to my second point.

Whether or not we're responsible enough to own guns, we are inexorably responsible for one another. The massacre in Newton wasn't just a failure on the part of Adam Lanza's parents, Adam Lanza's teachers, gun dealers in Adam Lanza's community, or the system of mental health screeners available to Adam Lanza. Violent death of children in our society represents a failure of our entire society. Certainly only Adam Lanza is ultimately responsible. Only Adam Lanza pulled the trigger. Only Adam Lanza could have stopped it before it started. No one else will face criminal charges in this case, and no one else should. But Adam Lanza is not an island unto himself, and while some in his family and community certainly had more access and opportunity to positively influence his troubled mind, all of us have some level of access and opportunity to do the same. We are each responsible for the influence we have on our society. And just as we all feel some level of emotional wound from the Newtown injustice, we should also feel some level of responsibility. Together, we have built a society in which children are gunned down in cold blood. The lesson of the first homicide rings out unheeded through thousands of years of human history: we are indeed our brother's keepers.

To the extent that Adam Lanza didn't feel that he was hurting himself when he hurt those children, to the extent that we don't feel we are hurting ourselves when we allow violence to shade the minds of our youth, we have lost touch with what it means to be human.

These problems — radical individualism, lack of empathy, violence, moral ambiguity, contempt for life, relative truth — these are deep, personal and profound issues. These aren't issues we can understand quickly or overcome easily. These are prehistoric and primary concerns that we must approach with humility, concern, and resolve. We're in a deep hole. Let's not forget that because we're distracted by a new episode of Breaking Bad.

Sunday School Christmas

Merry Christmas! Here's a recycled gift: the script of a sketch we did in my class at church several years ago. Our class is called Crossroads and it comprised 40 or 50 couples so it was hard to get to know everyone. We used to invite one couple each week to tell a little more about themselves. Here's the class intro scene from a special new couple. 


JOSE: Gosh, where to start? I'm Jose and this is Maria. We've been coming to IBC for a little while - like since the summer.

MARIA: But this is only the second or third time we've visited Crossroads. We've had trouble finding appropriate child care for our son—

JOSE (to Maria): They don't care about that. We're supposed to tell about our past, like our testimony.

MARIA: Ok, well you go.

JOSE: Ok, well we both grew up in believing homes. We met in college. At A&M. I was construction engineering. She was fine arts. We dated for a couple of years.

MARIA: Seven and a half months.

JOSE: Ok, so not quite a year. And then we decided to get married. And then—

MARIA (interrupting): I was visited by an angel.

JOSE (to Maria): I thought we weren't...

MARIA : And I got pregnant.

JOSE (to Maria, surprised): Wha? I thought...

MARIA (to Jose): Well, they're nice people. I just...
(to class) See, that part of our story is pretty unique. It's kind of hard to tell.

JOSE: So sometimes we just sort-of gloss over that.

MARIA: And let people think he knocked me up.

JOSE: Well, sometimes it's easier that way, especially with church people. They'll forgive you for sin, but not for being weird and talking about the Holy Spirit. I mean, not you guys. Er...

MARIA: Anyway, so there was all kinds of weirdness. This angel told me I was pregnant with God's son.

JOSE: Mine too. I got an angel too.

MARIA: But all our friends were like "Yeah, right" and my Dad completely flipped out.

JOSE: Yeah.

MARIA: I seriously thought he was going to kill Jose. Or get arrested. Or both.

JOSE: Yeah.

MARIA: So we decided the best thing might be for me to disappear for a while. So I went to Austin.

JOSE: The hill country.

MARIA: My cousin and her husband, Lizzy and Zach, live down there. She was pregnant too. And she had seen an angel too, so she believed me about my angel.

JOSE: I know it sounds like everybody in our family talks with angels and then gets pregnant all the time.
(to Maria) Let's get past this part.

MARIA: So I stayed with them for a while. That was great. I wrote a song then.

JOSE: Don't sing the song.

MARIA (glares at Jose)

JOSE: I stayed in College Station. I was working for my dad's construction company and just trying to save some money for doctors and hospital costs and baby stuff. She was gone for a month or two.

MARIA: Three and a half.

JOSE: Something like that. That was kinda hard. To be honest, I didn't really think that was fair at first. I didn't want any kids yet and then I find out I've got to raise somebody else's kid before I get to have my own? I mean, even if it was God's son, sheesh!
But then she finally came back.

MARIA: By then things had settled down and Dad had stopped making threats.

JOSE: Yeah.

MARIA: And it was finally going to be somewhat normal. Like I could finally plan the wedding and stuff.

JOSE: And then the stupid census thing happened.

MARIA: Stupid.

JOSE: Some stupid politician got it in his head that everyone needed to go to their home town for this census.

MARIA: I was like, "Couldn't we just do this on Facebook or something?"

JOSE: Yeah it was stupid.

MARIA: I mean: Census page — "Like" — done.

JOSE: Yeah well they said something about travel stimulating the economy, yadda yadda. But it was stupid.

MARIA: So we've gotta drive 16 hours in his 1981 Chevy pickup. Wouldn't go over 50 miles an hour. I could see the road through the floorboards. We may as well have been riding a mule.

JOSE: That was a great truck.

MARIA: Not when you're pregnant. It was awful.

JOSE: Anyway, this is taking too long. So we went to my home town. I'm from a town called Breadsville, Arizona.

MARIA: Two words: Po - dunk.

JOSE: It's pretty small.

MARIA: One hotel.

JOSE: And a bed-and-breakfast.

MARIA: Like anyone would want to stay in a bed-and-breakfast in Breadsville.

JOSE: Anyway, Breadsville used to be a lot bigger and there's kind-of an influential family from there so there were a lot of people in town for this census thing and we couldn't find a place to stay. The hotel was full. The B&B was full. And so it was pretty late at night and we had tried all the people I knew and even called some motels in other towns around there and there was just nothing. We were gonna have to sleep in the truck.

MARIA: There was no way I was sleeping in that truck.

JOSE: So I went back to the guy at the B&B and pretty much just begged him if we could crash on his couch or something. Told him we would get up early and leave before the breakfast and everything. And he said no, but that we could stay in his garage.

MARIA: Tool shed.

JOSE: It was his garage.

MARIA: It was tiny. Not like an attached garage with a floor and drywall. It was a shack with no floor and a bunch of tools and boxes of D-Con rat poison.

JOSE: He had an old car in there under a sheet. He helped me push that out to give us room and he brought us some blankets, and we made a pallet on the ground right next to this puddle of oil from his old car.

MARIA: It stank.

JOSE: Well, and it got worse because I don't know if it was all the excitement or the rough ride in the truck or what, but she hadn't had a single contraction before that night and all the sudden, she looks at me with big eyes and says her water just broke.

MARIA: Did we mention that Breadsville doesn't have a hospital either?

JOSE: So I go running up to the house and bang on the door and the guy doesn't answer! I guess he was tired of dealing with us. So I run back to the garage.

MARIA: Tool shed.

JOSE: And there's Maria...

MARIA: That's good, dear.

JOSE: She's sitting on this old seat from a riding lawnmower.

MARIA: You can stop, dear.

JOSE: With her legs spread apart and a blanket in front of her—

MARIA (gritting teeth): Jose, I said that's enough!

JOSE: Um...so...she had the baby.

MARIA: Jesus ... our son's name is Jesus.

(Pause here.)

JOSE: Nasty. I had not intended to cut the cord or any of that.

MARIA: He's a wimp.

JOSE: Yeah, when it comes to blood. It was nasty.

MARIA: He was beautiful.

JOSE: Well, I had to clean it all up, which was nasty. And I just about get done and somebody bangs on the door of the garage.

MARIA: Tool shed.

JOSE: And I figure it's the B&B owner because he probably heard the noise and we're waking up the guests or something. And I go and open the door and it's Paul Teutul.

MARIA: It was not Paul Teutul.

JOSE: The dude from OC Choppers. Anybody watch that?

MARIA: It was not Paul Teutul.

JOSE: It looked exactly like him. He had two other dudes with him. They were riding Harleys. I'm telling you it was him.

MARIA: In Breadsville, Arizona?

JOSE: For the census, maybe.

MARIA: Why didn't you get an autograph?

JOSE: I was ... distracted.

MARIA: So anyway, these biker guys come in and they're carrying boxes. I mean presents. Gift wrapped. And they put them down next to Jesus who is burrito-wrapped in a blanket and laying on the work bench. And they tell us that an angel - a whole bunch of angels - appeared to them—

JOSE: I know. More angels. Sounds crazy.

MARIA: And the angels told them that Jesus was special and where to find him.

JOSE: In a tool shed in Breadsville, Arizona.

MARIA: We stayed there for almost a month. Eventually got in to see a doctor. Took Jesus to church for the first time there. Some other visitors showed up too. Big wigs of some kind.

JOSE: Limos this time instead of Harleys. And they saw a star, not an angel.

MARIA: They told us the same thing the biker guys had. Jesus was special and they had come a long way to see him.

JOSE: And apparently stopped by their bank on the way because those boxes were full of cash!

MARIA: Very generous.

JOSE: I was afraid it was stolen.

MARIA: If it hadn't been for those gifts, there's no way we would have made it to Mexico and back.

JOSE: Yeah, but that's a different story.

MARIA: Yeah, so that's us. We have two boys: Jesus is six and Jaime is three. They're both precious.

JOSE: They're out of control.

MARIA: No. They just keep us on our toes.

JOSE: Our number comes up on the screens in service just about every week because Jesus is talking back to his teachers.

MARIA: Correcting his teachers.

JOSE: It's back-talking. But he'll learn.

MARIA: Yeah, so we're here now and we're very excited about getting plugged in to Crossroads.

JOSE: Yeah, I guess that's it. Thanks for letting us join you.

MARIA: Merry Christmas.

The Sandy Hook Evil

I promised myself I wouldn't make any public comments about the tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut for at least a week. When my news app pinged me this morning that bells were ringing there to mark the one-week anniversary of the shooting, it got me thinking, again, of what can possibly be said. I feel the need to issue two disclaimers related to this topic.

First, there is an enormous amount to say. When that level of evil is exposed in our society, it should spark deep, thoughtful, exhaustive and difficult discussions. This is a deep hole we're in. This isn't something we should read (or write) a couple of blog entries on and then move along to the next celebrity gossip. This should arrest our progress, or more accurately, make us aware that it halted while we weren't looking. As a society, we need to grapple better with things like evil, innocence, the sanctity of life, suffering, violence, mental health, and, yes, gun control. If we took the next 26 years to research, study, plan, test, and seek to understand violent evil, that wouldn't be enough to honor the 26 lives lost last week. I'm going to point out in this article (and probably a few others) a few of the things weighing most heavily on my mind this week, but what I have to say here is not all there is to say. What I know is not all there is to know. I do not have a 12-step plan for ending violent evil in America. And don't believe anyone who says they do.

Secondly, I'd like to acknowledge that none of my words here matter to the families who lost loved ones last week. I have sat with people who are enduring deep, deep sadness. For people in those situations, words don't matter; public policy doesn't matter; the threat of the next atrocity doesn't matter; their own safety doesn't matter. Nothing seems to matter but their loss. No blog post matters because no blog post is going to bring back their sons and daughters.

So with that much preamble, I must be about to launch quite a gun control debate, right? Not at all. I think we need to talk about gun control; I have some ideas and opinions on that topic. But I think we should get to that topic around year 25 or your 26-year study. I'd rather start with a more accurate categorization of last Friday at Sandy Hook Elementary. Last Friday wasn't primarily about gun violence. It wasn't primarily about mental health. It was primarily about evil. It was pure evil. It was the most evil thoughts of Adam Lanza's mind distilled into their most horrific and actionable form. It seems to me that this particular display of evil is special in our history. We've turned a corner. Americans have died in mass shootings before; children have died in mass shootings. But, as you've read countless times now, this is the first time in our nation's history anyone has embodied evil boldly enough to target kindergarteners.

And that matters.

I am not saying that a child's life is more precious than an adult's. My religion teaches that all people are created in God's image and all human life is sacred. I'm also not saying that those 20 children were any more valuable or important than the 16,000 children who died of hunger-related causes last Friday, or the 720 who died of AIDS that day. Each of those lives was sacred. Each of those deaths was an awful consequence of the presence of death in the world. But I am saying that last Friday's display of evil was symbolically weighty. It's a milestone of evil against vulnerable victims that stands out among its peers.

Our tendency over the past seven days has been to reach immediately for answers. We want solutions. We want to know, "What do we have to do to ensure that this doesn't happen again?" Obviously, that's a great question, one that we won't find easy answers to because there aren't easy answers. And I wonder if we're rushing toward solutions before we fully understand the problem. Again, the problem is evil. How do we understand evil?

To the extent that we pass some laws intended to limit the expression of evil, we are only fooling ourselves that we can control it. It could be that stricter gun laws would have forced Adam Lanza to kill three children with a kitchen knife rather than 20 children with guns, but for those hypothetical three families grieving this week, the end game is the same; they have been visited by evil. Likewise, an armed teacher or security guard might have stopped Adam Lanza after he killed the same three kids, but before he could get to the other 17. Again, would it matter to the families of his three victims? Yes, the numbers matter. Yes, three murders is better than 20. But let's not talk about behavioral band-aids that will reduce the numbers without taking about foundational truths that could actually have a larger effect. Let's talk about limiting the number of Adam Lanzas, not the number of kids Adam Lanza can kill.

Let's remain focused. The problem is that there is evil in our country. It's getting bolder. It's not lurking in dark alleys and the "other side of the tracks" any more. Evil is showing up in our gated communities and our suburban elementary schools.

And it's showing up in our hearts.

Let me drive this point home. You are a shooter like Adam Lanza. Do you know what signs Lanza exhibit before last Friday that he had the capacity to do what he did? None. At least very little. He might have seemed troubled at times, but so have you. He might have even been violent or melancholy or compulsive at times, but so have you. The reality is that we are all about two clicks away from bald-faced evil. Of course it doesn't seem that way. You're well-adjusted. Your life is manageable and predictable. You have a loving family. But let life throw you a few curves. Cancer. The death of a child. Job loss. Debt. Divorce. Disrespect. Betrayal. You'll start to withdraw. Your loving relationships will dissolve. You'll try more desperate versions of your coping mechanisms. You'll spend more time in the darker corners of your mind. And within weeks, you'll start to think about going out in a blaze of glory. America doesn't have two or three dozen potential Adam Lanzas playing video games in their moms' basements. America has 300 million potential Adam Lanzas.

Of course that doesn't happen to everyone who hits hard times, but the ones it does happen to aren't "more sick" than the rest of us. And we aren't "better people" than those who snap. The awful truth is that we are all capable of evil. We are all potential shooters. Evil isn't just in our neighbors' hearts; its in ours.

I was first disavowed of the notion that "I would never do something like that" in college. I had a friend named Ron Shamburger. He was a good guy. He came to the campus Christian meetings I was a part of. His family was stable. He made good grades. On September 30, 1994, Ron broke into his girlfriend's apartment, shot her in her bed, and then set fire to the place. He was executed by lethal injection on September 18, 2002. Evil got the better of Ron. If you think you're better than Ron, I hope live long and happy in your arrogant ignorance. I hope dumb luck keeps you from an outbreak of evil that would prove you wrong. If you're starting to see that your life's version of evil (shouting at your spouse? cheating on your taxes?) is only one step on a stairway toward hell, then you're starting to see the bigger issue at work in Newtown.

Evil exists in our country and in our hearts. I want to have the gun control debate, but let's table that for now and talk about the larger issue. Let's ask a more fundamental question. What are we going to do about evil? What on earth can we do?

Joseph and Sgt. Maj. Epting

During my college years, I was recruited heavily by the Army. I was in the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets, and I think it drives military recruiters crazy to have someone right on the doorstep — enrolled in ROTC and in uniform every day — and not close the deal. Every unit in the corps has a "military advisor" (read: recruiter); ours was Sergeant Major Epting. I remember one particular exchange with the sergeant major. It must have been his final attempt to win me over. He cornered me in a hallway outside an ROTC classroom and said, "So, Sanders, are you going to be in my army?"

"Sorry sergeant major. I've decided not to."

"That's too bad, Sanders. I like you. I hate to see you throw your life away."

I almost laughed. I really liked Sergeant Major Epting. I looked up to him. And my decision not to pursue a military contract was a difficult one. I have great respect for that career. But I didn't share the sergeant major's definition of a wasted life.

Oddly, Sergeant Major Epting is who I thought of when I read this morning's advent passage.

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”—which means, “God with us.”

When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

I can't imagine the pressure Joseph must have felt to get out of that situation. Forget the weight of generations of family tradition, religious obligation, and cultural shame. Even if he ignored all that, this is seriously messing with his life plan. Now, instead of a storybook romance, he's got to prepare for her "baggage". Instead of being the envy of all his buddies, he'll be their charity case. Instead of the marriage night he dreamed of, he'll be raking hay in a stable and waiting a few extra months to get his groove on with Mary.

Even after his angelic vision, it would have been hard to stick around. It would have been easy to dismiss the dream as the result of too much wine the night before, or to water down the vision with half-measures. But what Joseph did was the ancient Hebrew equivalent of throwing his life away. He was going to marry a woman who had, apparently, slept with another man while promised to Joseph. He was not only going to tolerate her story about virgin pregnancy; he was going to believe it himself. He was going to tell his family, "Oh it's not what you think. She didn't sleep with anyone. She's a pregnant virgin. God impregnated her."

Every friend, every family member, every priest Joseph knew would have been pleading with him not to be foolish, to see past Mary's lies and his infatuation, to consider his family name, and not to throw his life away.

Joseph's call is our call too. God calls us to believe an impossible, cockamamie story about angels and devils, an all-powerful invisible being, human sacrifice, a virgin birth, and the king of the universe in a Middle Eastern feed trough. Too often, we lose sight of how ridiculous our beliefs really are. We start to think that Mormons or Muslims or evolutionists believe crazy stories. We ask them to "be reasonable."

But God's call is not reasonable; it's insane, countercultural, and impossible. If you want to live in a story that makes sense — a belief system that "feels right" to you, check out Buddhism or Hinduism. Those are much easier to swallow. But if you're interested in the Christian story — in answering the call of the God in the manger — then get ready to believe the unbelievable. Get ready to throw your life away.

Shared Goals

My pastor is fond of saying, "We all want to get to the same place; we just disagree about how to get there." Usually he's talking about denominational divides when he says that, but I think it applies to the election too. It used to go without saying, but I've seen lots of venom in the public square lately, so I'm going to say it: We all want the same things. A better life for our kids — to be safe and free — to ensure that the under-represented, underprivileged, and under-resourced among us enjoy justice, protection and care. The same bright future is envisioned on both sides of the aisle. But this morning half of us woke up feeling that future is more possible than ever before and half of us woke up feeling that our hopes for such a future have been dashed. Let's be good winners and losers. But more importantly, let's realize we'll all lose if we can't find a way to talk about "how to get there" without name-calling and mistrust.

Fighting Election

Every so often, we get everyone together for a big fight. It's so strange. I don't really think we care so much about what we're fighting over (with one or two obvious exceptions). We just seem to like the fight. I'm talking about presidential elections, of course.

This dynamic is so bizarre to me. I know people who are perfectly well-adjusted, level-headed, rational beings who suddenly turn to ogres come election time. I know these people on both sides of the aisle.

It's like Thanksgiving. Every so often, we get all our parties together and try to figure things out and someone gets drunk and we all leave mad and we add to our family lore about the one time Uncle Larry tried to carve the turkey and ruined everything.

I wonder why we do this. There are probably dozens of reasons I don't understand but a few come to mind.

Control
Voting — or more accurately, winning the vote — gives us a sense of control. It feels like we're making a better future if our ideas are the ones that win. We have more confidence in our countrymen if we feel that the majority of them agree with us. If, on the other hand, most of them don't share our views, we complain about "what America is coming to" or wish that someone would "get those other people out of the dark ages." No one ever watches their candidate lose and then says, "Hmm. Most of my compatriots disagree with my position. I wonder if their ideas are actually better. I wonder what I can learn from them." I think there's a level of humility missing from our national discourse. And there's a longing for control. Every man-made religion on earth peddles control. It's a powerful motivator.

Winning
We've also all got a little bit of Charlie Sheen in us. We like winning. Our culture is obsessed with it. We've turned sport into a multi-billion dollar alternative reality where the ultimate virtue is winning. And we turn our non-competitive endeavors — academia, ministry, the arts — into competitions with awards and scorecards.

Politics gives us clear winners and losers. If you get more votes, you win. It's simple and easy to measure. It takes less work and less discernment than fighting our ideological battles where they matter — in our relationships.

False Enemies
That relates to my final idea. I think we work ourselves into a political fervor every four years because it's easier to battle enemies we can see. Every Christian gives ascent to the idea that our enemy isn't flesh and blood. Our enemy doesn't have a political party. But we tend to think of people on the other side of the aisle as pawns of the enemy. It's easier to fight those enemies. We can see them, vote against them, visit their websites, spread rumors about them, blame them, and demonize them. They're easy to hate.

But ultimately, they are a distraction. Our enemy is unseen as is our Hero.

I'm not saying politics isn't important. I voted in this election, and I treasure that right. It's one of the reasons I believe in our country. And I'm not saying we should abandon our convictions. I have some pretty strongly-held positions on issues of the day, especially justice issues like abortion. But I think we Christians tend to forget that the real battle isn't won or lost in the voting booth. The real battle happens on a grassroots level — deeper than that, it happens in hearts.

After all, that's the beauty of representative government. Our politicians aren't leaders; they are followers. That's true not just because of their character (I don't see a lot of conviction in most politicians) but because of their profession. Following is how politicians get elected. Trust me: if 90 percent of Americans deeply believed that abortion should be illegal, President Obama would be a staunch pro-lifer. He's a follower. They are all followers. It's up to us to lead them.

If you want to win an election, win hearts. Love people well. Pray against your enemy. Start with your neighbors and coworkers — not to bring their votes to your party, but bring their souls to restoration. And maybe in the trenches of the real battle, the allure of an election night victory party will become secondary.

Beer Money

Part of what makes church work and government not work is sheer size. One key to a successful community of any kind is interdependence. Let me explain.

Imagine you've dropped in on guy's night with the men from my small group. There are five of us — six counting you. We're at Buffalo Wild Wings (yes, you can talk about Jesus at a sports bar), and we all decide to chip in to buy a pitcher of beer (yes, you can talk about Jesus while drinking beer). Now imagine one of the guys can't contribute. He forgot his wallet or his budget is tight this month. What would we do? We would cover him, of course. We would buy his beer. And what would he do? He would thank us. He likely wouldn't forget his wallet again soon. And if he continued to do so, the rest of us might just tell him that we're getting tired of paying his way. Or if he was genuinely disadvantaged, we would happily continue to pay for him or possibly stop having guys night at some place where he's expected to buy stuff.

Around that table at Buffalo Wild Wings, there would be generosity, gratitude and accountability.

You can be interdependent with six guys, but the larger the group gets, the harder it becomes. If our group turns into 30 guys, some of the group won't even know who didn't pay. If our group is 300, we'll have to start a spreadsheet. At 3,000, we're not really even part of the same party; we're dividing up into lots of little groups within the big group. In a group of 3,000, you have to be very intentional about accountability, generosity and gratitude. It's easy to lose sight of who you should be grateful to, and who your generosity is helping.

Now imagine if our little guys group swells to 300 million people. Now when everyone pitches in, it's not generosity; it's taxation. And when someone gets a free ride, there isn't gratitude; there is shame and entitlement. And when someone misappropriates the beer money to spend it on favors for a friend, it goes unnoticed.

Now before you get mad and start waving election banners, let me point out that this is not a political stance. The same dynamic happens regardless of how conservative or liberal are the guys around the table. It's just human nature. There is a universal inverse relationship between the level of interdependence in a group and the number of its members.

Interdependence, and therefore authentic community, is only possible in small groups.

Pass the beer nuts.

Book Birthing

For some time now I've had this vision of writing my book in a cottage retreat with no distractions, open windows, a creaky wooden table, and a pipe.

That's stupid.

The idea just confronted me — just sneered and splashed water in my face to wake me from that years-long dream. Of course that's not how this is going to go. Of course I can't write like that — not the first book, at least. Maybe the 40th. No, this birth is going to be bloody and frustrating and unpleasant. It's going to be scary and it's going to stop and start so often that I'll be convinced several times that it will never come. That's how this will come, or it won't come at all. It will be gritty or it will be stillborn.

Lord, I pray for a healthy child.

Righteous Reffing

I've always loved sports. It's not because I'm good at them or because I'm trying to relive the glory days of the past or earn my dad's approval (you know guys who love sports for all those reasons). I just like to play. It's fun to compete, to get out there, to meet a challenge.

I also think there are important lessons to learn from sport: integrity, hard work, fair play, discipline, teamwork, confidence, the ability to contend with someone else and still respect them.

I like to watch sports as well as play them. I'm loyal to a few teams and I cheer for them regularly. It's not an obsession or a source of my self-worth (again, you know guys) but it's a healthy diversion. Like Downton Abbey with a scoreboard.

But I can no longer deny that our sports are changing. This weekend, we witnessed further evidence that sports armageddon is nigh. If you haven't read, watched or heard the voices screaming about poor officiating that cost the Green Bay Packers a game on Monday Night Football, then you can catch up here. What bothered me was not the botched call. I've seen officiating even worse than that. If pressed, I could even defend the call to an extent. What bothered me was the lack of perspective and integrity this episode revealed.

Let's start with integrity. I stayed up after the game to watch some of the coverage and it was amazing to me that none of the journalists who commented on this story blamed the receiver in question, Golden Tate, for cheating. Their outrage was aimed at the refs for not catching Tate cheating. There's an assumption here that players will use any means necessary, including cheating, to win. It's up to the referees to ensure fair play, not the consciences of the players.

After the game, there were interviews with both Tate and his coach Pete Carroll. Both were giddy. Neither seemed concerned about winning with an unfair advantage. The reporter asked about the play call, about the referees, but almost nothing asked about cheating. At one point, she did ask Tate, "Did you push off?" meaning, "Did you illegally interfere with your opponent's play?" But everyone watching knew Tate pushed off. We saw it replayed 48 times. Asking him if he cheated was like asking him if he was wearing a uniform. We could all see his uniform. We could all see him cheat. But as remarkable as the questioning was, Tate's answer was even more disturbing. Early in the interview, Tate said, "I play for God first and then for my teammates." I appreciate my brother giving glory to God for his gifts and blessings, but just seconds later when the reporter asked him if he cheated, he said, "I don't know what you're talking about." The message was apparently, "I'm a Christian, and I'm a cheat. I cheat for Jesus!"

Since the game, every SportsCenter, every newspaper article, every commentator with a microphone has decried the poor officiating and demanded improvement. No one has decried the lack of integrity on the part of the players and coach. No one has dared suggest that Golden Tate should have raised his hand in confession of the foul, or that Pete Carroll should have forfeited the win. What we need, they say, is better policing of the cheaters, not fewer cheaters.

The reason that cheating is expected, of course, is that so much is at stake. It's one thing to cheat in your neighborhood sandlot game. It's another when million-dollar contracts and billion-dollar tax-subsidized stadium deals are on the line. Or at least that's how the argument goes. But that argument reveals a lack of perspective on two levels.

First, we have let our recreational pursuits grow into behemoth business engines that affect whole state and national economies. This says so much about us — our addictive national personality, our celebrity culture, our ignorance of deeper truths and simple pleasures. Maybe the passing of Steve Sabol last week should send us a reminder about days when football players had second jobs. I know it's fantasy. I know it's "Good Old Days Syndrome", but let's consider it.

Secondly, so what if it's costly? Isn't that the point of integrity? If I understand the argument correctly, the idea is that people can't be expected to play fair when the stakes are high. Is that the lesson we want sports to teach?

What if Golden Tate had admitted to cheating in that post-game interview and said, "I don't think this win should count. I didn't really have possession of that ball. Just because the refs didn't see it doesn't mean it didn't happen."

You know what would happen to Tate? He would be ridiculed. He might lose his job. He would certainly be reprimanded by his coach and front office personnel. After all, money is at stake!

But he would also be a leader. Maybe that's exactly what the NFL, NBA and MLB need: someone who is willing to be foolish and honest rather than crooked and rich.

And that's the crux of this problem: values. In the world of professional sports, there are two values: winning and money. Everything else is subjected to those values. Among the barrage of interview, commentaries, columns, rants and reports related to Monday night's game, no one, not a single person associated with the NFL or any news organization, has said or written the four words that my parents taught me about keeping sports in perspective:

It's just a game.

Of God, Freedom and Community

I spoke to a group of people this week about freedom. Freedom is an inevitable ingredient in healthy community. When we are free to be who we really are, we are open to be loved deeply. The opposite is true too. If we are not free to be authentic, our relationships are restricted; as is our growth.

This morning I read this about freedom from one of my favorite authors, Thomas Merton:

As long as you pretend to live in pure autonomy, as your own master, without even a god to rule you, you will inevitably live as the servant of another man or as the alienated member of an organization. Paradoxically, it is the acceptance of God that makes you free and delivers you from human tyranny, for when you serve him you are no longer permitted to alienate your spirit in human servitude. God did not invite the children of Israel to leave the slavery of Egypt. He commanded them to do so. 

Merton is affirming that when we seek autonomy, we seek separation from our kind. To seek autonomy is to seek to be God for only God is entirely self-sufficient. And because that is true, he is holy, set-apart, different not only in degree but in kind. Jesus was not the best of our human kind; he was an entirely different kind. There can only be one God. When we seek to be him, we leave no room for others of our kind.

Autonomy leads assuredly to isolation. Isolation leads in turn to idolatry, pride, and slavery. The end of all these is destruction as our enemy designs. All of these work in opposition to mutual submission, community, obedience, humility and freedom.

If we wish to be free, we must submit to one another. If we wish to be God, we should seek isolation and independence.