Ghana is a Goner
Sorry I’ve been gone a bit. What drew me back to my blog? World cup fever. In the past I have made some enemies because things I said were interpreted to be slams against soccer being an enjoyable spectator sport. I am not the same man.
So friends, Americans, countrymen, lend me your ears. I come not to bury soccer but to praise soccer. Are not the activities of the soccer players evidence that they are honorable men? Are they not only honorable but also exciting and enjoyable to witness?
I will not repeat the errors of my past.
I will not lament the absence of scoring.
I will not infer that soccer is like a cross-country meet in a box.
I will not infer that the game has parallels to socialism because the rules (ie. can’t use your arms which eliminates 50% of your major appendages and means of production, and offsides which penalizes a player for being smarter and faster than his/her opponent) and the sameness of the players sacrifice individual excellence and achievement for group mediocrity thereby limiting production and overall excitement. I won't go there. I refuse.
I won't infer that other countries love the World Cup because it makes the US look wimpy and unremarkable.
I won't assert that worldwide soccer viewing data was produced by the same group that gave us Climate-gate and all the bogus climate change data.
I won't infer that soccer seems like a sport that should have evolved into something more complete and complicated.
I won't go there at all. I am so glad that I am a new man. To prove my enlightenment I came up with the inspiring slogan in the title of this blog. Ghana is a Goner. Who but a real fan could come up with that? I was hoping to market it but the game is coming up too quickly to get t-shirts made.
To help inspire you to catch my enthusiasm I suggest you try some or all of the following five ideas to rev up your World Cup Fever.
1. Find someone from Ghana and dance around them chanting "Ghana is a goner". Foreigners love this kind of American enthusiasm.
2. If you are playing any other sports during the World Cup weeks (ie. pick up basketball, volleyball, etc.....) end all your games when the score is 1 - 1.
3. Bring a vuvuzela (one of those plastic horns everyone blows at World Cup games) to work and blow it every time you complete a mundane task. Your boss and co-workers will love it.
4. Find several tasks that you normally use your hands for and use your head and/or legs instead. For example, at a concert instead of clapping pound your head on your knee. The awesomeness of soccer will become much clearer to you.....once your head stops ringing.
5. Be the first to write an anthology of great American soccer teams and players. It will sell like hot-cakes.....once we get some great teams and players.
6. A bonus offering. Lobby for honorary citizenship for Pele' since he is the only famous soccer player anyone knows. Then we can claim him as our own. Better yet, rename your dog or cat Pele' and make them wear a pet-sized soccer jersey as a constant reminder that the World Cup is all that matters.
Those are a few ideas. As for me I am looking to the future. As an encore to "Ghana is a Goner". I am hoping we play South Korea in round two and I can bust out my second round slogan of "We've got more Soul than Korea". If we play Paraguay, my research revealed that they are the third leading exporter of chalkboards. "Erase Paraguay" and "Chalk up a victory" are all I have in that scenario so far. I sure hope South Korea wins.
Gotta go. I have to go feed and walk Pele'.
All You Need is Love?
Many things have been put together in our culture that our creator meant to be kept separate. These boundaries are not arbitrary or constricting. They are for our own good and keeping them separated brings freedom.
Conversely, many things have been torn apart in our culture that He intended be kept together. Again, these are not arbitrary things and their wholeness is health while their separation is death.
We could list many things in each category, but one of the most significant and fundamental separations in our culture is the separation of love and responsibility.
Today love is passionate, instinctive, overpowering, unimpeachable, beyond rules, norms, and structures. Love is an irresistible force that comes upon us from the outside and transcends reason and discernment.
Responsibility has not only been separated from love but is often viewed as the opposite or enemy of love.
The biblical narrative gives a view of love very different from our culture's view. Love is not the enemy of responsibility. To the contrary.
Love is the sincere application of responsibility.
There are four Greek words for love each depicting a different type of love. They are agape, storge, philia, and eros. C.S. Lewis gives a great treatment of these in his book "The Four Loves".
Agape is often used to describe God's love for humanity and is depicted as an unconditional serving love. Lewis calls it charity.
Storge is a love that grows out of a familiarity without coercion such as a family relationship. Lewis calls this love affection.
Philia is a brotherly love that Lewis calls friendship.
Eros remains unchanged by Lewis, and is defined as romantic love, though he separates out sexual love and names it venus.
I refer you to Lewis for a full treatment of these loves. I used them here only to think about my definition of love being, the sincere application of responsibility, to see if it appeared sound in each type. The answer is a resounding yes. Responsibility is inseparable from love. To handle any of the loves differently perverts them into something other than love. The separation of responsibility in our lives has been to our great detriment. Our culture has separated responsibility from love by immersing us in the lie that I am ultimately responsible to myself and my feelings and dreams.
Responsibility infers that one is responsible to something or someone outside themselves. That someone is God and the thing we are responsible to is His mission to establish His kingdom on earth.
To understand all this we must stop thinking of love as something separate from God. I John tells us, God is love. This is not a descriptor of God, it is a descriptor of love. Love is only rightly understood and lived out in the context of being responsible to God for taking part in His mission.
All four loves require we live out our responsibility to that mission in our relationships. This calls us to rethink how we love our spouses, friends, co-workers, family, etc..... We cannot base our understanding of loving them on our feelings. That is not really love. We must base our love for others on the person and mission of God. If you are like me, this is both daunting and liberating. Daunting because I don't want to do it, liberating because the other way is a slow death. Everything disappoints eventually and I need something much better than myself to be responsible to. Fortunately, God is abundantly sufficient (to coin a paradox).
Who can I get to record my new song, "All You Need is Love and Responsibility"? Maybe Mylie Cyrus?.....probably not. How about Justin Beiber? Not likely. We may have to live this out without a hit single.
I think we can do it.
Whose Social Justice?
I got into a little trouble with a recent post for deriding the term "social justice". Some took exception to this line: "Goodbye Genesis, Jesus and a culture of life. Hello Darwin, Santa Claus and social justice."
I was on a roll feeling clever and failed to clarify what I meant by casting "social justice" in a negative light. I meant non-Christ-centered social justice. I did not mean to disparage all activities that attempt to address peoples' social and material needs.
What's the difference between Christ-centered social justice and non-Christ-centered social justice, you ask?
Hmmmm....... how can I illustrate this? I wish something would happen in the news that could help me with this. Maybe if I make a wish on my Michael Jackson action figure the gods of pop culture will produce something for me.
(Eyes closed holding my Michael Jackson doll) "I wish someone famous would do something controversial so popular media, the champions of emptiness, would give me a blog illustration." (I click my heels three times, moon walk for ten steps, do an MJ spin and open my eyes. Then I log on to the internet and poof.....it worked.)
Hello Sandra Bullock .
Christ-centered social justice matters. Let's look at Sandra's life to illustrate why. Sandra is newsworthy these days because she adopted a black child on the heels of her academy award winning role as an adoptive parent in the movie "Blindside". Though there has been some negative reaction to her adoption, most has been positive.
Sandra is lauded for rescuing this child from his hapless plight. This boy was on a course to grow up without a dad in a godless neighborhood overrun with drugs, sexual promiscuity, broken homes, broken relationships, shattered marriages, children out of wedlock, and totally relativistic values.
Thank goodness Sandra showed up. Now she can give him a home in Hollywood where he can grow up without a dad in a godless neighborhood overrun with drugs, sexual promiscuity, broken homes, broken and empty relationships, shattered marriages, children out of wedlock, and totally relativistic values.
Why are we happy for this little dude? We're happy for him because we often associate the bettering of a person's level of affluence with the bettering of their state of being. In other words if a person becomes richer, they are not only happier, but their significance and ultimate worth have increased.
On one level it seems like a great deal for the kid. Which of us wouldn't want to grow up rich and famous instead of poor and fearful? However, if Christ is really who He said He is, if He really is the Way the Truth and the Life, and if there truly is no other path to eternal joy except Him, then has this boy's lot in life really improved?
Here we see the emptiness of non-Christ-centered social justice. The boy has gained materially, but gained little of true value. However, Christ-followers caught up in sentiment and a worldly standard of love, eat it up like movie pop-corn.
In her Oscar acceptance speech, Sandra told how the main point of the movie "Blindside" was about, "....moms that take care of the babies and children no matter where they come from." The cameras panned to the real mom and dad who were in the audience, and they nodded and clapped with the rest of the audience.
It was a great "feel-good" moment. Sandra closed by saying we all deserve love no matter our race, religion, class, color, or sexual orientation. She made an ending joke about her and Meryl Streep being lovers because they had kissed with faux passion on stage earlier to show that they were not rivals.
What if the star of adoption stories is not moms? What if the star is Jesus Christ? What if we are drawn to earthly adoptions because they point to the potential for heavenly adoptions?
Who is Sandra Bullock to say who deserves love? Is she god? She sounded authoritative, but whose authority is it? Why appeal to authority (the word "deserves" implies an objective judge) when the only authority you are presenting is your own opinion?
Sandra, if everyone deserves love, why are you divorcing your adulterous husband? Maybe some truths do matter.
Why do we eat this stuff up? The 12-minute clip I watched showed everyone saying incredible things about each other and crying. It's almost like they're actors and actresses......hey.....wait a minute...
Why did the movie "Blindside" which takes place in a Christian home and Christian school never say the name Jesus? Why did they not show the family going to church? Did Mike Oher become a Christian? I trust that his real life family lives differently than we saw on the screen. I hope so. If all there is to Christian families is what was in the movie, then we do belong chillin' with Sandra and her peeps because our presence in our communitites is impotent.
The problem with social justice not pronouncing Christ to the world is it leaves no true authority to explain why some actions seem more "just" than others. All we are left with is material measures such as money and fame which carry no value in a casket. Little value and certainly no eternal value is given.
The heart of social justice is Jesus Christ being glorified and righteousness increasing. The church of Jesus Christ exists to live this out. You and I exist to live this out.
Always help those in need, and make sure you offer what they really need. After all, someone did for you.
A Bit of Humor for Moms
A humorous and fairly accurate look at motherhood. Three minutes that will make you smile.
The Mom Song - to the tune of the the William Tell Overture
Moms, may you continue to give Christ to your family in word and deed.
Let us not become weary in doing good. For at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9
Healthcare – How to Care: Part II Economics
Last week in a restaurant I noticed a powerful woman on a TV screen challenging me to make a move. She asked, "Everyone else is getting their bailout money; are you ready to get yours?" I barely repressed the urge to shout "No!" at the screen. Fortunately, I did. Since my mouth was full of food, nobody would have heard me, and I would have showered my neighbor in half-chewed chicken.
At first I was thunder-struck and deeply disturbed. But then I was elated because the fount of sermon and blog illustrations had gushed forth once again.
Who wrote this commercial, Bart Simpson? Throw out all the proverbs about sluggards who don't work coming to ruin. Throw out all ancient wisdom literature on the value of hard work .
Hey Aesop, hard work is a fable.
Sorry Ben Franklin. Early to bed, early to rise won't get you a bailout package.
Goodbye "Great Expectations". Snotty Pip trumps blacksmith Joe after all.
"Do Hard Things" give way to "Do No-Things" .
Nike's new slogan, "Just Don't Do It".
Little Red Hen, find all those animals who would't help you make your bread and give them your loaf. Then make them another.
This commercial is another manifestation of a trend overtaking our lives. There has been a sea of change in our culture's understanding of being human and how to think about work, leisure, and responsibility. Hard work and personal responsibility are out. Victim-hood, short-cuts, and hand-outs are in.
This type of thinking is in all of us. That is why we run up huge credit card debt to get things we can't afford, buy houses we should never have bought, play the stock market like a craps table, play the lottery, and resent and undermine those who "get ahead" of us. Gain without work used to be viewed as vice, but now it is viewed as entitlement.
Unfortunately, part of the change stems from Christians' lack of sound engagement in the arena of economics. We must understand that economic policies can cultivate a culture of life or a culture of death. There are three main enemies in our culture which undermine a biblically sound economic system.
The first is deliberate, non-biblical thinking about humanity, society and government. This thinking assumes either a godless universe or an impotent god(s). It also assumes that man is born good and his/her misfortune is because of societal unfairness. Government becomes the parent who controls life and makes things "fair". This is often done through taxes, social programs, centralized healthcare, public education, and sometimes bailouts. People are discouraged from getting ahead through taxation and regulation. Liberty is sacrificed for state protection from failure, under-achievement, and disparate levels of wealth.
The second enemy of a biblical worldview on economics is lazy Christian thinking. Here we spout economic thoughts based on sentimental feelings of compassion without measuring the actual results of those ideas. It gives us a self righteous ooey-gooey feeling and often helps us feel relevant. I've heard many Christians, including prominent leaders, set aside the abortion issue to elect people to advance justice through government programs and social re-engineering. Unfortunately, they speak without knowing much about history, economics, and human nature.
The third enemy is apathy. This is the easy way out. It requires no thinking and no engagement. This breeds Christians who fail or refuse to connect the dots of life to understand and embrace a biblical worldview. Life is more comfortable in the shallow pool. This strategy gives decision making over to others by default.
Thinking biblically on economics is vital to our role as God's people amidst a broken and dying world. Selfish, sentimental, and misguided economic thought is running rampant through the community of Jesus-followers. At the root is probably the most significant social battle raging today. That battle is over responsibility for social welfare. The options are the state or the individual. Up until the depression the answer was primarily the individual. Since then we have been in a steady slide toward the state assuming more responsibility.
Why should Christians care about this trend? Because as the state assumes more responsibility, they control more of how we think. This topic merits more time than I have here. In a nutshell, as our government assumes more responsibility over our lives they push the biblical worldview to the periphery of society and bring a secular worldview to the forefront. Goodbye Genesis, Jesus and a culture of life. Hello Darwin, Santa Claus and social justice. The connection between the government's control and the decline of religious practice, strong marriages, and whole families is unmistakable.
There are too many manifestations of the shift of responsibility to cover here. The topics include health care, globalization, bail outs, taxation, cap and trade, education funding and more. Instead of trying to address everything, I give you the following list of rules to apply as a framework for thinking and acting biblically on these matters.
Rule #1: Be guided by truly compassionate results for the materially needy rather than what makes you feel good or relevant. God tells us man is born sinful and is corrupted by shortcuts in all areas including economics. Wealth without work creates a corrupting dependency. Blind handouts often do more harm than good. Unthinking feel-good actions can often hinder other people and their development.
Rule #2: Embrace solutions utilizing your personal involvement relationally and financially before supporting government involvement. I had a boss who used to rail against unfairness of the market and the need for government to redistribute income and take over healthcare. Since he thought this so important, I asked him who in his neighborhood he was currently assisting on his own. (I knew from other conversations that he loathed his neighbors because they had lots of loud kids.) He quit talking to me about these issues and chose to focus on manifestations of religious hypocrisy - more irony.
Rule #3: Stop thinking economic issues and social issues are separate. Economics have as much to do with building a culture of life as does abortion policy. If you don't believe that then go to Cambodia, China or any country ravaged by variations of centralized government control of society in place of proper restraint of government and personal liberty.
Rule #4: Understand a biblical view of work and leisure. Work is not the enemy of leisure. They are both intergal parts of a rhythm of our daily lives. Take either away and the other corrupts.
Rule #5: Never lose focus on Christ’s mission for the Church. We each have a mission to advance eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ in all we do. This will be shaped uniquely for each person and household. The question "Will my activities advance Christ to the world?" should govern our activities and involvements.
James Montgomery Boice teaches Christ-followers on issues of social involvement to pray, persuade and participate. We should all do likewise.
Feelings – Nothing More than Feelings
I have a little backlog on posts regarding economics and a response to a reader's question about my idea that much of our life takes place in a man-made machine. I will crank those out soon. In the meantime here is a very good article from L'abri on a very pervasive but little recognized spirit of the age. This article is a little long but well worth your time.
Federally Mandated Tiger Woods Post
Sorry I haven't written for a week, but I have been in a legal battle. This past week the FCC mandated that all media outlets run features on Tiger Woods depicting him as courageous, remarkable, resilient, and penitent.
I assumed my little blog would be exempt; however, apparently I have quite a bit of market pull with left-handed Syrians from Rockford, MI. Consequently, the FCC sent their lawyers to bring me in line.
I asked them to clarify under what authority they could do this. Apparently, President Obama's Nobel Peace Prize allows him to mandate actions that forward peace. The President instructed the FCC to take this action because Tiger Woods' return to golf stardom would make the world more peaceful. People will watch him instead of fighting.
I tried to fight them legally. Unfortunately, when I told them my attorney was Perry Mason they seized my car, three of my children and my collection of Neil Diamond albums. I could survive without a car, and my kids would be returned soon because they would bankrupt the federal prison by leaving lights on in empty rooms. The Neil Diamond thing was too much, however; so I became the Bart Stupack of the lower peninsula and sold out. I did get a free sleeve of Nike golf balls in the process. I wonder if they came for Stupack's Neil Diamond collection?
So here goes. Tiger is courageous, wonderful, resilient, and penitent. I stand with the billions around the world who laud him as a conquering hero. If only the Masters could have been on Palm Sunday this year, we could have welcomed him with waving palm branches. I am sure NBC looked into switching.
Before you swat me with your palm branch, I assure you I have nothing against Tiger. He seems to be trying to chart a different course for his life. Honestly though he, like all pop stars, is so distant from me all I know of him is vapors of who he really is. I know sin marks us all, and large amounts of fame and fortune would cause most of us to run our lives onto the rocks of decadence.
I don't even blame the television networks. They are godless entities who must create gods to validate their existence. We must marvel at the gods they give us. Who doesn't relish basking in the philosophical musings of Tiger, Brett Farvre, Terrell Owens, A Rod, Venus Williams, Serena Williams, and John Benton (lead of the US Olympic curling team)? Like the Israelites at Mt. Siani, we demand gods we can understand on our own terms. Then we can judge them instead of falling under their judgement.
The blame for the angst I feel for the Tiger love-fest must be placed squarely on us. We love the false universe of stardom more than we love the real universe. The stardom universe is of our making and so can be understood to be like a machine. The machine accepts and rejects certain behaviors. The thing the machine hates most is behavior that could destroy the machine. (Any flashbacks you are having to the movie 2001 A Space Odyssey are perfectly appropriate here.)
Tiger claims he was quite nervous for his return to his public ministry.....er.....I mean public career. I don't doubt it. However, at the core of that anxiety is the question - will the machine accept me again? Will I get what I once had? As we watch the carefully scripted and scheduled return, we see great effort spent on doing the right things so the public will extend its favor once again. I am sure there are daily debriefings with a PR team on how things are going and what adjustments should be made.
I do not want Tiger to be forever vilified. I do not desire him to be shunned or to experience more humiliation. I do not want to extract a pound of flesh. However, there is something very disturbing in his return that is typical of all such celebrity cleansings.
It is as if the machine is what cleanses and grants absolution. The galleries cheer, the announcers swoon, and the advertisers return, and we get the world's version of redemption. Unfortunately, it is too shallow and too naive. We watch Tiger assimilated back into the machine that helped bring about his downfall in the first place.
What is lacking is a deep repentance that brings the power of Christ's life, death, and resurrection to the forefront. What becomes remarkable is not a great score at the Masters after a moral fall, but the reality of what Christ did for humanity. What is missing is Tiger talking of his lostness without Christ, instead of appreciating that everyone still loves him.
We all have Tiger in us. We want to succeed in the world/machine so we can be judged on its terms rather than on God's real terms. We don't want to be sinners dependent on Christ. We want to be people who make mistakes and poor decisions who are made whole merely by charming people into forgetting about our errors.
Tiger's story is one of him making all the right moves, not Jesus making the move we couldn't. He has fame and fortune clouding his vision. What's our excuse? For his sake and ours I wish he could realize the only move to make is to kneel at the foot of the cross.
Unfortunately, the machine will have none of that.
Good Friday
Take four minutes to set your mind with the video link below. You'll be blessed.
Maundy Thursday
Today is Maundy Thursday on the Christian calendar. Much happened this day on the eve of Christ's crucifixion.
Satan entered an already misguided Judas who then decided to betray Jesus to the Pharisees. Judas betrayed Jesus at the Garden of Gethsemane, then realized his plans were not going to lead where he wanted. He attempted to return the money as an attempt of self-cleansing, but missed out on true repentance.
The Last Supper took place which included Jesus washing Peter's feet, Peter's boast to never betray Jesus, Judas' exposure as a betrayer, the establishment of the practice of communion for the Church, and Christ's giving of the "new" command "to love one another just as I have loved you."
The word maundy comes from a latin word which means command and puts the focus of the day on Jesus' command to love one another. Jesus pronounces this to be a new command. However, a simple review of the biblical narrative would show that loving each other was hardly new command.
The new part is, "just as I have loved you." The command is no longer abstract it is tangible. It is no longer a command in the traditional sense, it is flesh. Jesus said earlier in His ministry that He did not come to replace the Law, but to fill it up. In a sense He came to make the Law flesh. His command this day is for His followers to go do what He did.
Jesus is saying I have done this impossible thing so it may be possible in you.
The observance of Holy Week is an invitation to make this week more than the start of Spring Break, more than another church service, more than egg hunts and ham dinners. It is an invitation to allow the Spirit to have full run of your being so your creator may make you into who you were meant to be. It is an invitation to a life that each day looks more like Jesus' life.
Love one another as He loved us.