Preaching to the Chorus Line: Part I

Keep in time. You're doing fine.

In Memoriam... Marty Osten

Marty Osten, he was a Chicagoan. So, we'll call him “MO” for short. I know Marty and I know his MO. You see, he came from the same place I do. 

I shared in his struggles. Sometimes, every day was a struggle. I shared his triumphs. There can never be too many of those. I watched Marty shoot for the stars, and accept something much closer to ground floor reality. Yes, Marty and I, we come from the same place. 

Marty had his heart broken by a woman who he still loved. He carried her picture with him everywhere he went. He'd pull it out and look at it once in a while to remind himself that the love was worth the pain. Yes, it's true, Marty and I come from the same place.

Marty was a computer guy back before the dot-com bubble burst, and though he was outpaced by technology, he never grew tired of the chase. Sometimes all we have to live on is faded glory from yesterday's race. Yup, Marty and I come from the same place.

There were many times I would find Marty at the library, and he'd have his aging laptop and connected external drives splayed out before him like a personal corporate network. He'd developed an amazing system to file all his stuff that never took him where he wanted to go. Marty and I, we're from the same place. Yes, we are.

He struggled with addictions. He was a decent man. I'd lend him five or ten bucks when he needed it, and he always paid it back. He was a humble man who wasn't afraid to share his doubts and fears. That's something I will miss about Marty. We shared a bond of trust deeper than I can share here, because Marty and I we came from the same place.

Once in awhile, we'd talk about the place we come from in whispers because it was a public library and people might take offense. Marty was sensitive to others, and he wanted to be well liked. In all his strengths and all his frailties, in all his superhuman dreams and all his humanity, Marty and I come from the same place... just like the rest of you gathered here today. 

We all come from the same place and we will surely all return to Him. That place is God, and Marty he just fell asleep on the ride.

Sleep tight Marty, we'll be joining you soon.

My Friend Sharon

I spent some time today helping a great friend and Sister in Christ. Her name is Sharon, and she was moving from her home to her home. I know that is redundant, but that's what she was doing and I was helping her put it all together. Putting it all together is what we do when we move after taking it all apart. That's the evolution of moving from home to home. We take the old apart and rebuild it all anew, only the location changes… or maybe there is more to this moving thing that we should consider.

Moving can be frustrating, intimidating, and stressful in more ways than we can ever be prepared for, since no matter how well we plan our move, there are always the actions of others which we cannot predict or even comprehend after the fact. However, a move from home to home can also be fun, exhilarating, and filled with hope for something better than we had before. In most cases, that is why we move, we are more pleased with the potential of the new home and all that it offers, such as; community, schools, property appreciation potential, and comfort over the old home.

My friend Sharon had a beautiful home, the first she ever owned, which held many fond memories within its walls.

• Our coffee and cigarette times on the front porch
• Our Bible studies in the living room
• The times she and I wept for (many) joys and (a few) sorrows
• Our granola disaster in the kitchen
• Here compulsive vacuuming throughout
• Our landscaping conundrums in the yard
• Her indecision and my vexation

Those are just the ones I had the pleasure of enjoying with her, and I am just one of her many loving friends and family.

There were also some more recent, not so heart-warming memories which I will gladly fail to enumerate herein. These along with all the positive things is what helped her decide to move forward from home to home.

I pray that she will soon discover that the wonderful memories from which she avulsed herself  are no longer held within the walls of the home she left behind because they made the move with her. As for the unpleasant ones, I pray that she will leave them to die in the cellar of the past where they belong. Amen.

The past is that which we leave behind, the present is that which we carry, and the future is where we're going with…  all the taped and labeled boxes, wrapped China, bundled pictures, the stuff we know we took but will never find, and most importantly all the perfectly preserved and safely packed beautiful things we've been a part of before we left home for home.

God's Hegelian Dialect Part lII: Reaction

In Part II, I offered my understanding of, and reason for Creation. I also filled in how our human race fit into this grand design. It may be more accurately expressed, “How the grand design was tailored to fit us.” Yet, it seems that we are either improperly made or poorly installed parts in this wondrous system. Whales don't struggle with these issues, neither do axolotls (See images below). One look at this guy and you know that he'll fit in anywhere.

You may also realize that he is part of the whimsical Provision of God discussed in Part l.

Not so long ago, Christendom erroneously placed the Earth at the center of the solar system not by the testimony of Scripture, but by compiled human error and an assumption about what Scripture “should” (by human understanding) imply.

How did such a bizarre twist of reason come to be de facto Doctrine?

In the late second century, a pagan astronomer named Ptolemy of Alexandria formulated the geocentric system which placed the the earth at the center of the solar system with the sun and all other planets orbiting around us. Ptolemy's error remained “scientific” fact and was later adopted as Christian dogma which lasted into the Age of Reason. It made sense to the now powerful Christian hierarchy that God's Creation would place us at the center. The Faithful who dared question Church authority on such matters were at risk of being declared heretics and punished accordingly. It took until 1992 for the Catholic Church to own up to its mistreatment of Galileo who promoted a  heliocentric solar system which placed the sun at the center.

Throughout Church history there have been countless martyrs of science who have paid a heavy price for standing on their God given reason in opposition to Church doctrines. As a result, today there are many in the field of science who hold a grudge.

On the other side of this implied duality, many within the Body of Christ feel that science has demoted humanity from divinely created beings to mere chemical accidents. Scientists who support this worldview will claim that the ekklesia have it all wrong. In fact, it’s been a promotion for humanity from fortuitous chemical accident to quick-witted, mostly hairless descendant of apes. This has not brought solace to those who put their trust in God, and they hold a grudge, as well.

More's the pity, in my opinion.

What I find most egregious about this centuries old feud for the heart, mind, and soul of mankind is how baseless much of it is on both sides.

Scientists under the erroneous instruction of Christian theologians who misinterpreted the first few chapters of Genesis became a smoldering hot spot between these two factions. (Remember that fear and faction do not exist independently.) Genesis was never intended to be a scientific textbook for the Creation. Much of it is allegory as the Jews, who wrote it, understand. Somehow in the original schism between Jews and Christians this minor fact, which turned into major factions, was overlooked.The problems that we struggle with most as individuals, communities, and denominations are the ones we cause ourselves.

I look for harmony where there is discord between science and Scripture. For instance, the Flood story recorded in Genesis 6 correlates nicely with what anthropology calls the "population bottleneck", a time when humans nearly disappeared from the planet. Both worldviews support a near extinction event in our recent past. If we insist that it must include a man named Noah on a boat with all non-marine creatures on-board, then we have ample fodder for discord. But, if we allow the Flood to be allegory of an anthropologically supported event, which I believe it is, it resonates in both heart and mind. A “perfect pitch” I find to be exclusively reserved for God. Here is the common ground we as people of faith, reason, and reasonable faith should be seeking and taking with each other. Instead, religion and reason continue as adversaries both believing it's either one or the other.

While today in the year 2016 (or 5776 by the Hebrew calendar) we, with few holdouts, accept that the earth is not the center of the solar system. It isn’t even a very significant planet when compared to many of our local neighbors. The Earth has only one moon, no rings, no giant spots, or other immediately distinguishing features. One might say our pale blue dot of a planet is somewhat boring at first glance, but God is a Creator who focuses on content over superficial appearance. This may explain why He humbled Himself to come as a man from the rural backwater of Galilee to walk with us, His precious Creation, even when we refused to walk with Him.

Our solar system is nowhere near the center of our Milky Way galaxy. We are out in the boonies of our galaxy, nestled in an unassuming location between two notable spiral arms. Nothing seems to indicate that there is anything important here by our human conception. We'd expect to be up front and center where the Supreme Being presumably “should” have placed us. However, being a bit closer to that “prized galactic real estate” would kill us. The radiation levels near galactic center are far in excess of our capacity. The dead center is occupied by an inactive black hole that if it were active could gobble up our solar system like a snack. We are placed in what seems to be a very safe, quiet backwater, a lot like that undistinguished place called Galilee. This kind of overlooked corollary demonstrates to me that we have a much smarter God than we anticipate, appreciate, or even dare to imagine.

“For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God”, rings as true today as when it was first written. When we look at the empirical data, we have a most (fasten your seat-belts, please) anthropocentric Universe. (Both cosmologists and animal rights activists just found a new common enemy in me. Ah harmony!)

Consider, what this Universe offers us, it meets our every human need from simple matter (which is far from simple) to awesome wonder (quantum levels of complexity beyond the “simple” stuff.) Here we sit perched atop the Animal Kingdom, not by a slim margin but head and shoulders above our nearest intellectual rival. (Animal rights activists hate me even more and evolutionary biologist are now signed on), I feel perfectly capable of pointing out to my loyal opposition that humans are the only species capable of taking offense at my comments. Prove me wrong, but until then…

Q.E.D.

Rather than working with science, many of the cloth have turned against science. Many of the lab coat have turned against a God of seeming irrationality and increasingly scant probability. That is our reaction. We are divided by our beliefs. Partisanship is the glue which divides Theists and Atheists, Catholics and Protestants, Creationists and Evolutionists, Blacks and Whites, Republicans and Democrats, Capitalists and Communists, Monists and Dualists, Christians and Jews, us and all. This is a very poor reaction.

While we may disagree on God or an afterlife, we can surely agree that we will all pass through the great equalizer, the final harmonizer we call death. Maybe we should just "Be kind for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle."* Along the way we might recall that Jesus often evoked quarrelsome reactions from His disciples by providing the right answer to their wrong question.

* The origin of the quote, "Be kind for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle" is a matter of great controversy attributed from another alumni of Alexandria, Philo of Alexandria, or maybe it was Plato, or John Watson, or Ian MacLaren which is John Watson's real name? 

"Oh, bother!"  ~ Winnie the Pooh (for sure!)

God's Hegelian Dialect Part II: Our Problem

In Part One, I covered The Problem as if the issue were solved, which it is. Both The Problem and The Solution were foregone conclusions an eternity before anything in Creation came to be. They were “known knowns” as Donald Rumsfeld would have redundantly categorized this matter. 

The Fall of Man, as recorded in the third chapter of Genesis, was not only expected, but... (You may want to brace yourself. Fair warning)... necessary. 

Yes, that’s right, I said, “necessary”. The Fall of Man was incontrovertibly, inexorably, and categorically unavoidable. It was an essential part of God's Plan. Now, before you start warming up a burning stake for me to occupy, allow me to explain…

However, for the benefit of the less reactionary readers among us, few though they may be...

• The Tree of Knowledge wasn't placed conveniently within Eve's reach by some design flaw on God's part.

• The “craftiest of all the creatures” didn't appear by parthenogenesis, nor was his craftiness the result of happenstance.

• Eve didn't just happen to be as gullible as she was by chance.

• Adam wasn't so easily influenced by his wife by a role of the dice.

• God wasn't incommunicado whilst the Serpent plied his trade.

If the Fall narrative is true in fact or merely allegory, this leaves us with only one reasonable option, it was planned. So precisely well planned by the Ancient of Days, Himself, that He begot the Solution prior to the Problem, our Problem. 

Now, before you curse God for The Fall of Man, which might have been more appropriately named, “The Trip of Man”, consider what this means. Moreover, consider the Nature of the Supreme Being that Created this most beautiful Universe with perfectly balanced chemistry, physics, and geology to produce our galaxy. Then, consider this God, this Almighty God who placed our solar system out of harm's way at the outside edge of a spiral arm a long distance from galactic center. Contemplate this awe inspiring God who waited the 12.75 billion years for all to be perfect for us to inhabit the place we call home, planet Earth. Mull over this God of Love and Forgiveness and  Provision and Protection, and when you have thoroughly reviewed all of these Works of the Almighty ask yourself, “What's His purpose for all of this, this Creation?”

Are you Stumped? 

Okay, I'll give you the answer…

As any proud parent, He made our nursery beautiful…

Spacious too...

Deep as well...

Plenty of headroom to grow...

We can have company…

Or make it just you and me…

God will be there too. Guaranteed!

All of these wonderful features and everything else we know and love is right here in God's nursery. 

God did a great job, did He?

So, here we are in the safety and comfort of Our Father's beautifully prepared physical nursery for spiritual beings. We are so well provided for that we can envy, covet, and become jealous of each other just like a toddler who always want the other child's toy even when holding an identical toy. We all know that type of selfish, greedy, self-centered child. They are so easy to identify, especially when it's your toy at risk, but somehow when we are that demanding brat we have a hard time taking that blame.

Here, we learn the cost of sin in its fullness. One painful lesson or more at a time. The syllabus covers important subjects like the folly of deception, the sting of betrayal, the bitter fruit of narcissism, the emptiness that a life built on consumerism provides to the dying, and all the other nasty stuff that our broken human nature entails. These are the types and kinds of experiences and feelings that we will need to be complete beings, our finished product, capable and worthy co-rulers with Christ.

Today, there are many Christians praying for the Rapture. They will tell you that they want to leave this wicked, sinful world because they just can't wait to be with Jesus. However, I think that they we're the kind of kids who couldn't wait until summer vacation, or the weekend, or whatever else was off in the future and not happening right now. They miss a lot of life waiting for it to happen. They forget or perhaps never understood that our physical lives are not trivial, they are essential specifically to God. 

The time we spend as a corporeal seed may be ephemeral but it is absolutely vital to our purpose. The horrors we witness, the beauty we experience, the evil we endure, the warmth we share, the pain and the pleasure we feel are all teaching tools for our benefit. The negative experiences; horror, evil, pain, and so many others are often cited as evidence that there is no God or if there is, then He must be a malevolent deity. However, all of these maligned experiences provide us with the most valuable lessons we will ever receive. The lessons we learn through suffering are those we best remember. Indeed, if we never suffered injury, injustice, or betrayal, how would we ever learn forgive?

Today, suffering is something our modern paradigm urges us to avoid at nearly all cost. Pain avoidance is the primary focus of many human endeavors; healthcare, liability insurance, government bailouts, welfare programs, and even copper bracelets with bio-magnets sold on late night television infomercials. All are devised to eliminate or attenuate some form of suffering and all are all based at least partially on fraud. It makes perfect sense, doesn't it? Pain avoidance is dry-labbing a critical lesson. Without having truly suffered in our lives, how would we ever learn compassion?

Without evil in all its manifestations, how would we be able to comprehend good in all of its far more abundant forms?

Without knowing loneliness, how could we understand what it means to be in relationship, and to desire it?

Without the loss of your life's love, how would we know how to cherish every moment together?

How could we know much of anything that really matters unless we had suffered what it is to lack those very things?

So, that's our Problem. This is our homework problem assigned by the God who is the Solution here in the nursery He built for and with us.

May He bless you for and in all of your work on Our Problem.

God's Hegelian Dialect Part I: The Problem

The Problem

Our relationship with God began with Provision, the stuff of life. You know, the things and stuff that we cannot live without. Stuff like our bodies made of atoms arranged in molecules. None of those bonded atoms forming molecules have ever been alive, but all of them are you, and you are alive. That's not a chemical accident, and neither are you. That is the miracle of Provision, along with food, clothing, cute waitresses, hot tubs, Lamborghinis, and all the other necessities of life.

Okay, I don't really need the Lamborghini. I just want it. Hot tubs, too. The remainder is non-negotiable, and so is Provision. Without Provision, we are and have nothing. Provision is absolutely necessary and all Provision comes from God, even the most negotiable. From the unnecessary and the frivolous to the substance of you, all Provided by the Undivided.

Consider how many atoms you have created from a formless void. None. Everything you and I have, or ever will have is, was, and will be an act of God’s Provision. But why would He do such a thing? What's His angle? What do we owe Him in return? Where is the quid pro quo? That's our human nature at work. Always doubting, always on the defense, always fearing the coup de grace, the killing blow that concludes the negotiation. That is what the human form of grace looks like. We're looking for the price tag, the hook, and eventually the sting. It is God's  Nature to Create each of us as both provided (for others) and provided for (others for us),  the sum of which is our human Provision. The human family which crosses all races, all genders, all ethnicity, all borders, and every other superficial difference which separates thee from me. The whole being greater than the sum of its parts. That is a trademark of God.

Our relationship with God has one more element, another trademark of God. Our Father's desire for our happiness. That desire is called, Lovingkindness. Yes, Lovingkindness is a real word, but unfortunately we find very few applications for it in our modern world. We might feel something similar to Lovingkindness for our children, but our kids are also a point of personal pride for a parent. 


Lovingkindness embodies perfect selfless love, but we are not fully capable of true selflessness. It's not that we don't try or don't desire the experience, but we lack the ability to dispense perfect selfless love. Lovingkindness is not something that we possess in our rather limited collection of “gazoftiks”. Yes, gazoftiks is a real word, too. A real word that my father made up. It means “improvised tools”.  There is an old saying, “If the only tool you have is a hammer suddenly all your problems look like nails.” You don't accomplish much but you're destructive as can be. The Romans and the Temple apparatchik thought their problem could be solved by nails. Three of them to be specific. That's a human trademark.

If we searched for the human face of Lovingkindness, Mother Theresa and Gandhi come close to filling the order, at least our idealized versions of these saints. In my understanding, my worldview, only Jesus Christ makes the grade. In my picture book dictionary the entry for Lovingkindness has a picture of Jesus on the Cross in the moment He said,

“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)

I neglected to mention that my picture book dictionary has audio. Pretty cool, huh?

Lovingkindness holds forgiveness, as well. It isn't the type of forgiveness which we are familiar with in our legalistic system, our increasingly legalistic families, or our increasingly disparent churches. The Lovingkindness form of forgiveness is preemptive. God has Provided the solution for the problem before the problem existed. That Solution is named Jesus Christ.


So, there is The Solution. Yes, I know I didn't write much about The Problem, but that's how God works. He's pre-emtive. He provides The Solution before The Problem exists. That's another trademark of God.

ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES

Okay Addictions???

How much are you earning now? How much do you need to be making five years from now? Have you been working with your banker, accountant, or financial advisor towards a plan. Are you investment ratios right for this stage of your financial planning life? Is your insurance coverage adequate? How many years before the kids are going away to college? How long before you have to retire? What will the nursing home cost? Are you happy?

I bet your feeling a bit queasy, aren't you? It's alright, go ahead and take a few minutes to unclench that sphincter muscle and normalize your respiration. Think blue water, green rolling hills, and warm summer nights. Better now?

Money is an obsession. An approved obsession, but an obsession none the less. If you think about it a great deal and are fairly good at handling the green stuff, it's even considered a laudable preoccupation. Should you be one of those rare gems that eat, sleep, and dream cold hard cash but can multiply it like a magic act, you are practically worshipped.

Money or any other material wealth is an okay addiction, because we love it, we need it, and we cannot live without it. It's just that simple, isn't it?

Ever looked at your brother-in-laws mansion, boat, and BMW, and feel envy? Ever considered how your sister was so lucky to marry the plastic surgeon when you got the plumber, and felt that twinge of jealousy that visits occasionally?  Sure, we almost all have, that's called "covetousness".

What? Yes, it is the sin of coveting. It isn't the money that committed the sin, just your love of it. We live in a time and culture when coveting is called "inspiration", "motivation ", and "visualization". Keeping up with the Joneses, Browns, Bakers, and don't forget those real housewives and the Kardashians is a litmus test by which we judge how (and who) we are in the hierarchy of society. It's just a tool, that's all, isn't it?

Nope, but it's still an acceptable, excusable, and reasonable sin today, so that makes it okay. It's for a good cause, the ends justify the means, and it really can't hurt anything. Covetousness would be illegal if it were bad, so what's the difference?

How could you prove it in court? That would be a hell of a prosecution to convince even one juror that the accused coveted, maybe it was simple lifestyle enhancement. Perhaps a coincidence that two neighbors also bought increasingly flashy and expensive custom ski-racks for their identical, consecutive model year Mercedes Benz. It's possible.

Sure it is, but that doesn't change what it is, it's coveting and that's a sin. Oh, it is a socially acceptable sin because we live in a consumption based world and we also have a mortgage to pay.

Is it really that important?

God put it in the Top Ten, so tame your addiction or if you have figured it out, let God do the taming and be receptive to His Work. You may discover your ski-racks don't need Kevlar jacketed GPS and Forwards Looking Infrared Radar.

You may even find a little time to be happy.