intention

Graduation!

My niece graduated from high school yesterday. (Of course, it’s impossible that this young woman is old enough to finish high school. It’s a little bit like that famous creepy Wooderson line in Dazed and Confused, in reverse: every year they get older and I stay the saaame age.) Her journey has been very interesting. The family (2 adults, 2 girls, and a variety of pets) decided to leave their home and live in a motor coach for the last several years. This necessitated a remote learning situation, and she received her diploma from a Christian school based in Pensacola, Florida. And in May, they hold an in-person ceremony that looks exactly like every high school graduation looks, except most of the kids have never met each other.

The keynote speaker was the Academy President, who didn’t have to be awesome but was anyway. He gave a message with 3 main points, the first was “Never underestimate the value of daily faithfulness.”

Sunday was Mother’s Day (incidentally, I don’t really believe in participating in these holidays invented to sell product, opportunities to worship at the altar of consumerism, but that’s hardly important) and I mentioned that anyone can be great on Mother’s Day. Anyone can buy a present and call on Mother’s Day. Anyone can honor their mom on Mother’s Day. But we are not anyone. It takes someone different to honor their mom on an ordinary Wednesday afternoon, right?

Jesus commands us to love each other, even our enemies, and it’s mostly the same thing. Everybody can practice love for the people they like, or when they want to, but what about the people we don’t like, or that we disagree with, or don’t agree with, or when we’re tired and don’t feel like it? This works for everything, I suppose. Great marriages aren’t built on airport pickups, anniversaries, or honeymoons – everybody shows up for those things – they’re built on mealtimes and mornings, on kind words and patience. And a high maximum bench press doesn’t happen in a 3 hour workout, it happens through a long, long, long series of boring workouts.

My niece watched lectures, took tests, read textbooks, and wrote essays on a tour bus. She did it at all times of the day, without a desk or a classroom or bells. Most times she did it without teachers, just her and her “daily faithfulness.”

And I’m thinking about why she did that. What got her out of bed to open the books, over and over and over, who and what was she being faithful to? The answer probably isn’t one thing. I’d guess she’d tell you that she was faithful to the God who gave her the gifts she has, and the call she has been given. But I think she was also faithful to the person she is becoming, to a future version of herself, who practices quiet daily faithfulness, discipline and intention.

The hard work of building isn’t ever for today, it’s for a vision of the marriage, the bench press, the person you want to be who does those things, who loves in spite of feelings or convenience. When you see it, it’s inspiring and almost never about motivation. Nobody feels like it all the time, but she probably found that she doesn’t even ask herself how she feels, there’s not an IF in the neighborhood. The graduate that she was working towards – and that she now is – simply gets up and goes to work. We’re all proud of her, it’ll be fantastic to see who she decides to become next.

1,000 Questions

Today is our wedding anniversary, and Friday is my son’s graduation. I’ll write about them both on my other blog, lovewithacapitall.com. Maybe next week will have the graduation reflection in both spaces. Who knows? But there is another website, if you happen to be interested. But today, here, is directly related to our Sunday morning service…

Since I began teaching at the bridge, there has been one recurring complaint. Not that there haven’t been others – there is usually a chorus of “you should have done it this way,” or, “I don’t like the way you did that” – it’s just that each one of those is specific and pointed. They don’t like my voice, my shoes, my perspective. There’s plenty to not like. But the most common, general criticism is that I rarely project verses, important words & concepts, and any of the 1,000 questions I ask every week, on the screen.

There are 2 kinds of negative feedback. One has absolutely nothing to do with me (and is way more common). The mouth that is speaking cuts on purpose, out of a well of pain or insecurity in them. I can see this now, when, as a younger man, I couldn’t differentiate and allowed everything in, as if it were all equally valid and good-hearted. It isn’t. This doesn’t mean they still can’t be right about me, with their attack, it just means I spend much less time evaluating.

About how I receive this “help:” I am not so arrogant to think I do everything perfectly, am always right, and I am not so fragile to think my imperfection means that I am always wrong or worthless. So, I can (mostly) receive it with humble gratitude. Sometimes, though, boundaries are required – what I’ve also learned is that not everyone can have unlimited access to you.

Anyway, the second is genuine and helpful, even if I ultimately choose not to change me, my opinion or my process. These are friends, they care about me, want me to be healthy, happy, effective. I take lots of time considering their words, suggestions, and if/how I would integrate it into a newer, better version of me. Then, I either do or do not. (And against Yoda’s wishes, I sometimes try, with varying success.)

This projection issue is easily in the second camp. The well-meaning people that make this suggestion are absolutely right, I should.

So, why don’t I?

I don’t really know. I see the value in it. And the “I don’t know” goes against one of the characteristics I find most important: mindfulness. We should know why we do what we do, be intentional about it. It’s actually why I ask the questions, in the first place, to introduce us to ourselves and invite us to show up and get to know us, from the inside out. My boys knew “I don’t know” is 100% unacceptable and only prolongs the lecture (ha!). And my house rule as a dad has always been, if I didn’t know why not, the answer has to be yes. So, why don’t I just put the questions on a PowerPoint? I don’t know.

Here they are, from this week: Why do we do what we do? (That’s an ironic first question, isn’t it?) Who is building the “house?” Are things in their proper place? Who/What delights our hearts?

Maybe I’ll start. I’m pretty embarrassed to admit that I’ve been sleeepwalking through this relatively innocuous issue. But if I act without intention or awareness in relatively small things, maybe I will with big ones, too. Maybe this isn’t about slides at all. Maybe it’s about the man I am constantly becoming.

Next week we’ll probably have slides.