Tag Archives: Friendship

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Proverbs 28

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In the end, people appreciate honest criticism 
      far more than flattery.
Proverbs 28:23 (NLT)

While studying theatre in college, my professor worked hard to teach us the value of honest criticism and temptation of listening to empty flattery. After a show you’ll have a throng of people tell you “good job,” but that hollow compliment does nothing for you. When someone tells you “good job,” my professor said, your response should be “What was good about it?” A specific praise about a moment, an action, or a decision you made on stage that struck them positively is something from which you can learn and build on. A simple “good job,” profits you nothing.

Better still is when someone gives you the gift of an honest piece of criticism. A character in the script I’m polishing up is given a very specific age to play. After reading the play, one of the readers commented that the lines and stage directions seemed too young for the age described. When she said that it was like a cloud parted and I saw it for the first time. She hit the nail on the head. I completely rewrote a bunch of dialogue and action to fix it.

I don’t understand people who think criticism is a bad thing, inherently negative, and something not to be tolerated. I may not like some of what I hear, but if I understand what’s not working for people I can fix it or at least I can better communicate why I’m doing or saying or acting the way I do so that others can have a better understanding of the decisions I’ve made.

Today, I’m grateful for those in my life who are willing to be honestly critical with me.

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Proverbs 25

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Better Off Dead
Better Off Dead (Image via RottenTomatoes.com)

Singing cheerful songs to a person with a heavy heart 
      is like taking someone’s coat in cold weather 
      or pouring vinegar in a wound.
Proverbs 25:20 (NLT) 

I grew up with John Cusack‘s teen angst comedy Better Off Dead. It was a cult classic back in the day. The film is about the travails of Cusack’s character, Lane, whose girlfriend dumps him for the captain of the Ski team. Lane goes into a deep depression and the results are extremely comical.

There’s one great scene that flashed in my head this morning when I read the proverb above from today’s chapter. The day after getting dumped, Lane gets in his parent’s station wagon to drive to school. Of course, on the radio he immediately hears Neil Sedaka singing the chipper tune Breaking Up is Hard to Do. He switches the station again and again, but every song is a frustratingly inappropriate reminder of getting dumped. The scene cuts to an exterior shot of the car as Lane chucks the car’s radio, which has clearly been ripped from the dashboard, out the window.

Comedies tickle our funny bone by creating situations to which we can all relate. No one wants to hear Neal Sedaka’s eternally cheery voice, with doo-wop girls behind him, reminding you that you just got dumped. You want to hear a Lead Belly or B.B. King wailing out the blues. You want to hear a good angry thrashing song to scream out your pain and frustration.

To King Solomon’s point, a friend is someone who is going to empathize with you in your time of need. When you’re walking through a deep, dark valley in life, a friend will recognize where you are and will join you there so they can be your companion as you make your way out of it.

Today, I’m thankful for great friends who knew not to play cheerful songs when my heart was heavy. I hope I have, and will be, an empathetic friend to my companions in their own times of need.

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Proverbs 20

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Many will say they are loyal friends, 
      but who can find one who is truly reliable?
Proverbs 20:6 (NLT)

Who are you gonna call at 2:00 a.m. when the world is crashing down around you and you are at the end of your rope?

That question has been asked at various men’s gatherings I’ve attended over the years. It’s is a worthwhile question every man should answer. As men, we tend to retreat into our man cave, switch on ESPN, fire up the video game, break open a cold one, and zone out. With other guys we talk sports, we talk cars, we talk babes, we play poker, we ride Harley’s, we hunt. But all the man cave manliness can easily distract us from developing relationships and having crucial conversations that get to the important stuff of life.

What does it really mean to be a man? How do I love my wife well? How do I do right by my kids? What do I really do with this whole “God thing?” When you’re not having those conversations with other men, then the shit hits the fan at 2:00 a.m., we need to pick up the phone and cry out for help, but there is nothing but a blank stare and a feeling of panic. I’ve got no one I can call.

Today, I’m thankful that I not only have a guy I can call – I have a list of guys on speed dial. I have a list of guys starting with my family, to my oldest friend, to guys from high school, to guys from college, to guys with whom I’ve walked this journey the past few years. I am so blessed with friends with whom I can live it up in the man cave having a blast being guys, but then I can then pour a cold one, stoke up a stogie, and wade fearlessly into the deep weeds of life.

Those kind of relationships are generally not stumbled upon. They aren’t the pay out of a relational lottery. They are sought after, cultivated, and consciously grown over time. If you live in my area, this is a great place to start the search.

Who are you gonna call?

Random Thoughts

Tom’s 30 Day Blogging Challenge Day 8

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If you were on trial and someone you know (who is not an attorney) had to act as your legal representative, who would you want to defend you?

If it please the court:

What is really cool about this question is that I have several people that I could and would call upon. I had fun thinking about my many friends and acquaintances and considering their many positive qualities. No doubt I could put together an impressive amateur legal team. I had to think about the right mix of qualities that this person would need to have to be a good legal representative. The person I think who best exemplies that necessary mix would be my friend Chad.

Chad has that intangible quality that experience has led me to believe he could, and likely would, succeed at almost anything he set his heart and mind to accomplish. He’s intelligent and a quick learner. He presents himself well and would be articulate, easily building rapport with the judge and jury. I also see in Chad the necessary ability to feel empathy and compassion deeply while holding those feelings in check when there’s a battle to be fought and the need to focus on the immediate need.

Underneath all that, he’s a good friend and I know he’d have my back and take the responsbility very seriously.

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Zechariah13

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A crowd of people in the main square of Copenh...
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I’ll say, ‘That’s my people.’
   They’ll say, ‘God—my God!'” Zechariah 13:9b (MSG)

Walking through a crowd of people at a local event, I know a lot of people. Most of them are simply familir acquaintances. I smile. I wave. I greet the person by name and utter a non-chalant “How are you?” as both of us keep moving. They are a face in the crowd. A familiar face, perhaps, but still just a face with a name and little bit if of knowledge that makes the slight differentiation from a complete stranger.

Walking on through the crowd, I see someone I know. More than passing knowledge of their name and a few facts about them, I know this person intimately. We are good friends. I stop. He stops. We embrace warmly. My “How are you?” is now directed to the person with eye contact and intention. I want to know. I will stand and listen for the response. We have spent time together. We have shared the journey. The knowledge of one another is far more intimate. More than that, there is an affinity for one another. The crowd mills around in every direction, but attention is focused on this one person and this one conversation. When the conversation ends, I am quick to tell my fellow companions about the person to whom I was just having conversation. “That was my friend,” I’ll say as I describe him and our relationship. I want them to know my friend, as well.

I think about God’s Message to Zechariah and feel underneath the text His strong desire to be in relationship with us. Not just a casual, passing knowledge about one another but a deep relationship that comes from sharing time, conversation and experience. The kind of relationship that sources a desire to proclaim it, and share it with others. “That’s my people!” God says. “That’s my God,” I say to my companions.

I walk through the crowd. What about God? Is He a complete stranger. Would I know Him if I bumped into Him? Is he simply a familiar face for whom I have not problem smiling and waving with a passing nod. Or, is He someone I know and would gladly stop to talk and introduce to my companions?

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 22

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Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ This is the most important, the first on any list. But there is a second to set alongside it: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ These two commands are pegs; everything in God’s Law and the Prophets hangs from them.”  Matthew 22:37-40 (MSG)

A certain friend found himself in a tough spot. Despite knowing better, he’d made a mess of his life. He’d squandered what he had going for him and wandered a long way from the straight and narrow. Embarrassed and ashamed of his behavior, my friend’s parent, loved ones, and church friends seized every opportunity to remind him of all that he had done wrong and give him a piece of their minds. It didn’t take long before my friend avoided them like the plague, shunning any communication with them in the hope of avoiding their condemning and judgmental jabs.

About that time, a stranger came along who saw what a fix my friend was in and began to walk beside him. The stranger did not condone my friends’ obnoxious behavior, but nevertheless chose to listen, to have gentle conversation, and to be present in my friend’s life. The stranger’s love and grace became instrumental in my prodigal friend’s restoration.

I don’t know why moral commands seem to outweigh the command to love when it comes to those we should love the most. Time and time again I watch people act as if moral failure in another person seemingly renders the command to love null and void, giving them license to shun and/or condemn. In this, I’m as guilty as the next person. I wish I’d shown my friend the same love and grace as the stranger.

This week is Easter, and I’m thinking a lot about Jesus laying down His life in the ultimate act of sacrificial love for people who didn’t deserve it. When I’d wandered far from the path, Jesus responded with forgiveness and grace. He took the penalty of my sin upon himself and received the punishment He didn’t deserve so that I could be free from it.

If I don’t respond in the same way to others who are similarly lost, I somehow get the sense that I’m profaning what Jesus did for me.

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Wayfarer's Journal

Parenting, Like Good Friendships, Never End

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A few days ago I called my friend, Scott, to wish him a Happy Birthday. Scott is my most tenured friend. We met when I was four or five years old; it was so long ago that it predates my conscious memory. He lived a few houses down the street from me and our friendship began with Big Jim and G.I. Joes. It carried on through Schwinn Spyder five-speeds with banana seats, through paper routes, games of freeze-tag and after school basketball games on the Johnson’s driveway. We went through high school together, got in trouble together in Dr. Kober’s Hermeneutics class in college, and were in each others weddings. While our adult years have come and gone with relatively little contact, we can always connect and immediately pick up where we left off.

So it was with our brief exchange on the phone the other night. When Scott asked how life was, I remarked that I feel as though parenting is requiring more of my time and energy now that my girls are grown and gone and out of the house – more time and energy than was required when they were in high school and living under my roof. Scott laughed.

It’s almost 2:00 a.m. and I’m writing this post from the lobby of my hotel in Denver, Colorado. Knowing that my daughter was planning to drive home from the Twin Cities tonight, and hearing about a big snow storm bearing down on the Midwest, I texted Madison to make sure she’d checked the weather.  I told her that I didn’t want her and the car she purchased this week in the ditch of I-35 in the wee hours of the morning.

The phone woke me and Wendy up at 1:25 a.m. The ditch from which she was calling me was just south of Albert Lea, MN.

[sigh]

And so, I sit here in the lobby praying and waiting for her call to tell me the Minnesota State Patrol has arrived, that the tow truck is not going to cost more than the low limit on her credit card, and that she is safely back on the road. That accomplished, I will sit here in the lobby and pray some more until I get the call that her car is running and she has found the nearest safe, warm place to ride the storm out.

So, I am finding that parenting never ends, though the responsibilities and demands ebb and flow through the changing stages of our children’s lives. With his knowing laugh, I’m guessing Scott has found the same to be true.

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day 1 Chronicles 27

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Hushai the Arkite was the king’s friend. 1 Chronicles 27:33b (MSG)

How cool for Hushai to be forever memorialized in God’s Message as “the king’s friend.” That’s not a bad way to be remembered.

I look back at my journey and am grateful for all those friends who have shared it with me. Some friends shared the path for a leg or two before striking out on their own way. Other friends have been present off and on through time. Then there are those who have been a constant presence in one way or another. I’m blessed.

Today, I’m grateful for my friends past and present. I’m thankful for the difference they’ve made in my life.

Creative Commons photo courtesy of Flickr and joshmaz
Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day 1 Chronicles 19

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Crowd. But when David’s servants arrived in Ammonite country and came to Hanun to bring condolences, the Ammonite leaders warned Hanun, “Do you for a minute suppose that David is honoring your father by sending you comforters? Don’t you know that he’s sent these men to snoop around the city and size it up so that he can capture it?” 1 Chronicles 19:2-3 (MSG)

When my daughters were entering their teen years, I told both of them that I would trust them until they did something to lose my trust. Then I warned them that they did NOT want to lose my trust. I found it interesting that both of my daughters came to appreciate and value my trust. While both girls were not without their teenager mistakes, I know that both of them came to value that trust, especially in contrast to the irrational mistrust they saw other parents placing on their friends.

Along the journey, I’ve tended to believe the best in people and their motives, and it’s served me well. I figure it’s best to treat people the way you want to be treated, and I always want people to believe the best in me. I can count precious few times in my life that a person took advantage of that trust. They were isolated cases that taught me a lot about the individual involved. They were exceptional situations and I don’t think a few exceptions justifies dismantling the golden rule.

How different Hanun’s outcome would have been if he’d simply taken David’s condolences as they were meant. Accepting David’s token of friendship could have meant abundant blessings and a meaningful alliance. Instead, Hanun found himself with a very powerful enemy.

Today, I’m choosing to believe the best in people.

Creative Commons photo courtesy of Flickr and jp_42