Monthly Archives: July 2013

“Success Will Kill You” or “I Want You to Go Home. Seriously.”

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Isaiah 55 asks a good quesimagestion.

Well…a number of good questions.  Verse two asks, “Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy?”

God, if we could only ask that question more.  To ourselves.  To our kids. To our spouses.

But mostly to ourselves.

See, I have a lot of people sit on my couch in a week.  They talk.  I talk.  I listen.  They listen.

There’s a lot of it.

And one thing that I notice more and more from  pretty much everyone under the age of sixty these days is that we have this fixation on 80 hour work weeks and being busy.

There is a nasty myth going around that we need to be the first ones at work and the last ones home.  In fact, there’s a Forbes article from yesterday where entrepreneur extraordinaire John Nazar gives that very same advice.

We don’t.  And it’s killing us.  Jason Nazar may be successful, but at what price?

It’s at this point where I’ll say, “Physician, heal thyself” because Lord knows that I fall into the 80 hour work week trap a lot.

And it costs me.

So much, in fact, that I have a couple of blogs waiting in the wings where I admit to some of my bad work habits and what it’s doing to my spiritual life.

But more than anything I want to tell the majority of these couples, and singles, and people under sixty, to just go home.

Seriously.  Go home.

Part of the bane of the middle class is the idea that success means more money and prestige and more toys and more expensive vacations and more, more, more.  It’s like we get addicted to stuff and once we have a snort of “stuff” we can’t get it out of our noses and we have to consume it until our houses and calendars are cluttered and our hearts are empty.

This is a spiritual problem.  And it’s hard for someone like me because I can pretty much do “work” anywhere.  Because I deal in people, and people have this amazing way of sticking with you and crowding out your vision so that you don’t see your wife or husband or child or partner even when you’re at home because you’re stuck on someone else’s issues that you’ve decided is your own issue.

And by God you’re going to work that problem from sun up to sun down.

Because that’s success.  That’s what it takes.

If that’s it, then I’m going to excuse myself from the race.

And I want you to, too.

Our mothers and fathers fought hard in the labor movements to ensure a 40 hour work week.  And God damn our prosperity because we have kindly forgotten that and have opted in favor of 80 hours and email inboxes that must always be open lest we miss something.

80 hours, which means we burn the midnight oil long after our kids and spouses are in bed.  Because that’s what it takes. It takes us not spending quiet time next to our loved ones to be successful.  It takes being tired and grumpy in the morning to our kid because we have to put food on our middle class tables.

There are people who are working two or three jobs because they have to; that’s what it takes to survive.  That’s a terrible truth that could take some midnight oil to solve.

But many of us are working one job twice over in a week because that’s what it takes to have a three car garage.

Physician, heal thyself.

But I can’t.  And I don’t think the church has sufficiently taken on this issue, which is spiritual in nature, with our congregants.  We bemoan the demise of the family but blame it on mixed up gender roles instead of our addiction to success.  We bemoan that nobody comes on Sunday mornings and blame it on faithlessness and institutional decline instead of the fact that an 80 hour work week doesn’t want another hour of obligation…especially if that time could be spent catching up on work or getting a jump on work. Or spending time with our spouse and kids that we forfeited on Thursday to stay late.

We spend money on things that don’t feed us.  We labor for things that won’t satisfy.

We all know the story of pastors and nurses who sit at the bedsides of the dying and hear them say they wish they had worked less and loved more.  But somehow we all think we’re the exception to that.  And that we won’t regret 80 hours because we’ll retire early. And that’s what it takes.  And it’ll pay off one day.

I ran into a fellow pastor who is hired part-time at a church.  We were chatting and I said, “So what does part-time look like for you?” to which he responded, “Well, if I actually worked part time, I think I’d be a pretty crappy pastor.”

And I disagreed and said so.  I pushed back.  I don’t want to cultivate a society that expects full time work for part time pay, and I don’t want to cultivate an individual who accepts that they aren’t valuable enough to not be defined by their job.

It’s a spiritual issue.  In my work I can “work for God” so much that I lose sight of God altogether because I’m so busy.  In our work we can lose sight of ourselves, of our God-given identities, because we take on the identity of “success.”

Don’t be successful if it’s going to kill you.  In fact, I’d say that success will probably kill you…at least the parts of you that people love most and want most.

Time in community.  Time in family.  These are things I value.  These are things I want my parishioners to value.  Jesus wasn’t successful by any measurable standard.  And yet Jesus followers flock to mega-churches in mega-numbers because they want to be a part of something that succeeds…hoping it will bleed over into their personal lives.

How can we have spiritually healthy people if we have spiritual leaders and spiritual homes who are in the same rhythm as the mega-firm and the mega-business?

By and large, I just want you to go home.  And I want me to go home more. As a Christian, as a pastor, as someone who cares about the health and souls of my people, just go home.

And I want the church to tackle this issue more.

Seriously.

There Aren’t Just Six Types of Atheists

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CNN had a story yesterday entitled, “Behold, the Six Types of Atheists.”images

Where do I start?

I think it’s fine to have a story on atheism. It’s good, even. I do think it’s telling that, by and large, their atheist choices come predictably from Hollywood, academia, or the loud cast of militant atheism characters (with a notable exception being the Humanist chaplain who has a really wonderful book; I highly recommend it).  God forbid (a little pun there) we pull from atheist business owners, politicians, world leaders, or even regular every day people.

I think that, whether intentionally done or not, touting the usual atheist bastions of Hollywood and academia just reinforces this idea of liberalism going hand-in-hand with atheism.

And it doesn’t.  What about the thinking Christians out there? Or Hollywood theists? There are some, you know.  And they’re not all anti-intellectual and annoying (looking at you Stephen Baldwin and the faculty of Liberty University).

And I’m not saying that we now need a “Behold, the Six Types of Believers” or anything like that, but the closest thing I found on CNN to that story was a similar story pertaining to pics of “born again” celebrities who were either a) annoying about their beliefs or b) hyper fundamentalists.

What about folks like me?  I had a good long while of unbelief.  I came back to the faith quietly, without a lot of fanfare.  I practice my faith with, what I hope is, some humility and thought and a healthy dose of consideration.

What I’m trying to say, I guess, is that there aren’t just six types of atheism.  There are probably 600,000 types.  Because it’s not just enough to say you don’t believe in the reality of a God…we add all sorts of asterisks and appendices to the things we trust all the time.

Likewise, there aren’t just six types of theism or deism or any belief system you might want to name.  There are 6 million types.  Maybe 6 billion…as many as there are people who ascribe to faith in the world.

We don’t configure our worlds the same way.  I’m not talking about relativism here, I’m talking about reality.  If given a survey, I doubt we’d all come up with the same checked boxes within any camp: Christian, Buddhist, Atheist, or Zoroastrian.

And I guess I don’t like CNN trying to play as if there are six types of atheism, whether they’re just “painting with a wide brush” or actually trying to do some reporting (a first).

Because painting with such a wide brush allows authors like Hitchens and Dawkins to paint me into the canvas with people who claim to “believe” and claim the name “Christian” but look nothing like me.  Wide-brush painting might help us say something, but as Richard Yates sagely points out, “Never say anything that doesn’t improve on silence.”

And perhaps our world would be better without half the words in it.  My own words, included.

So, I’m a reluctant Christian; this is true.  But for all my atheist readers, I would encourage you to also be a reluctant atheist in light of CNN’s stereotyping of you yesterday.  After-all, do you want to be pigeonholed somewhere between Keira Knightley and Richard Branson, or would you rather land somewhere between Richard Dawkins and Kurt Vonnegut?

To be fair, I find those characters much less annoying and much more insightful than Kirk Cameron or Joel Osteen…

But I still wouldn’t feel good just being stuck on their continuum.

And as long as we keep imagining that everyone fits in a nice little box, it makes it a lot easier to just dismiss people who don’t think and behave and love and believe like us…and then we can all just make our little camps and never have meaningful interaction again.

Amen?

God’s Will is Not an Algorithm (Looking At You Christian Mingle)

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I’m prepping to preach on Psalm 25:1-10.  I think it’s timely.images

See, I have serious issues with people breaking the Second Commandment.

I think it’s a woefully misunderstood commandment, by and large.

Most of my Confirmation kids think it’s about cursing when we first come to it in our study of the Decalogue.  By the time they leave, though, I hope they have a broader view…they tell me they do.

I want to impart this much on them: as a preacher I am very (i.e., terribly) nervous about ever saying something from the voice of God.  Because I don’t want to use God’s name, or likeness, or voice, uselessly.  This is really what the Second Commandment is about, I think.

So that lovely billboard that says, “You know that ‘Love one another’ thing?  I mean that.-God”.  I think it’s in bad taste.  And poor form.

And I think it breaks the Second Commandment just as much as those signs that say, “God hates fags.”

I don’t think their impact is the same, of course.  The former is aimed toward a reminder of love, the latter is best used as firewood.  But I think they’re both wrongheaded.

In Psalm 25 we have a student (the Psalmist) entreating the teacher (God) to teach them and lead them on godly “pathways.”  “Show me how to live,” the Psalmist asks.

And if you go to the book store, you’ll see tons of books dedicated to just that.  There are so many in this world who are simply convinced of God’s will, pathway, for not only their life but also yours.

And I am suspicious of it all.  And it gives me the shakes to think that I am culpable at times of falling into that same trap.

It’s like Christian Mingle’s tagline, that online dating service marketed specifically for Christians: “Find God’s Match for You.”

Do we really think that God’s will is algorithmic in origin?  Do we really think that God wants you to choose from a pull-down menu “washboard abs” (an actual choice on that site), and that God’s match for you will appear based on that, your height, and your education level?

God, I hope not.

Why, then, do we think that other things pertaining to God’s will align like this?

Career changes, relationships, neighborhood locations, vacation destination…”where does God want me to go?  What is God’s will for my life?”

So often this is just a way for us to find ways of getting divine support for our own decisions and situations.  I would be the first to admit that I don’t think God wants you to harm yourself or others; I can say that this is not “the good” that God desires for humanity.  But between two career choices?  Or a neighborhood move? Or a relationship?

Can we not be honest about it all and say that to quickly know God’s will…perhaps to know it at all…is really just a way we try to placate ourselves into thinking we’re making good choices?

Leslie D. Weatherhead, that process theologian best known for his work The Will of God (a good, if dated, work), tells the story of the parson who is offered a high-paying job at a new parish in the next city over, twice the salary of his current position.  When a young parishioner asked the parson’s son what his father will do, the son replies, “Well, Dad is praying over it, but Mom is packing.”

I think Dad has made his choice.  Or maybe Mom has.  A humorous (and true) example of this in action.

The worst example of course, and I’ve mentioned this before, is assigning tragedy to being part of “God’s will.”

This is another placation of sorts.  It’s easy for us to deal with life situations if we believe they’re divinely ordained.

But I want to talk about honesty here; I don’t want to be careless just because it’s useful. And I don’t think God wanted your child to die, your mother to have cancer, you to be born with one arm, or that Asiana Airlines flight to crash.

Gravity happens.  Cells divide and mutate…sometimes in ways that are tragic for life.

But to call such things “God’s will” is sick and demented and wrong.  And it’s not any better to say, “Well, I’d never say it at the time because it’s not helpful, but it’s true that it is God’s will…”

In fact, that’s worse because it’s patronizing.

And I think it’s wrong to say that it must be God’s will that these things occur because in such situations people gain great insight, or muster great courage, and that those goods outweigh the tragic bad.

In this vein Weatherhead can again be enlightening.  He notes that tragic situations do not cause great courage or insight, they just uncover it.  And to suggest that such courage or knowledge couldn’t be gained in other, non-tragic ways, is shortsighted.

We either give lip service to seeking “God’s will” while just reinforcing our own, or we proclaim “God’s will” carelessly while not really knowing what we’re talking about.

Both are sad realities for the Christian world.  This is how I see it most often done, though.

To steal Kierkegaard’s famous title, the topic of God’s will should approached with “fear and trembling.”  And with a healthy dose of mystery.

This is why spiritual disciplines are very important.  They’re less than formulaic; anyone immersed in deep discernment can tell you that it often feels like three steps forward and two back when trying to suss out a path in the deep woods of doubt and indecision.

They invite us into mystery.

Finding the will of God is less like being the captain of a ship out at sea whose rudder turns it sharply as the stars realign and the course changes in the captain’s sight.  We want such swift movement…we desire it and love it when people tell us they have such clarity.

But I, by and large, don’t trust it…and don’t encourage you to, either.

I liken it more to being a laborer on an archeological dig where slowly we uncover the thing we are seeking. And even then we sometimes end up uncovering a broken pot when we were hoping for a dinosaur.

The fact that God’s will is difficult…impossible in the specifics?…to determine is clear by those who commit themselves to the monastic life.

It is, in essence, declaring that one might arrive at God’s will by the time the tomb calls us.  Maybe. Hence why it’s a life choice.  And a good bit of discernment goes into deciding to enter an order; it takes years and years.

And sometimes people discern wrongly.  God’s will is not algorithmic in nature.

Instead of always hastily proclaiming knowledge of God’s will, I’d much rather we all agree to stumble blindly (and be honest about it) while fervently praying, discerning, and sifting for goodness in this world as we go.  Seek God’s will; sure.  But let’s not pretend to be so certain or have such clarity.  Let’s not pretend to have quick answers and divine revelations when really all we want is wish reinforcement.

I don’t think Christian Mingle can find God’s match for you.  I think it can find you some good dates, and maybe even a partner (apparently only if you’re straight, though…you can’t seek for the same sex).

But I wouldn’t say that the person you find there is “God’s match” for you anymore than the person you pick up at the bar.  And I think they should be ashamed for using that tagline.  It breaks the Second Commandment.  And it’s a dumb tagline anyway.

Instead of waiting around for God’s will, do something (very Lutheran) and step out into the world.  Sift away at the sands of life as you go; look for the good.  But don’t imagine that you can be on the “wrong path” anymore than you are on the “right path.”

You are on the pathway.  At each step you sift a little more and slowly eek out the beautiful existence.

The Psalmist doesn’t wait for God to teach them the right path before beginning the journey, but instead prays for constant companionship and enlightenment and courage as they go.  I hope I can do that, too.  Hence why I practice spiritual disciplines (as best I can).

So throw away those books that proclaim God’s will for your life is only 200 pages away; you can be “purpose driven” without it, I think.

And if you write such books, do so with fear and trembling and not because you know it will sell in a world where people want quick answers, and literalism, and divine algorithms.  What we need is honesty.  And I’m often a reluctant Christian because honesty seems to be kind of rare in this particular arena.

“Paula Deen and VRA are Spiritual Topics” or “Look, Shiny Objects”

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You’re tired of hearing about Paula Deen.  I am, too.shiny-objects

But indulge one more thought, if you will.

She was on Today last week giving a teary account of her heart.  Having watched it as it happened, I found it evasive.  I also found it heartfelt.  And I felt bad for her.  And I felt bad for the situation.  And I felt bad for her words and the way her words fall into a long history of words and actions that have hurt people and society and continue to hurt people.

And I felt bad that she couldn’t see her racism.  And how she plays into systems of power…how she is a system of power.

Racism is the mix of privilege and power resulting in prejudice.

This is all troubling.  There’s more trouble, though.

In her interview on Today, Matt Lauer asked if her publicity tour to explain herself and reclaim her image was about money.  And then he went on to list all of the organizations that are dropping her left and right (and we continue to get information about organizations divesting from her name).  And the conversation became about money.

The reality is, though, that the more the media focuses on her hemorrhaging bank account, the less we as a community talk about race. This is the bigger trouble.

And all of these organizations dumping her, are they doing so because racism is bad or because it’s bad business?

In her “apology” (it wasn’t), I heard Ms. Deen talk about her values, about her morals, about her thinking that all of God’s creations are equal.

And she talked about organizations sticking with her and what that meant to her, how they “knew her.”

But what she didn’t talk about was racism and her racism.  And what Lauer didn’t ask her about was racism.

They talked about morals, they talked about money, they talked about talking about apologies.

But nothing about white privilege or racism.

And this all looming under the Voting Rights Act decision from SCOTUS, now stripped from enforcement.  And these two events are connected.  And we fail to see it.

See, this is a spiritual issue.  It’s a spiritual issue because we have become adept at finding the shiny object in the room instead of the threat, and this hurts us at levels deeper than just skin.  Our attraction to distraction is gutting our souls as human beings, as society, as community, as people of faith.

The economization of everything is one of the best shiny objects humanity deludes themselves with.  “Racism is bad for business!  Look at Paula Deen’s situation!” This is what we implicitly hear.  What we should be hearing, I think, is “Racism is bad for society.  It’s bad for community.  It’s bad for your spirit.  It’s bad for our world.”

But when you can put a price tag on something, it becomes about money.  And money is easier to talk about than racism.

This past week of SCOTUS activity provides us with another shiny object lesson.  VRA is stripped of its power, and then DOMA is stripped of i’s power.  One after the other.  I do not, by any stretch of the imagination, think that these verdicts were randomly ordered.  Let’s overturn the past quickly and quietly, and then offer an olive branch of sorts to a progressive future (although it’s a partial olive branch as the justices failed to find any Constitutional basis for marriage equality).

A portion of the population denied marriage before are now opened to the possibility (though not ensured), while a portion of the population who were ensured voting rights are now just “open to the possibility.”

This is a spiritual issue.  We distract and deceive to keep real problems from being addressed.

Richard Rohr talks about this in his book “Everything Belongs.”  He notes that progressives will keep on making mistakes, and conservatives feel their job, then, is to keep those mistakes from being corrected.

We follow this lovely pattern because we easily become distracted from addressing the heart of the matter, and we don’t really like the radical work of changing it that falls outside of “progressive” or “conservative” labels (because, secretly we believe in the system).

And what is that heart of the matter?

People. Community. Society.

Jesus dealt with this all the time.  “What must I do to inherit abundant life?” the rich man asks.  His question has an eye on distractions, as he has “many  things” and wants to add eternal life to his collection.  He economizes everything, even Jesus and abundant life (and so does much of the church…let’s be honest).  The focus is changed by Jesus not on what he has to do, but who he is.  He must sell his objects.

He can’t take it.  He walks away in dismay because he has many things…but lacks himself.

The woman at the well had had five husbands (and we just love to tout her as a whore, though the text doesn’t support it).  She’s differentiated from Jesus by gender, religion, reputation, and even agency (she has a bucket, after all).  Jesus’ focus is on her.

And yet what do we focus on with this oft-preached text?  Her imagined sexual acts.

Shiny objects with some to spare.

This is a spiritual issue.  The world is in love with shiny objects because they keep us from discussing real problems, and the spirit of society, our spiritual lives, community as a whole are worse off.

And for the Christian following Jesus, we have an example of where our focus should be.  And yet…it’s not.

We’re in love with sick systems.

What must we do to inherit abundant life?  Go and sell our shiny objects.

And we walk away with dismay, because we have many…