love

Context

Sunday mornings are always interesting, for all of us. We wake up in certain ways. Saturday nights are interesting. The week before, the week ahead, how we slept, we sometimes have sore throats or coughs or allergic reactions. Maybe we had a fight with our husband, youngest child, or the washing machine is broken again. Work has been too heavy…or too light. Bills are due, and how are we going to make that work??? And now, by some miracle, we got up and left the house and came to this place, and what do we do with our hearts, our minds, our stubbed toes and too-tight pants?

I wonder if these people will notice? Do they have it all together, with their hugs and combed hair, or do they feel like me, too? When the singing starts, some put their hands up, some sing sooo loud, some just move their mouths, some don’t at all, and I just feel like crying. They call it worship…what is that? What exactly does it mean to worship?

And now the sermon? Everywhere else it’s a lecture or a talk, a teaching, but here, it’s a sermon. Is that cool, or is it weird? We’ll read parts of the Bible, and what if I can’t hear because I can’t pay attention? I just stare out the window or look at the pages, what does that say? I probably should have just stayed home…

This story, I’ve heard a million times. I know it, and this person talking, they know it, why are we still talking about it? I wonder what’s for lunch, or if we’re still fighting. Why are churches the only places where you can find pew-style seating? If they were so comfortable, wouldn’t they have caught on elsewhere? Maybe they haven’t because we have to step over each other to get in and out. Who knows? This place.

More music. Maybe I can leave now, before anyone talks to me? Is that what I want? Maybe not, maybe it would be cool to talk to someone, maybe I could tell them, maybe I wouldn’t feel so alone? But maybe they’d judge, maybe they’d raise their eyebrows and I’d know, right away, what a terrible idea it was to open, even a crack. Maybe I’d feel even more alone than I do right now? Is that even possible?

Now we are holding hands and praying. Does God hear, is he listening to the voice of a person in a small church in a small town? Do you know there are 1 million churches in this small town, I bet there are more churches than people. Why so many? Why do we pray? Is it so God changes His mind and decides to fix this, help me pay my bills, turn the doctor’s positive result negative? If He could, and if He loved me, why wouldn’t He just do that? And if He didn’t, why would my asking change anything? I thought He knew everything, knows what I want, what I need. Does He love me?

Why am I here?

So we leave, and on the way, someone looks at us, holds our hand, tells us they know, and they really do. Or they don’t, and we slip out before anyone can see the chaos in our hearts.

So, what is worship? I know now. It’s this. All of it. Showing up, as we are, thoroughly broken or euphoric (and everywhere in between) and asking allll of the questions. Pretending isn’t worship, it’s hypocrisy, and it has no place in a church. We bring the pieces of our lives and lay them at His feet – some of them are flawless in their beauty, and some are broken beyond ever being repaired, but in the loving hands of Jesus, and the Church He’s created, they are all gorgeous.

(…and, for the record, we never should have just stayed home;)

Where I Was Wrong

Yesterday, we discussed John’s 1st letter, chapter 1, verse 6, which reads, “If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.” AND I wrote a post last week about where we spend our time, money, energy, (who the AI on our phones says we are) and if those spaces are consistent with what we say we believe is important. If it’s not, John says we are liars.

If I say Morrissey is my favorite artist (he is), but listen to The Beatles every day, far more often than I listen to Morrissey, am I lying when I say Morrissey? Maybe. John says yes.

So, the question is, do I have to change the way I behave to have fellowship with Him? Essentially, are there things I have to do?

Then, after the service, a man gave me his thoughts. He said, “You have to change your life, you have to be different.” Really? Have to?

Are there things we have to do to have fellowship with Him? I now think it’s a bit more complex than that.

Paul will occasionally address, in his letters, the belief some held that, if we are saved by grace, if our salvation is truly by/through His grace alone, then we can (and will) do anything we want. This is true. (Maybe not the “and will” parenthetical.) It’s also a distortion. He writes those letters to people like me.

This is what I taught often in the early days of my ministry. I wanted, I needed, to settle any doubts of whether we are loved, what unconditional means, and how big His grace is. I’d say, “Does that mean we can do anything we want? Yes.” I followed that up with “…but what we want changes.” The emphasis was clearly on the “Yes,” and not the “…but.” And, perhaps not surprisingly, my ministry was not as effective as it could, or should, have been. I was limiting, or cheapening, the Gospel.

There is an idea of cheap grace. If you owe 50 cents, and I don’t make you pay it back, that’s nice. If you owe 50 billion dollars, and I don’t make you pay that back, then that’s much more than nice. The debt I pay for you is humongous. The forgiveness of something so large is life-changing. Where I was wrong is that by de-emphasizing the debt, I also de-emphasized the forgiveness. I minimized the gift. It doesn’t change the answer, it is still His grace alone, but it does certainly alter each of the moments that follow.

If it isn’t life-changing, like the $50,000,000,000, maybe we simply don’t know it’s 50 billion dollars, or we don’t have any concept of how big an amount that is. There are some very cool demonstrations on the relative size of a billion on YouTube – maybe we need to watch one.

Do we have to be different? We just are. Maybe we don’t have to, but maybe that’s because we stop using terms like that. Maybe we just don’t understand any longer why it would be a have to at all.

I used to avoid the word ‘sin,’ at all costs. I don’t anymore. Now, it’s the vehicle to adequately frame His forgiveness. It’s not attached to shame or judgment, instead, it’s the best way to illustrate His sacrifice. The want does change, and if it doesn’t, then maybe we don’t know what 50 billion dollars is.

When we understand the size of the gift, there’s a certain gratitude and shift in perspective that goes along with that and radically transforms our minds & lives. But even then, there will still be times we come to a fork in the road, hear a voice of temptation in our ears, and have to choose whether to “walk in darkness.” And I’m pretty sure, in those cases, it’ll help to think about those 50 billion reasons to follow the one that leads to the light.

The Hours

I was reading an article this morning about food, exercise, and how we spend the hours of our days & weeks. And it has me thinking about things other than food and exercise, but still how we spend the hours of our days & weeks.

Often times, we try to out-train a bad diet (and when I say “we,” I mean “me,” but my guess is I don’t just mean me.) For instance, let’s say we are on a diet that allows 2,000 calories. Saturday, we go out to dinner and have an extra piece of pizza and dessert, and end up with 2,800 calories for the day. That’s ok, because we figure we’ll just go to the gym and get on the elliptical machine to work it off. For a 200 lb man to burn those 800 calories, it would take upwards of an hour of haaard work. Or we could’ve not eaten the dessert.

Do you have an hour to spend doing cardio penance? Probably not. We have lives, we’re loving people. But I do go to the gym, and that must count for a lot. The fact that socked me in the stomach was this: if we spend an hour a day, that is less than 5% of our day. Most of us go 3-5 times/week, which is 1.7-2.9% of our weeks. That is shocking, right? Do we think of it like that? I go 6 times/week, and that’s so much, but it’s only 3.6% of my whole week!!! The rest of the time – the other 162 hours – is a much more significant picture of my total fitness. I could be eating well, parking further away from stores or work, taking after-dinner walks, yoga, I could be doing lots of things. 3.6% is really surprising and, honestly, disappointing, isn’t it?

Church will be 1 hour on Sunday (if we can make it this week). 0.5%.

This is obviously not to add any guilt. We certainly don’t need any more of that, too many of us already carry the “not enough” mindset into spiritual matters. What it is is what my very good friend calls “black coffee.” Church isn’t the only way we commune with God. So, do we read our Bibles and/or pray an hour/day? Think about our percentages caring for our relationships with Our Creator. If we spent 3% caring for our children or our spouses, do you think you’d be particularly close? I watched a documentary today on Christianity in America that was an hour and a half. I spent more of my day watching TV than I did working out, yet I’d define myself more as a Man Who Goes To The Gym than Man Who Watches TV. But what does the AI on my phone say I am? That I am a Man Who Loves? (The Machines don’t care what I say or think I am, only where I am and what I do.) We are far more than our AI would ever know, we’re more than just percentages or location pings, but percentages, location pings, checkbooks, and screen times are undeniable factors in the mosaic that is our identity.

I am often struck by these types of stories, that lead down paths of examination and introspection. Everything is connected and asks it’s own questions. And as a general rule, when answering the BIG question, “Who am I?” it’s important to start with some black coffee, even if it burns going down.

How Do You???

I’m guessing nobody wants to read another post on youth sports, and how my coaching career came to an end (a loss), or how I feel about it today (a melancholy peace, if you know what I mean, and I know that you do – it comes from a 2 Hands practice, where you hold all emotions, sometimes seemingly conflicting, at once.)

And we’re discussing righteousness on Sundays, and why and how the spirituality spills out of us into real life, in real time. There’s so much more to think/say/argue about that, right? But the site prompt today is: How do you express your gratitude? And I like that, so we’ll start there.

Let me ask you, first – how do you express your gratitude? We all have a practice of thankfulness…well, when things are going well, we know what shalom means, and we feel positive, joyful, engaged, creative, hopeful, then we all have a practice of thankfulness. When we don’t, when we’re discouraged, isolated, restless, overly cynical, we forget that practice. That practice is also how we get back and find our hearts and souls, how we find our identities, who we actually are.

However today is, when your eyes are open, creation is crackling with the energy of the divine, and you are totally aware of who you are and who He is, how does that gratitude come out of you? Do you sing in the car? Walk a bit more slowly, with your eyes up? Do you call your friends? Are you on social media more or less? Do you move more, eat better? Do you give compliments? Hugs? Kisses? Do you dance in the kitchen as your make your dinner? Do you pray more or less? Read your Bible more or less? What kind of music do you listen to? Are you aware of time? Fun questions, right?

And what I’m thinking about connection is that the way I began this post only seemed unrelated. Nothing is ever unrelated. I coached those kids for lots of years, lots of games, and sooooo many practices, and that was absolutely an expression of the gratitude I feel at being here, now, and these gifts I have been given (gifts I could never deserve.) The kids were some of the best gifts, so caring for them and loving them was simply a grateful response. Writing to you, on this blog, is an expression of thanks. I sing and dance a lot, too.

And, as long as we’re at it, that’s what righteousness is. It is a response to the gifts (all of them, but especially the BIG one: salvation) we have received. We have a new life, so maybe we could live it as thanks, treating ourselves as His, royalty, wonderfully made. So often we make everything so complicated. If you give me a great gift, I treat it with care, giving it a place of prominence in my home. It is valuable to me, so I act that way. I don’t hit it with a hammer or kick it down the stairs. I am thankful and that is reflected in my behavior.

Our lives are our most obvious expressions of gratitude, and we might as well live them as the masterpieces He already knows we are.

What I’ve Learned About New Things

This is a fairly significant week for me. Decisions have been made (I think) and these particular decisions will lead to many more. I have coached youth sports for 10+ years, in different fashions. I’ve been an assistant and the head coach, baseball, basketball, and soccer (even though I really, really don’t care for soccer). Mostly, this was out of necessity, 8 year-olds need parents to volunteer, whether they know/understand the game or not. Then, I stuck to baseball, because I have been a ballplayer. Which was pretty great, we won lots and lots of games, and lost lots and lots of games. This year is the first one where the team I’m coaching doesn’t include either of my sons. That’s sort of unusual, and if I’m honest, I don’t even like baseball too much anymore. But I love the boys I coach, I’m invested in their lives, and I know that I’ll create a safe environment where others might not.

The season began and I figured it would be the last, because leaving my family to go to the field was nearly impossible. But then the kids were great and I changed my mind and this was where I belong, in ministry with bats and balls. Then no way, then of course, then then then, changing with the wind. The kids were always great.

There have been many, many moments and experiences, faces and families, lesson after lesson on being and becoming the human beings they will be, who we will all be. And when I think of those things, I am overwhelmed, honored, grateful, and sad, in equal parts. I have been so blessed to receive the gift of being able to do this, and I will choose to do it no longer. In any small way I have made an impact, the people I’ve done it with, and for, have impacted me to an exponentially greater degree. I’m a very different person than I was 10 years ago.

But I’ve been a baseball coach, and moving from that includes a gigantic amount of uncertainty. If I were to leave, then what? Without this particular ministry, where would my ministry be? (Because having none is obviously not an option.) What exactly would I do with this time? And what about the program we’ve built? Or the league? Who knows? But is it my responsibility to answer that question, should I be one who knows?

You know this feeling, right? If we don’t know the next steps, it’s hard to move. We like control and we like to know where the next steps lead. But that is a luxury we don’t always have. And it doesn’t make those invisible next steps wrong. Sometime we are loudly called to “Go,” but the “Where?” is met with deafening silence.

(This is just volunteer recreational baseball, so maybe it’s not this dramatic. But if you know me for more than 10 seconds, you know I don’t believe in “just” anything, and everything we do, and how we do it, can have massive, world-changing consequences. Showing up and speaking fresh words into someone’s life in a significant time/space can transform reality forever. “Just” anything? Never.)

So, as far as those questions, I don’t know. But I will. Some of those questions aren’t mine to answer, no matter how loud the should’s and supposed to’s and what if’s and but’s scream. The ones that are are exciting and wide open. I wonder.

This weekend will be the last games for us, and for me. That feels fine, I don’t mind complex, complicated situations that require many more than 2 hands to hold. Of course, there will be loss – all change is loss, after all – that has to be mourned and reconciled and integrated. And it will be. I’ll keep growing, I’ll continue to be a very different person that I was, than I am.

And as we know very well, when I write “the last games,” it is in pencil. Maybe the “Go” isn’t what I think it is today, or maybe it’s just about asking the questions as to why I do what I do. Endings are always hard, and New Things are always scary, right? Even asking the questions are scary. But we do all of this, ask, answer, grow, go, together.

Spirituality & Righteousness

The site through which we create and operate our websites (both the Bridge and my Love With A Capital L) asks a prompt every day. The idea is that we gain engagement by posting a lot, as much as possible, like every day, even several times a day. Whether that’s true, I can’t say. It seems to me that an avalanche of content would dilute each one. They probably know better than I do. I’ll probably keep writing once/week. Anyway, today’s prompt is: How important is spirituality to you? And I think that’s funny, because spirituality is the glue that holds any- and everything together, gives meaning to routine, significance to each moment, weight to all of our relationships. How important? The question doesn’t make sense because nothing exists without spirit/Spirit, it’s like asking, how important is breathing to your workouts? There isn’t a workout without breath, there isn’t an us without the spiritual element (whether we acknowledge it or not).

But that’s not why I’m writing today.

We began a new series on the Breastplate of Righteousness yesterday, and anytime we discuss righteousness, or holiness, our senses heighten and our defenses rise. We simply don’t like to be told what to do, no matter who is doing the telling. And the slightest hint that what we’ve chosen is not particularly healthy is a code red to our fight-or-flight response. Maybe we dig in and argue, maybe we pack our bags and move on.

It’s as if we desperately need the freedom to ruin our lives. And that’s what this is about, a plea from our Creator to not ruin our lives, relationships, to not take a wrecking ball to our world. When He asks, without even thinking, we bristle indignantly and prepare for destruction. I always had such a problem with all of the “shall not’s” of the Bible. Thou shall not lie??? What?!!? How can a Loving God command something like this, how can He take my freedom away? I neeeed to be able to deceive and spend my anxiety-ridden moments afraid of being discovered and reaping the consequences of the lies. Good times.

Our definition of freedom is an interesting one.

I often use sexuality as examples, but that’s because the Bible so often does. I could use alcohol (I hate alcohol the most, by far, and it’s not close), gambling, laziness, anything. It could be any tool we use that might “miss the mark.” Everything is permissible, but not everything is beneficial. The key is to bypass that initial automatic rebellious response, so that we can clearly consider our behavior without stirring up the rage of our pride. I wonder how we do that? Probably the same way we do anything – acknowledging that it’s there, without judgment or fear, and taking baby steps (with each other, with the Spirit) into an unknown future, with trust and hope.

I’m pretty sure we don’t have to viciously defend our self-destructive streak anymore. Maybe we could try on some new clothes, like a shiny new breastplate? And maybe we could do that the only way we’re designed, together?

Piggies

So, about these guinea pigs. Their names are Hazel and Pipkin and they’re 3ish years old, they look like big hairy loaves. They don’t move very much, which I understand is pretty usual for guinea pigs. When my son cleans their cage, he puts them outside in a makeshift fence (with a top so nothing can snatch them) and they lay right down and eat whatever grass is under them. They talk to each other, and to us, in language that sounds like an 80’s video game. I read that they’re such social creatures that you need to have 2, otherwise they die of loneliness, and I don’t care at all whether that’s scientifically true or not, it’s wonderful.

They’re so cute it makes me want to cry.

Anyway, I often feed them. I give them romaine lettuce, baby carrots and Timothy hay. After washing the veggies, as I walk towards them, I call/sing, “Gir-rulls…gir-rulls…” and they lose their minds, beeping and squeaking and chewing on the cage door as an answer.

I open the door and try to pet them while they run (sort of?) around the cage, then I give them a carrot each, which they grab, then drop and wait for the next thing. Then I drop the lettuce, and they immediately move on to that, then come back, waiting for the next thing. That’s when I put the hay into their bowls and they dive into that. For a bite or 2, then wait for the next thing. There is no next thing, so they go back to what they have. Hazel likes the lettuce most, Pipkin is a carrot girl. They always forget these facts in greedy anticipation of what’s next. They don’t want what they have, they want what’s next.

And that’s too often like us, right? We have all we need, yet there’s always something new that we need, a new model, a new solution for a problem we had no idea we had. It’s hard to be here, now. We love our spouses, but there’s this new exotic co-worker… This job is what I worked for, but that one might be better. We can’t even tell, because we’ve stopped looking at this blessing some time ago, longing for the grass on the other side.

I heard grass has an interesting property that makes it appear greener from a distance. So, the grass actually MIGHT BE greener on the other side. But as we already know, once we get there, it’s just grass, and the grass we left now looks greener. As Yoda profoundly remarked about Luke Skywalker, “All his life has he looked away…to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm? What he was doing.” And of course, while he was saying it, Luke was daydreaming!

Arthur Schopenhauer writes, “A man is never happy, but spends his whole life in striving after something that he thinks will make him so; he seldom attains his goal, and when he does, it is only to be disappointed; he is mostly shipwrecked in the end, and comes into harbour with mast and rigging gone. And then, it is all one whether he is happy or miserable; for his life was never anything more than a present moment always vanishing; and now it is over.”

These piggies are never happy, but spend their whole lives striving after something they think will make them so. Where are we? Are our minds on where we are, on what we are doing? Hmm? Are we truly with the people around us, sitting at the dinner table? I’ve seen many people leave relationships, careers, schools, churches, faith because another one was shiny and green, only to find it not so perfect, after all.

In Genesis 28:16 (you know we’d end up here, right?), Jacob wakes up and says, “Surely the Lord was in this place and I was unaware.” He missed the beauty of the gift he’d been given, the gift of the present moment. Let’s not do that, ok?

James & The Note-Writers

The note in my Bible on James 2:14 (What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them?) reads, “If our life remains unchanged, we don’t truly believe the truths we claim to believe.” That’s pretty harsh, and leaves little room for wiggling. But is it true?

I guess the question is, can we receive salvation and continue to sin? Doesn’t our salvation cover our sin? And if so, then (as several letters of Paul’s address) can’t I just keep on doing whatever I want? Will our salvation & new life convict us, causing us to stop doing those things that destroy us? What if we still do those things, or want to do those things? Does that mean “we don’t believe the truths we claim to believe?” And then, I guess we should ask if that sounds too much like a ‘works’ theology. This book of James is awfully deep water.

I do have an idea, and it hinges on John’s use of 2 kinds of sin. The first is like falling in a hole, where we mess up. It’s mostly a mistake, and we’re mostly sorry. The other is translated like, “keep on sinning,” and that means we live in a hole, and mess up, and decide to live in that mess. We might be sorry, in that one, but not too much.

So, Jesus loves us, and maybe we fall in love with Him, He rescues us, and we receive new life, but sometimes while we’re scrolling, we end up on certain sites that aren’t for us, they’re beneath our calling. We know He doesn’t want us on those sites. Maybe we stay, but we’re a guilty afterwards, and don’t want to do it again. That’s one.

Now, Jesus loves us, and maybe we fall in love with Him, He rescues us, and we receive new life, but we search those sites purposefully, then stay on them. We know He doesn’t want us on them, but we don’t really care. We like them, they’re fun, and on the spectrum of things I could be doing wrong, this one isn’t too bad, it’s not hurting anyone, etc. That’s the other.

I don’t think James is talking about the first. And maybe the change the people who write the notes in my Bible are looking for is the sentence, “we don’t want to do it again.” We know what He wants, know what His Word says, and want to do it. When we don’t, it hurts us. That hurt is a change in our lives that will eventually lead us to not end up on those sites at all.

The “unchanged” life means we might know, but doing it just isn’t that big of a deal.

But can we believe the truths we claim to believe and still operate under the second scenario? What does it mean to believe?

If I tell you I believe the Styx album Kilroy Was Here (which includes the hit single, “Mr. Roboto”) is the best album ever recorded, but I don’t own it and haven’t listened to it since 1984, will you believe that I think it’s the best album ever recorded? Maybe that’s what James and the Note-writers are pointing to. We think we think belief is intellectual, but we really don’t, in practice. I’m figuring we understand this just fine, we simply don’t like it. We don’t like not having a way around, a justification, an argument. We like to pretend.

We sometimes ask so many questions so that we don’t have to act on the answers. Probably, we all agree with the note-writers (and to know if we do, maybe replace spirituality, Jesus, the Gospel, with this Styx album, Dawn dish detergent, or our relationships.) If I truly love The Angel… well, I don’t think I’ve ever even asked if I could love her AND date other women. I’ve never wondered if her forgiveness and grace would cover over my infidelities. My love for her, my YES, changes my life, to where I’m not even considering the NO’s anymore.

If she’d ask me to forgive somebody, I’d probably try to do it until I actually did, because I love her and want to do the things that make her happy. I wouldn’t just ignore her, and pretend she didn’t mean it. Or look for a loophole. Or ask if I can do both, love her AND hate them.

Maybe I’m a little tired of the grace/works debate, or maybe I’m tired of asking the questions that keep me stuck. Maybe I want to eliminate the word games that keep us all stuck. OR maybe I’m just done pretending.

Great Big Walking Eyeballs

I wrote this on my lovewithacapitall.com site, but I’ve changed my mind and will share it with you, too, with some minor changes. It’s about the ministry of my life and the Angel, which have, at the very least, some overlap. There isn’t any separation in our lives, all of us is spiritual. I heard once, “we’re not human beings having a spiritual experience, we’re spiritual beings having a human experience,” and that’s pretty much accurate. (As Google tells me, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin said it. I don’t know who he is, but he’s right at least once, in this regard.) I called it 23 there, and I wouldn’t call it 23 anymore, now I call it Great Big Walking Eyeballs. I hope you like it, and it has some value to you:

Last time, we talked about “having it all” or living a “best life.” This week was my 23rd wedding anniversary, so maybe I should have mentioned that. 

I’m a simple man, and that’s a very good thing, because my life and ministry is primarily to climb into complicated, chaotic situations. Work, for me, is connection/relationships and doing the best I can to bring peace and hope into anxious, hopeless, sometimes wildly unstable spaces. This is work, but the thing about having identical personal & vocational missions is there’s no division between on and off. I don’t really have days off. But I don’t want them, either. To me, this is purpose, and it’s heavy and keeps me up lots of nights, but I wouldn’t want it any other way. 

However, the truth is, I couldn’t do it at all if my home & marriage wasn’t a place of physical, emotional, spiritual rest. It’s very difficult to step into the drama of others when your life is dramatic. There’s simply not enough left to fully engage with the storms others are facing when we’re exhausted with our own raging storms. If I’m being punched in the face, it’s harder to notice your fight, much less come to your aid. 

This brings me to the Angel. She’s calm and easy. It’s 23 years but sometimes feels like 100, but, at other times, feels like I met her yesterday. I don’t know what 23 years feels like, or should feel like, but what I know is that I am completely, totally open with her (as the Bible says, “naked and unashamed”), but I also get butterflies when I kiss her, just like the first time.

I told her last night, that I very often focus (at least out loud) on the ‘lover’ aspect of our relationship. I very often tell her how oevrwhelmingly foxy she is, and how 23 years of marriage has done nothing to dull my attraction to her. So, on a public pie chart, that’s the biggest piece. But on the one no one sees, the pie chart of my heart, it’s probably a smaller piece than the rest. She’s Proverbs 31. She’s my best friend, my partner, an inspiration and model for living a life of faith. She gives strength by simply being who she is in a world that isn’t always kind to the beautiful ones. Kind, merciful, the best mother to her sons and mentor to the rest of the people lucky enough to be in her orbit. She’s creative and confident, capable, talented, driven, brilliant, gifted hand over fist by her Creator. Did I mention knock-down gorgeous? How staggering is it that when thinking/speaking about the best looking woman in the world, her looks aren’t anywhere close to the best thing about her? We’ve built a calm life from the ground up, so that we can walk anywhere, enter into any circumstance, because this soft, loving home is waiting to refill all we’ve lost outside.

We make choices, right? The best choices feel easy & obvious in retrospect, but upon further inspection, require days and years of building. The path to our particular marriage and home is marked with uncomfortability and perseverance (only Heaven knows how many arguments and sleepless nights this path has contained, so far), where it might have been easier to check out (in whatever form “checking out” takes) than to keep building. “Having it all” certainly isn’t easy, and it has lots and lots of exit ramps, but those obstacles don’t make it less of a blessing. Maybe they make it more. More significant, more valuable, more our own. 

I have no idea why she’d marry someone like me, but I don’t care about that. It’s her problem, not mine. My responsibility in all of this is to remain grateful, with wide open eyes to this amazing life I’ve been given.

Maybe that’s as good of a life philosophy as we can find, when it comes to religion, faith, and grace. There isn’t really a why to answer, “Why me? Why us?” But that’s not for us. Our responsibility in all of this is to remain grateful, with wide open eyes to these amazing gifts (life, forgiveness, righteousness, salvation, 2nd life, resurrection, each other, the Church, the church, love, acceptance, belonging, talents, passions, love, more love, all the love) we’ve been given. Like great big walking eyeballs full of thankful tears.

Youth Sports: Facepaint, Silver Chains, and Ugly Arm Sleeves

This baseball team I get to coach presented a choice for me last year. The boys wanted to use eye black (a product usually used in a black strip under the eyes to reduce glare) all over their faces, creatively, as a form of self-expression. We had bats and cats and stripes and anything else you can imagine in the field.

When the boys asked me if we would allow them to do this, my instinct was, of course, absolutely not. I am fairly progressive in many ways, but very old-fashioned in many more. And in all things sports, I consider what my dad would have thought, and he would’ve lost his mind. Against that instinct, I said yes. The other coaches disagreed, but we continued to look like a traveling band of KISS impersonators.

I waited all year for repercussion from the league that never came. We are 2 games into this season, and received our first stern email. This year, in addition to the paint, we now have big, loud silver chains and ugly arm sleeves. One wore a hoodie under his jersey on a 95 degree day. I can’t possibly tell you why, but I don’t have to. I responded to the president of the league, with, “I’ll/We’ll do whatever you say, but…” And explained our/my position.

Let me say this, to begin, my team is a collection of The Best Group of Young Men you’ll ever find. (It’s interesting, as the team turns over and the boys are replaced, the groups changes yet they remain “the best group of young men you’ll ever find.” Interesting, right? Maybe 15-16 year-old boys aren’t the worst.) But they’re also kind of squirrelly. Just like I was, and you were, and my dad was, and his dad was, and these kids sons will be. They’re funny and weird, terrific human beings. Of course they’re creative and individual, they are created in the image of a wildly creative God.

My position is, among others, we are totally respectful – of ourselves, each other, other teams, the league, the game. Other teams shout, “drop it!” shout at and fight with each other on the field, sass their coaches, curse at umpires and parents, walk on the field and give far less than their best. Do you know the term “try hard” (as in “he’s such a try hard”) is meant as a derogatory slur? Some 15-16 year-old boys are the worst.

But our team loves each other, stands and supports each other, never puts down other teams, runs out routine ground balls, does everything any of the coaches ask them to do (even when it means they sit on the bench and be good teammates or wipe the paint off and take off their chains), it is an entire roster of “try hards.” Other teams can’t get all of their players to the field on playoff game days, we have everyone for every practice. My dad would’ve LOVED them, he would’ve come to watch them play every day, paint or not.

I’m writing this here for a specific reason. Maybe you already figured this wasn’t totally about eye black and youth sports. So, my last reason was, of course, evangelism. Kids can be pretty disrespectful and generally like video games and Snapchat more than they like activity outside. Participation in all sports is down everywhere. If we want them to play, maybe we need to understand who they are and where they come from, what’s important to them. Maybe we can’t continue to cling to our notions of how we used to at the expense of today and tomorrow. Maybe nobody cares. What is the message? We might need to remember Why instead of How.

My son used to have very long, unkempt hair that I may not have always liked. BUT he is the best person you know. He’s kind, respectful, generous, empathetic and loving. When that’s who you are, who cares how you wear your hair???

This team loves baseball, plays exactly the ‘right’ way (whatever that means…my dad probably knows), and is beautiful to everyone. They come out and know, without a doubt, that they are valued and loved by their coaches. (I wonder if kids might be pretty disrespectful because they’re insecure and scared to death that they’re inadequate, and desperately need the grown-ups to listen and show them they’re worth more than they ever dreamed.) My team is who you want them to be. When that’s what you are, who cares if their arm sleeves have wolves on them??? Sometimes the traditions we hold so tightly to can become a different sort of chain around our necks.

In the Scriptures, Paul had a similar decision to make. He was bringing the Gospel of peace and love, salvation, reconciliation, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to new people & cultures. He learned who they were, what they cared about, who their gods were, what they were reading, and on and on. He knew them then he went to where they were. He cared for them and connected in ways they could understand. We’re not only coaching baseball, we’re coaching the Gospel.

If we want people to open their eyes to Jesus (Who is already there, waiting) and His love (which is already there, for all of us)… If we truly want them to know Who He is and who they are more than we want to win… Maybe we can release the chains that we cling so tightly to and let them wear theirs.