When God Decided To Invent

When God decided to invent

everything he took one

breath bigger than a circus tent

and everything began

When man determined to destroy

himself he picked the was

of shall and finding only why

smashed it into because

- E. E. Cummings

It is our nature to want a reason for everything.  We want to know the cause, we want to know the purpose and we want to know where it is all going.  We want to know the “Why?”

And so we search.

We do not handle the “because I said so” of a parent very well; we seek the hidden meaning in each of life’s circumstances and look to crack the code of purpose when life’s movements leave us baffled.

In our frantic pursuit of the "because" we find only Anxious Thoughts and Sleepless Nights.

Yet some things are just as they are; no moralizing needed, no hidden meaning and nothing to decode.  Simply:

Is & Shall

This is the space where exhilarating wonder and breath-holding terror collide.  This is the space where we learn to swim in the deep end of life and are buoyed by the mystery of God.  This is the place where we are most alive.

It's Not My Fault

“It’s not my fault!”

Congratulations, but what I really want to know is…

“How are we going to fix the situation?”

Making excuses will not help you or those you are in relationship with.  Excuses and shifting responsibility is easy (making it attractive) but terrible uncreative (rendering it unhelpful).

A true professional, whether it is a Pro-Athlete, Pro-Politician, Pro-Office Manager, Pro-Student, or Pro-Spouse is less concerned with who is at fault and more concerned with being a part of the plan to bring remedy.

Proven

“Jesus, Jesus how I trust him!  How I proved him o’er and o’er”.

What does it mean to prove Jesus?

Does it mean that we need to brush up on our apologetics so we can systematically uphold the tenants of the faith?  I don’t think so.  Maybe the hymn is a charge to the faithful to evangelize their neighbor with the four spiritual laws?  I’m not so convinced.

Proof distilled in these terms is static, cold, and without need of relationship…this kind of “proof” is lifeless.

Proving Jesus is not about what we know or what we can convince others of.  Instead, the proof is found in a dynamic, living, relationship in which we act in faith and he responds in promise. The Israelites proved YHWH when, in faith, they found themselves between the Red Sea and Pharaoh’s army.  David proved his King when he stepped on the battle field to face a giant.  Mary proved her Father when she birthed Salvation.

Proving Jesus means we create the space and God shows up to the dance.

And when he does?

Those who have the privilege to watch…can’t help but marvel. 

May you muster all you can to step out into the thin places of life with the inkling that he just might show up.  And, when he does…may you experience the thrill of proving Jesus over and over again.

Giving Up On the Game

“How are you, young man?  No doubt you’re expecting a lecture, but I promise that’s the last thing I intend.  Your decision to leave medical school is your own entirely.  I can even understand and sympathize.  Around the third year, when exhaustion and nausea have taken up permanent residence in your bones, the healing profession seems less like a calling and more like and exercise in expedience and venality.  I understand that brand of despair better than I wish.  But it’s a different decision you’ve made that troubles me more deeply.

I mean your choice to give up golf.”                        - The Legend of Bagger Vance

Idealism, promise, expectation, hope.  These are all good things.  These elements do more than get us out of bed in the morning; they propel us into each day with the anticipation that something remarkable and worth while will take place.

We are a burst of energy in which no obstacle is too big.  Exhaustion never even gets a chance to yawn because we are awakened to a mission bigger than ourselves.  We embody the change we want to bring to the world and we believe we can do anything.

Then…

Challenge flanks us in a manner totally unexpected; completely blind-sided.  We see a side to the Opposition that we never saw before and we are left disarmed, disrobed, and disheartened.  The ideal, once fuel for life, offers nothing but the bitter taste of “what could have been”.

Cynicism encroaches as we question the work, the calling.  “What’s the point?”, “Why bother?” “Where’s the meaning?” become just a few of the rhetorical questions we feast on.  We come to a grinding halt.

We give up.  We are sidelined.  We are beaten.  Something within us dies.

And we are left with a choice:

Fade away until nothing is left.

or…

Keep playing.

May you, in your moment of defeat, your season of disillusionment, be filled with just enough promise to believe that giving up on the game is never an option.  And may you have the courage to keep showing up to the life no one else has been gifted to live.

Tiny Little gods

The little gods of this world make demands.  They tell us what we should be doing, how we should be behaving, who we should vote for, and why we should believe what we believe.  These little gods bark commands with a puffed up chests and give orders that relish in compliance.

Politics, religion, family dynamics, and our inner thoughts all give a platform to these little gods.  We are attracted to little gods because they claim to have each answer carefully packaged…no need to wrestle, chew, and digest.  They are remarkable little creatures and so getting lured in by tiny gods is easy.

They speak with a cadence of confidence and mask their delusions with authority. 

When we bend our ear to the little gods we give them power to speak into our life and alter who we really are.  They feed on our insecurities, grow in our conformity and devour our identity.

But the secret?  These tiny gods are afraid.

Afraid that you will see them for what they are…trivial, small, insignificant.  Afraid you will awaken from their spell and no longer pay attention to them.  Afraid the home they constructed, fit only for a straw man, will blow away.

Be skeptical of the pat answers that leave no lasting satisfaction.  Be cautious when your allegiance is expected, and be leery of the little gods that make demands…

That you might be open to the one God that gives invitations.

Living Icons

“We seldom celebrate enough the fact that healingness and newness are inborn in the human person, and we can release them into the world in creative and redemptive ways.  We are perhaps too frozen in the notion that we are faithful if we are obedient.  We are moral if we play it safe.  We are virtuous if we ask God to do stuff for us.  Slowly and not often enough do we learn that God is not one who bails us out, or one who nags and supervises what is entrusted to us.  The good news is a glorious but demanding affirmation that we are trusted by God to live a new kind of life.”      - Walter Brueggemann

You are one of God’s icons; designed to reflect his very nature.

Goodness.

Mercy.

Justice.

Love.    

Do not wait for God…he is waiting for you.  You have been trusted to act, to move in ways that promote wholeness, restoration and peace.

Today, and each moment within its confines, you have opportunity to live out what has been hard wired into you.  Do not listen to the voice that says, “not good enough”, “forgotten”, “washed up”, “unqualified”, “fool”.  Instead listen as the Author of All sends you forward with new words:

“Chosen”, “Esteemed”, “Friend”, “Daughter”, “Son”...

"Image bearer".

Don't Wait to Create

Get moving.  Put something on paper.  Anything.

Grab a brush and splash some color or take a pen and fashion some words.  Don’t think, just do.

The color doesn’t have to be brilliant to shine and the words don’t have to make a sentence to make sense…just get going.

Writer’s block?  What to create?  What if it’s no good?

No time for excuses, no critic can fully critique those who create.

Go!