Tag Archives: Compassion

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Best of 2023 #7: Eli’s Unintended Lesson

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I’m on vacation for three weeks. While I’m gone, please enjoy the top 15 posts from 2023 based on total number of page views and podcast plays. Cheers!

Eli's Unintended Lesson (CaD Job 35) – Wayfarer

How much less, then, will [God] listen
    when you say that you do not see him,
that your case is before him
    and you must wait for him.
Job 35:14 (NIV)

Eli the younger is a fascinating character in the larger context of the Job Story. He isn’t mentioned at all in the opening introduction of Job’s three friends. He just kind of appears out of nowhere once Job and the three elder friends have finished their conversation and then presumes, as the youngest person with the least life experience, to teach the rest of the men wisdom.

What a twit.

In yesterday’s post/podcast I mentioned one of the life lessons I carried with me from the days of my divorce: I don’t know what I don’t know. It seems to have resonated with a lot of people. As I meditated on today’s chapter of young Eli’s continued know-it-all blather, there was another lesson from the days of my divorce that came to mind.

I received a long, hand written letter during that period of time. It was about ten pages written on both sides. The entire letter was a scripture laden treatise on the unforgivable sin of divorce and a pronouncement of my eternal condemnation to hell.

Three observations: First of all, it was a letter – not a personal visit to say, “Tom, I hear you’re going through a rough time. Let me buy you a cup of coffee. I’d love to hear how you’re doing.” Second of all, I and my family are going through one of the most difficult and painful of human experiences and you want to take this moment to condemn me? As the saying goes, “With friends like that, who needs enemies?” Finally, the ironic thing is that the person who wrote the letter had a wife who left him decades before, divorced him, and got remarried but the letter-writer refused to acknowledge the fact. So, is your letter about me or is really about you?

What a twit.

Throughout young Eli’s four speeches, Job remains silent.

I get it. I immediately threw the letter away.

I do find a lesson to be learned from Eli the younger’s self-important arguments, but not the lessons I think he intended. The lesson I’m taking away from his discourses so far is that I don’t want to be a twit to my friends when they’re suffering and struggling. Maybe a little compassion and a lot less self-importance and condemnation.

It’s been in the worst stretches of my life journey that I learned who my friends really are.

Chapter to read for tomorrow’s Best of 2023: Jeremiah 9

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

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Love & Punishment

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I will not carry out my fierce anger,
    nor will I devastate Ephraim again.
For I am God, and not a man—
    the Holy One among you.
    I will not come against their cities.
Hosea 11:9 (NIV)

As a child, I remember noticing patterns in life. There was a certain flow to how things happened. One of these patterns was how my parents exacted punishment. When I was caught doing something bad, my parents anger was aroused. The punishment was carried out, and I was typically remanded to my room to think on both my infraction and the shame of my punishment. A short time later, my parent would come to my bedroom much calmer and full of compassion. Hugs were then doled out as I expressed my remorse. I was given a reminder of their love for me and wanting the best for me.

Jesus used multiple metaphors in His parables to share about God’s Kingdom and how it works. He spoke of a woman tearing apart her house looking for a lost coin. At another time it was a man selling everything he had to acquire a field that held buried treasure. More famously, He used the example of father who graciously, and lovingly welcomes his lost son home.

In the same way, the ancient prophets would use different metaphors to deliver what was. basically the same message. Hosea has repeatedly used the metaphor God gave him of Israel being like a promiscuous and adulterous wife. In today’s chapter, Hosea switches to a completely different metaphor and prefigures Jesus’ parable of the lost and prodigal son. Hosea describes God lovingly delivering his son Israel from slavery in Egypt, teaching the boy to walk, lovingly leading and feeding the lad as he grew into a nation. But the boy foolishly rejected his Father and, like Jesus’ prodigal, will find himself broken and destitute in the “distant land” of Assyria.

Once again, like I experienced with my own parents, Hosea mixes punishment with both grace and hope. Yes, Israel will find itself in captivity and exile. Yes, the boy will suffer the consequences of his hard-hearted rebellion. But, just as I learned that after the punishment and remorse came grace, compassion, and restoration, the boy Israel will return from exile and punishment, the relationship between boy and Father restored.

In the quiet of this morning after Thanksgiving, I find myself grateful for loving parents who modeled God’s love in the way they parented and punished. I hope that my children might say the same as they look back on the example I set as a father. I am also grateful that Jesus ultimately fulfilled Hosea’s prophetic vision of a loving, gracious, and compassionate Father by by coming not to condemn the world, but to graciously save the world.

In a world that is currently tearing itself apart with hate and prejudice, and reeling from the consequences of that vitriol, I pray that I can be a living example of God’s love, grace, and compassion that both Hosea, and Jesus, proclaimed.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

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Eli’s Unintended Lesson

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Eli's Unintended Lesson (CaD Job 35) – Wayfarer

How much less, then, will [God] listen
    when you say that you do not see him,
that your case is before him
    and you must wait for him.
Job 35:14 (NIV)

Eli the younger is a fascinating character in the larger context of the Job Story. He isn’t mentioned at all in the opening introduction of Job’s three friends. He just kind of appears out of nowhere once Job and the three elder friends have finished their conversation and then presumes, as the youngest person with the least life experience, to teach the rest of the men wisdom.

What a twit.

In yesterday’s post/podcast I mentioned one of the life lessons I carried with me from the days of my divorce: I don’t know what I don’t know. It seems to have resonated with a lot of people. As I meditated on today’s chapter of young Eli’s continued know-it-all blather, there was another lesson from the days of my divorce that came to mind.

I received a long, hand written letter during that period of time. It was about ten pages written on both sides. The entire letter was a scripture laden treatise on the unforgivable sin of divorce and a pronouncement of my eternal condemnation to hell.

Three observations: First of all, it was a letter – not a personal visit to say, “Tom, I hear you’re going through a rough time. Let me buy you a cup of coffee. I’d love to hear how you’re doing.” Second of all, I and my family are going through one of the most difficult and painful of human experiences and you want to take this moment to condemn me? As the saying goes, “With friends like that, who needs enemies?” Finally, the ironic thing is that the person who wrote the letter had a wife who left him decades before, divorced him, and got remarried but the letter-writer refused to acknowledge the fact. So, is your letter about me or is really about you?

What a twit.

Throughout young Eli’s four speeches, Job remains silent.

I get it. I immediately threw the letter away.

I do find a lesson to be learned from Eli the younger’s self-important arguments, but not the lessons I think he intended. The lesson I’m taking away from his discourses so far is that I don’t want to be a twit to my friends when they’re suffering and struggling. Maybe a little compassion and a lot less self-importance and condemnation.

It’s been in the worst stretches of my life journey that I learned who my friends really are.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

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The Shaming

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The Shaming (CaD Jer 13) – Wayfarer

And if you ask yourself,
    “Why has this happened to me?”—
it is because of your many sins
    that your skirts have been torn off
    and your body mistreated.
Jeremiah 13:22 (NIV)

The HBO miniseries Band of Brothers is one of my all-time favorites. Based on the excellent book of the same name by historian Stephen E. Ambrose, it tells the real life stories of the men of Easy Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne in World War II. They were one of the most active company’s in the war and had among the highest casualty rates as they fought from the beaches of Normandy to the Battle of the Bulge and were the first Allies to capture Hitler’s famed “Eagles Nest” in Austria.

One of the more powerful scenes from the series takes place during the liberation of the Netherlands from the Nazis. The local citizens flood the streets to celebrate, and the men of Easy Company get plenty of hugs and kisses from young Dutch maids. The young infantrymen then witness the public shaming of those young Dutch ladies who had slept with and endeared themselves to their Nazi occupiers. They are pulled into the streets into crowds of their fellow citizens. Their dresses are torn off and their hair cut off as their peers mock them for “prostituting themselves” with the Nazis. It’s a difficult scene to watch.

That scene came to mind, however, as I read today’s chapter. Based on the context of Jeremiah’s words, we can make an educated guess as to the time period of Jeremiah’s message. He says:

Say to the king and to the queen mother,
    “Come down from your thrones,
for your glorious crowns
    will fall from your heads.”

In our recent chapter-a-day trek through 2 Kings, it told of the brief reign King Jehoiachin who ascended the throne at age 18, and his mother Nehushta. It was they whom the conquering Nebuchadnezzar would pull from the throne and carry into exile in 597 B.C. This, in turn, allows us to put the events Jeremiah describes in today’s chapter into context.

Jeremiah’s ascension to prominence happened during the reign of the reformer King Josiah, who I wrote about on Monday. My post that day pointed out that government dictates don’t change hearts. As evidence, history records that as soon as Josiah died, his successors immediately reversed Josiah’s reforms. Idolatry was back in business like American breweries after Prohibition. Judah’s kings and people immediately went back to worshipping fertility gods, sleeping with temple prostitutes, and participating in all of the pagan practices that Josiah had attempted to stamp out.

Jeremiah has, therefore, been watching this happen for 12 years as he proclaims the words of today’s prophetic message. He’s watched Josiah’s successors play a game of political appeasement and shifting loyalties between Egypt and Babylon in an effort strike a profitable alliance. In doing so, they “prostitute” themselves in servitude to the empire who will give them the best deal for their submission and political bondage.

Jeremiah’s message is a harsh one. Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian conqueror, is angry that the young king’s predecessor had betrayed and embarrassed him by turning against him. Jehoiachin and his mother will be publicly shamed and carried off to Babylon as captives just as Jeremiah has been predicting for years. Twice Jeremiah provides a word picture stating that just as their idolatry was spiritual prostitution against their God, so their captivity and exile is the same as the public shaming of a prostitute.

In the quiet this morning, I can’t help but think about standing in the sandals of Jeremiah. It’s easy for me to get sucked into seeing the characters in these stories as black-and-white, good-and-evil caricatures. Jehoiachin and Nehushta are the evil idolators receiving their comeuppance. Jeremiah is the good prophet gloating over the downfall of his antagonists.

But then I think of the scene in Band of Brothers. The scene of these women being publicly shamed was powerfully tragic. It was followed by a scene in which one of the shamed female collaborators stood alone by the side of a road as the Americans drove by on tanks and troop carriers. Her head shaved, her dress in tatters, and her baby (presumably the offspring of a German soldier) in her arms. Tears streamed down her cheeks. The men of Easy Company weren’t laughing. They were sobered and moved by the site. One of them hands her a mess kit so she and her child have something to eat.

In a similar vein, Jeremiah describes his own emotions regarding the impending shaming and exile of his king and people. It is not gloating, or pride, or schadenfreude. It’s grief:

If you do not listen,
    I will weep in secret
    because of your pride;
my eyes will weep bitterly,
    overflowing with tears,
    because the Lord’s flock will be taken captive.

One of the basic tenets of Jesus’ teaching tells me not to worry about the speck in someone’s eye while ignoring the log in my own. I observe in Jeremiah that kind of spirit. He had been mocked, threatened, and persecuted by his own people, the very people who are about to face the harsh realities that Jerry had predicted. The prophet will be vindicated and proved right. But he takes no pleasure in this. In fact, it pains him greatly. There’s a lesson for me in this when I observe the public shaming of others. The truth is that there’s plenty of shaming fodder in my own life.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

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Two Sides of Jesus

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Two Sides of Jesus (CaD John 2) – Wayfarer

“Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing…”
John 2:6 (NIV)

In yesterday’s opening chapter of John’s biography of Jesus, I shared that identity is a core theme of John’s narrative.

  • John identifies Jesus as the embodied, eternal Word through which all things were created, whom John himself saw glorified.
  • John identifies Jesus as a spiritual bookend to Moses; The law came through Moses, while grace and truth came through Jesus.
  • John the Baptist identifies himself as not the Messiah, but one who “comes before” and “a voice in the wilderness” preparing the way.
  • John the Baptist identifies Jesus as “the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
  • Jesus identifies his first disciples and gives Simon a new identity, as “Peter.”

In today’s chapter, John chooses two episodes to begin introducing the reader to Jesus. I couldn’t help but recall John’s words at the end of his narrative:

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.

John 21:25 (NIV)

So why did John choose these two episodes? First, Jesus acts out of His divinity. He gives in to His mother’s request to salvage a wedding feast for the host by miraculously turning water into wine. In the second, Jesus acts out of His humanity at the Temple in Jerusalem. He overturns the tables of the moneychangers in the Temple courts and creates a small riot.

I spent some time meditating on these two stories, and I found them to be a fascinating contrast which identifies two important aspects of Jesus’ person. Jesus channels divine power to extend compassionate generosity to a common, everyday person stuck in a very human social dilemma. John doesn’t even identify the bride, the groom, or the family who found themselves on the cusp of social humiliation by running out of wine for their guests. What a very ordinary human dilemma for Jesus to solve by miraculously producing 180 gallons of wine (and not just your average table wine, He produced the “good stuff”).

In the second episode, Jesus sets Himself against human corruption that polluted the religious institution and Temple system. The leaders of the Temple had a racket going. They extorted money and lined their pockets from poor religious pilgrims who came from all over the world to offer ritual offerings and sacrifices, forcing them to exchange Roman or other currency into Temple currency (plus taxes and fees, of course). No miracle here. Jesus very humanly channels His inner challenger to fire a shot across the bow of the powerful, religious racketeers. It is the opening shot of a three-year conflict that will end with the racketeers’ conspiracy to commit the legally sanctioned murder of Jesus.

Miraculously divine compassion for a common, everyday nobody.

Courageous human action against a corrupt “kingdom of this world.”

And even in the water-to-wine miracle, there exists a powerful metaphor that connects these two episodes. The “six stone jars” Jesus had the wedding attendants use were intended to be used by the religious leaders for their “ceremonial washing” water. The religious leaders will later accuse Jesus of refusing to follow their prescribed ritual “washing.” They will also accuse Jesus of being a drunkard. Jesus uses the water jars used for the religious leaders’ hypocritical cleansing to produce 180 gallons of “new wine.” And, I also can’t forget that there were six jars, and the number six is identified in the Great Story as “man’s number.” Man’s institutional religious hypocrisy is transformed into divine kindness and compassion for a nameless, poor commoner.

  • Fruitful acts of divine love and compassion towards others
  • Bold defiance of institutional corruption and hypocrisy

In the quiet this morning I find myself desiring to embody these two characteristics that John identifies in Jesus.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

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The Person I Want to Be

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The Person I Want to Be (CaD Ps 112) – Wayfarer

Praise the LORD!
Blessed are those who fear the Lord,
    who find great delight in his commands.
Psalm 112:1 (NIV)

I happen to be in the middle of a rather large project for a client. Our company has been helping them design, develop, launch, and implement a Quality Assessment (QA) program for their company. You know, the ol’ “Your call may be monitored for training and coaching purposes“? That’s a big chunk of what I do.

So it was this weekend that I’ve been deep in the weeds producing some training to introduce the program to my client’s front-line team members. One of the things I stated in the training is that you always want to build a QA program with the goal in mind, and in this case, the goal is to actually achieve the client’s corporate Mission and Vision statement.

Many years ago, as my life was emerging from the ash heap I had made of it, I happened upon today’s chapter, Psalm 112. I remember reading the lyrics to this ancient Hebrew song and realizing that it described the person I want to become and to be on this earthly journey. I remember thinking that day, “When this journey’s over and my number is up, I would hope that when friends and loved ones gather to celebrate my homecoming they could read Psalm 112 and say, ‘THAT was Tom.'”

“Blessed…” (vs. 1)
I have been blessed in so many ways, and never want to lose sight of that or fail to acknowledge it and be grateful for the grace given to me that my life doesn’t merit.

“Children mighty in the land…” (vs. 2)
I want to leave a legacy, not of earthly accomplishments, wealth, and fame, but children, grandchildren, and descendants whose life journeys walk the path of Psalm 112, as well.

“Wealth and riches are in their houses…” (vs. 3)
I never thought of this as a monetary blessing, but a spiritual one. Jesus said, “Don’t seek treasure on earth where it can be stolen, decay, and where you will leave it behind for all eternity. Seek eternal spiritual treasure that can’t be stolen. It doesn’t rot, and it will profit you through all eternity.” As a follower of Jesus, that’s the goal. That said, It also reminds me that if I manage my blessings and resources with the wisdom and the principles found in the Great Story, I will likely be just fine from a financial perspective. I haven’t arrived, by the way. I’m still in process.

“Even in darkness light dawns…” (vs. 4)
“They have no fear of bad news. Their hearts are secure, trusting in the Lord…” (vs. 7)
“Their hearts are secure. They will have no fear…” (vs. 8)
As an Enneagram Type Four, my core temperament always fights pessimism. Ironic, then, that God led me into a career in which my monthly and annual income is an ever-changing sum and has never been a sure-thing that secured by a corporation, a government, or a union (even though even that sense of security is ultimately an illusion). Recently I told our daughter that I perpetually assume that I’m one day away from living in a van down by the river. These words from Psalm 112 have become a spiritual bulwark against my pessimistic personality. It gives me an anchor in life’s “Chain Reaction of Praise” moments. I haven’t arrived, by the way. I’m still in process.

“…for those who are gracious, compassionate, righteous.” (vs. 4)
“Good will come to those who are generous and lend freely,
who conduct their affairs with justice…” (vs. 5)
“They have freely scattered their gifts to the poor…” (vs. 9)
Much of my life journey has been marked by a scarcity mentality. Along the way, I have come to realize that this has come from the perfect storm of my Type 4 personality, the realities of growing up as the youngest sibling, and growing up in a home in which my needs were always met, but there was never had a lot of financial margin. Psalm 112 and it’s repeated call to grace, compassion, generosity, and justice has been instrumental in helping me grow out of my scarcity thought-patterns and into the loving generosity that Jesus asks of me. I haven’t arrived, by the way. I’m still in process.

“…their righteousness endures forever.” (vs. 3)
“Surely the righteous will never be shaken;
they will be remembered forever...” (vs. 6)
“…their righteousness endures forever;
their horn will be lifted high in honor.” (vs. 9)
As I grew up, there was a period of time in which the women from my mother’s family would gather together. They would feast, laugh, share memories, and honor my great-grandmother, Grandma Daisy. Grandma Daisy Day made an impression on me as a kid. It revealed to me the legacy and impression that my maternal clan’s matriarch made on her descendants through her faith, love, grace, and generosity. She died pretty much penniless after a life dotted with tragedy and struggle. Her eternal bank account was full, and the legacy she left on her descendants was priceless. That’s the kind of legacy I’d like to leave behind, as well.

In the quiet this morning, I am celebrating the impression Psalm 112 has had on my life journey. It’s memorized, and etched in my soul. I have the song title inked on my right bicep, where it reminds me that my strength lies in becoming the person Psalm 112 describes.

It’s good reminder on this “reset” day that Monday is on a weekly basis and I’m heading back into life’s fray.

Have a great week, my friend!

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Doing Something

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Doing Something (CaD Ex 12) – Wayfarer

…on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord.
Exodus 12:12 (NRSVCE)

We are living through strange times.

Yesterday Wendy and I attended our local gathering of Jesus’ followers which was meeting corporately for the first time in months. With everything set up and following social distancing rules by local and state authorities, it just felt weird and disconcerting. This physical and relational reality only intensified the spiritual and emotional turmoil Wendy and I found ourselves in as we grapple with the inexcusable murder of George Floyd and the intensity of reactions it sparked across our nation and the world.

As worship began I fell to my knees as the emotional dam burst within me. Wendy and I wept together. Like almost everyone else with whom we discuss the situation, we are sad and angry. We agonize over what we can and must do in the wake of this crime and the evil, complex, vast, and multi-dimensional injustice of racism that continues to perpetuate in our nation, as it has for hundreds of years.

As I read today’s chapter, I felt the synchronicity that often comes in the morning when I open to the chapter that has fallen onto my schedule that day. It felt like no mistake that I was reading of the Hebrews’ climactic escape from their slavery in Egypt. What struck me this morning, and which I never internalized in the countless times I’ve read and studied it, is that the event is more than just the freedom of the Hebrews out of the chains of their slavery. Their escape took place amidst the wailing cries of their oppressors. God arranged for the oppressors to experience the pain, suffering, and loss that they and their system had visited on others for hundreds of years.

I also cannot help but mull over the fact that this same Hebrew/Arab conflict has lasted for millennia. The hatred and acts of aggression, oppression, and violence have gone back and forth and lasted for so long that I personally consider it impossible to completely plumb the depths. Guilt and innocence, oppression and suffering are found on both sides throughout history. From ancient tribal disputes to the settlement disputes on the West Bank today. How strange to read today’s chapter and to realize that the events lie at the root of yet another vast, complex, multi-dimensional human conflict that continues to perpetuate to this day.

So where does that leave us?

Wendy arranged for us to have a Zoom meeting with our children yesterday afternoon. From their homes in South Carolina and Scotland, we all talked and shared about our thoughts, feelings, experiences, struggles, and desire to do something. Every one of us shared our thoughts and intentions around what we can do.

In our local gathering of Jesus’ followers, we heard a humble, vulnerable, and honest message from Kevin Korver who, to his credit, passionately addressed the situation head-on. In the end, he led us in this corporate action list:

As we remain and abide in the circle of love, the divine dance of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we will:
Repent and confess
Bear good fruit
Listen, hear, and pray with love
Bless not curse
Love sacrificially
Become a bridge builder
Seek new friends.

Will it make a difference? It’s not a miraculous answer to the evil, complex, vast, and multi-dimensional injustice that continues to perpetuate in our nation. But, perhaps if I who profess to be a follower of Jesus actually and intentionally do these things it will make a change in me and those around me.

I’m reminded this morning that Harriett Tubman led approximately 70 slaves to freedom on some 13 missions. Seventy out of some 6 million slaves. She courageously and intentionally did what she could.

There’s no reason I can’t expect the same from myself.

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Shades of Schadenfreude

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[Jonah] prayed to the Lord, “Isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.
Jonah 4:2 (NIV)

As I get older, I’ve grown to enjoy etymology, the study of words and their origins. I find it fascinating how these building blocks of communication become part of our everyday conversations, and how they wax and wane in popular usage. I also find it fascinating how cultures ascribe certain significance, power, and meaning to certain words, while others don’t. Our kids in Scotland have a few great anecdotes about uncomfortable social moments when they discovered that a word they used, which has a benign meaning in the States, has a very different meaning in the U.K.

There is a word I first noticed a few years ago, and I’ve found that it’s growing in popularity: schadenfreude. It’s a compound German word that comes from the root words meaning “harm” and “joy“. It means to take pleasure in another’s person’s misfortune.

There certainly is a natural and rather harmless way that we enjoy seeing the bad guy get his comeuppance. I was one of the many who watched the entire series Game of Thrones. The series was masterful in creating really bad characters who I wanted to see come to a nasty, bitter end and was happy when it eventually happened.

At the same time, there is a dark side of schadenfreude that I feel like I’m witnessing more and more in our current culture. It’s not enough to disagree with another person’s political, religious, or social worldviews, we have to publicly call them names and post antagonizing memes on social media. Just last night I found myself shutting off social media and walking away. I realized how mean-spirited the posts were that I was reading and it wasn’t having a positive effect on my psyche or my feelings towards others.

In today’s final chapter of the story of Jonah, we finally learn what was at the heart of Jonah’s mad dash to flee from what God had asked him to do. Jonah didn’t want God to be gracious and merciful with his enemies. Jonah wanted to wallow in schadenfreude and watch his enemies, the Assyrians, suffer.

In the sermon on the mount, Jesus took five common statements about matters of relationship and then told His followers He was raising the bar. Jesus’ expectation for me as a follower is that I behave in a way that goes against the grain of common human behavior:

“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.”
Matthew 5:43-47 (MSG)

Reading Jonah’s story this week has caused me to do some real personal introspection. You can see it in the common ways my posts have ended the past few days.

As I was reading about the etymology of the word schadenfreude, I learned that many cultures and languages have a word that means the same thing. I recognize that there is a relatively harmless pleasure that I take when my favorite team’s rival loses. C’est la vie. I don’t, however, want to wake up someday and find myself in Jonah’s sandals. Following Jesus means loving, even those people who wish to see me suffer; Even those who actually act on it.

“Forgive them. They don’t realize what they’re doing.”

God, make me more like that.

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Matters of Heart

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He did what was right in the sight of the Lord, yet not with a true heart.
2 Chronicles 25:2 (NRSVCE)

In all my years as a follower of Jesus, I’ve observed that we as humans are far more comfortable with flesh than with Spirit. From our earliest years we’re taught to trust what our senses are telling us:

The stove coil is red and it’s radiating heat. Don’t touch it.

The meat smells funny. Don’t eat it.

Something in my knee just popped. Stop running.

I’m feeling light headed and nauseous. Better lie down.

Following Jesus, however, is a faith journey. God’s Message says that faith is “the assurance of what we hope for, evidence of that which we cannot see.” There’s no sight, smell, touch, taste, or hearing involved. Quite the opposite. Faith is beyond our physical senses. God continues to say over and over and over again that He judges not on what can be seen, but what is unseen; God looks at the heart.

When God was directing Samuel who he should anoint as king, He told the prophet: “The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

Yet I’ve observed continually that most followers of Jesus, and the institutions we create to organize ourselves, repeatedly revert back to our inherent human instinct to trust our base physical senses. We judge others on what we see in their appearance, what we observe in their behaviors, or we we hear about them from others. Our institutions create rules, both written and unwritten, about a person’s worth and standing before God based on how they look and/or behave. I’ve come to believe that we do this because it comes naturally, it is easy, and it gives us (both individually and as a group) comfort when others conform to the social, religious, and behavioral standards we stipulate and expect.

But that’s not how God operates. He says it quite plainly. “My thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are your ways my ways.” (Isaiah 55:8) And, as the Bard so beautifully put it: “There’s the rub.”

Dealing with the unseen motives and intents of the heart, as God does, is messy. It requires discernment, wisdom, grace, and risk.

In today’s chapter, the Chronicler describes Judah’s King Amaziah as a person who did the right things, but not from a true heart. His actions were admirable, his behavior conformed to expectation, but his motivations were all in the wrong place. It brings to mind the religious leaders of Jesus’ day, of whom Jesus said:

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get, but on the meat of God’s Law, things like fairness and compassion and commitment—the absolute basics!—you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you look, writing a life story that’s wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over commas and semicolons?

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You burnish the surface of your cups and bowls so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and gluttony. Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface will mean something.

“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You’re like manicured grave plots, grass clipped and the flowers bright, but six feet down it’s all rotting bones and worm-eaten flesh. People look at you and think you’re saints, but beneath the skin you’re total frauds.

“Snakes! Reptilian sneaks! Do you think you can worm your way out of this? Never have to pay the piper? It’s on account of people like you that I send prophets and wise guides and scholars generation after generation—and generation after generation you treat them like dirt, greeting them with lynch mobs, hounding them with abuse.”

The religious people of Jesus day were doing the same things I have observed in religious people of my day. Posturing, appearance, and propriety intended to prove righteousness from what can be physically seen and and audibly heard.

Jesus took a different approach. He gathered a motley crew of followers that included rough, uneducated fishermen, a pair of brothers with anger management issues, a sleazy tax collector, a thief, and a right wing terrorist. He taught them about faith. He exemplified the love he expected of them. He instilled in them compassion. They didn’t come close to measuring up to any kind of acceptable religious standard of their day. But that didn’t matter to God. “The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” 

God’s standard is as simple as a Broadway tune: “You gotta have heart!”

This morning I find myself wanting desperately not to be an Amaziah or a Pharisee. Screw religious trappings and the litmus tests of the institutional church.

I want more heart. And I want to find the heart of others, not their conformity to the standards with which I’m personally comfortable.

Chapter-a-Day

Hats, Fasting, and a Couple of Important Questions

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“Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted?”
Zechariah 7: 5 (NIV)

Yesterday I had the privilege of leading our local gathering of Jesus’ followers. I was kicking off a series of messages on Paul’s letter to the believers in Corinth. And so, I’ve been mired in studying the letter and the situation in Corinth around 55 A.D.  One of the themes that bubbles to the surface over and over again are instructions that Paul gave which are rooted in contemporary Corinthian culture. Other instructions are universal to human culture in all times.

I find myself asking, “What instructions were for the Corinthian believers at that time (that don’t fit our current realities)? What instructions may speak to me in 2018 (that the Corinthians couldn’t fathom almost 2000 years ago)? What instruction are ours (they apply to anyone, at any time, in any culture)?”

For example, one set of instructions is about covering your head. In first century Corinth there were layers of meaning in the cultural and religious aspects of whether you covered your head and when. Some of it came from Jewish law and tradition (which the Greek believers probably thought silly) and some of it was the practical differentiation of woman broadcasting in publicly that she was not one of Aphrodite’s temple priestess-prostitutes.

The truth of the matter is that until a generation or so ago, the tradition of women covering their heads in church and men removing their caps/hats was still a big thing culturally. The local Costume Shop has hundreds and hundreds of gorgeous women’s hats with cute little veils that locals have donated over the years (see featured photo). There was a time just a few decades ago when a woman would not go to church without a hat on. Today, in our culture, if a woman does so it’s simply a fashionable novelty.

Likewise, my dad and I have a good-natured, on-going feud when we’re gathered for family meals and it’s time to pray and eat. My dad gives me grief if I have a cap on. I have never been able to discern a good reason for having to remove my hat when the family is  informally ordering a pizza and watching the game. I joke with my dad that it’s actually more sanitary if I keep my cap on. He always wins the argument on his authority and my respect, but I’ve still never heard a good reason.

The bottom-line question is: “Why (or why not) are we doing this?”

That was the exact question God had for the prophet Zechariah. Zechariah and company inquired of the Lord whether they should continue to observe traditional months of fasting. God replied, “Why are you fasting?” God then goes on to point out that what Zac and the boys are not doing are things like being just, showing compassion to people who are different, looking out for the needs of orphans, widows, and the oppressed. The implied question God is asking as I read between the lines is this: “Why would I care if you self-righteously starve yourself in some public display of your religiosity when you’re missing the heart of what I desire from you — to love others as you love yourself?”

Good question, and a good question for those of us who claim to follow Jesus and have wrapped ourselves in religious traditions of all kinds over the years.

“What does God care about? What, therefore, should I really care about? What in my religious practices, rituals, and cultural rules do I make a higher priority than the things God truly cares about?