love

Leadership

The website that we use to create & post content on the Bridge (bridgefaithcommunity.com) and the Love With A Capital L (lovewithacapitall.com) websites is called Jetpack. It’s easy and free, 2 characteristics that make it very friendly for me. Jetpack wants it’s users to post often and gives lots of tools to make that happen. One of them is a prompt (a question or an idea), and today’s is: Do you see yourself as a leader?

This is interesting, because we all can have such widely contrasting views on this question. The nature of my position at the Bridge makes it obvious for me, but how do you answer the prompt? I’ve heard the phrase, “I’m no leader,” so many times, I’d start to believe it, if it wasn’t so wrong.

I also hear “I’m not a creative person.” Where do you think these lies began? When did we first hear them? Were they something we were told? And why? Why would someone lead us to believe such false notions about ourselves?

Much of our journey of faith, following Jesus, is un-learning the nonsense we’ve been taught.

Not a creative person? If we are awake and aware, if we look around, we see the fruit of a wildly creative God. The world is exploding with color and texture and beauty and function. We are made in the image of that God. It is as if we are saying, “We are all made in His image…except for me.” It’s strange we would accept this as truth isn’t it?

As far as leadership, last week we discussed our relationships in the home and asked some very difficult questions: Are we keeping score, making long records of wrongs? Are we patient? AND would our children be the first to call us patient? Would our spouses be defending our kindness? Would they defend the words we use, or our tones? Are we proud? Would our wives or children say we need it our way? Do they think we need to control how we make a pb&j sandwich? 

If these questions are so valuable (and so hard to answer honestly), that implies that people are watching. Our children are learning from our example. Our spouses are discovering who we are, how we move, what’s important to us. All of this points to the opportunity to impact the world around us, an opportunity that is only fully realized when we acknowledge the truth of our responsibility.

At work, in the grocery stores, behind the wheel, at the gym, we are always on display. How do we speak to each other? What can the cashier at the Walmart learn about the Gospel from our marriages? From our interactions with our teenage sons & daughters? If love is patient, would someone feel loved after interacting with us? Would they feel inspired our gratitude or deflated by our sour, complaining hearts?

This is the definition of leadership, and probably we’ve closed our eyes to avoid it. Those days are over, they have to be. There’s a saying that goes, “Teach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words.” We’re all teachers, illustrators, leaders, everybody is watching. I don’t always like the prompts, they often amplify a disappointingly stark difference in perspectives between the cultural and the spiritual. What we do matters to someone, so that makes it matter to everyone. Once we see this, our vision clears to possibility. And this is how it all starts…

2 Aching Muscles

On Friday, I pulled a muscle in my back. This, I suppose, isn’t the most surprising thing in the world. It happens. What’s embarrassing about it is that I did it while throwing frisbee. Or rather, disc golf. That sounds much cooler than “frisbee.” We’ve been playing quite a bit lately, and it was a pretty good time, until I felt like I got stabbed in my back and now it hurts to breathe too deeply or dead lift or get up or move quickly or walk around like a normal person. Sigh. So there’s that. I don’t know when I got this old. I used to be able to throw frisbees with no consequence. Sheesh, its just a frisbee.

If I take some ibuprofen, it’s not too bad. I bet nobody knew on Sunday morning or yesterday visiting family. Maybe they did, you know I can be very dramatic in my self-pity.

Today it’s better – I haven’t taken anything for pain yet today – but maybe that’s because there is another thing that is affecting an entirely different muscle in my aging body.

My youngest son just left for the first day of his senior year of high school. This has been only the first leg of the “lasts.” The last high school summer league in basketball. The last summer vacation of high school. The last first day.

There’s a meme (the wisdom literature of our time, our proverbs) that says something like “one day you’ll carry your child to bed and it’ll be the last time, and you won’t know it at the time.” And it can be anything. These 2 boys used to sleep on my chest. We walked them to school, drove them to practices, watched band concerts. I used to put them on my shoulders, or better yet, in a backpack for walks, like Yoda. If I sat them on my shoulders now, there would be many more than one muscle pulled. (My older boy is bigger than me in every way, maybe I should get on his shoulders to see now.)

As we all get older, we get the gift of knowing it’s the last. I knew the last time I’d coach each of them. I knew when I handed the championship trophy to this now-high school-senior and hugged him, that it would be the last time I would ever do that. That’s why I cried in front of everyone. We know today is his last first day of high school. We know the next first day of school, he won’t be living in this house. I cry a lot in front of everyone. (Today, though, with this pulled muscle in my back, it hurts A LOT to cry, more than usual.)

I talk a lot about a 2 hands theology. We are asked to hold the sadness – in this case, the sadness of the loss of my little boy – AND the celebration and joy – in this case, he’s a cooler, better person than I could have ever dreamed he’d be. Both of these boys are, and that is more wonderful than I can tell you. Except they’re not boys anymore, they’re men, and that hurts worse than I can tell you. My tears are a holy mixture of pain and joy.

That mixture has a name and is, simply, gratitude. More than anything that I can’t tell you is how thankful I am. My sister & I were talking, awestruck at these lives with which we have been blessed. This is certainly not to say they have been easy or without struggle or without times we doubted and there were times we might not have felt so grateful. But the thing about a 2 hands theology is that we have always been honest about those times, and the truth is, that’s probably why we’re so thankful today. We have been there for all of it.

I remember tearing their artwork from the walls of our old house as it went underwater, but I couldn’t get it all. And I prize what I took and mourn the loss of what I left behind. My aim has always been to live a fully present life, showing up to the pleasure, the wins, and the suffering, the losses. There have been so many of both, and I wouldn’t trade any of them.

So yes, I am celebrating with an ecstatic heart at this life I’ve been given and what I get to see and experience…and there is no amount of ibuprofen that can ease the hurt of what I get to see and experience. But the best thing is that there is no world where I’d want to.

Gifts

I usually like to write and post on a Monday or, at the latest, Tuesday. Today is Thursday. This week has been full. My heart is full, my head and my schedule are somewhat less full, but still enough to add a certain extra weight to the everyday.

First, the “everyday” reminds me of the AI quote from Sunday about the profane. Profane is defined as “Things that are not sacred, such as ordinary daily routines of life. Profane elements are secular, mundane, and practical, and are not considered to hold any spiritual significance.” I think that is a poor definition, because it implies that there are areas of life that don’t hold spiritual significance. It seems to me that part of our problem is that we believe that these areas exist, and therefore, and treat them as if they are meaningless. They lie outside of any greater consequence, and check out. We mindlessly step in the same footprints as yesterday and tomorrow and next Friday and last January.

So I believe that with all of my heart: there is no separation, and everything is spiritual, as long as we hold it with care and love.

Then, the homework was to open our eyes to the beauty of this life, to see all of this as a gift, the blessings, and look for spaces to be grateful. Notice these wonderful lives of ours.

And sometimes, I am invited to discover if these beliefs I say I hold are the ones I actually hold. Invited to do the homework myself. Asked the very difficult question of priority – when belief and faith come into conflict with convenience or my idea of what is supposed to be, then which side wins? Not only in my head or on paper, but in flesh and blood?

We all have this same invitation a ka-jillion times a day.

I make a weekly to-do list that I cross off (it is very satisfying to cross them off) as I complete each item. 2 of the items are “Bridge Post,” and “Love Post.” I write these posts on Monday or Tuesday. But Monday and Tuesday, I had homework and belief to practice. I don’t always get these pop quizzes right, often times I’ll serve my to-do list and treat other opportunities as things to get through to return to my list.

Thankfully, this week, I was (mostly) fully present to this gift I have been given, and I’m only writing this on a Thursday. Small steps make good lives, and sometimes they make lives so much better and deeper than you could have ever possibly imagined.

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?