Leaving Offense: Three Ways to Live a Life Free of the Chains of Offense

My daughter, Josephine, went to the Post Office the other day. As she stood in line, socially distanced, waiting to top up her MetroCard, she noticed that the attendant was a conversationalist. Because conversation in public is on the endangered list, Josephine took the time to have a chat. Here is a recap of the interaction (as best as I can write it down from Josephine's descriptions).

Post Office Employee: Good morning! How are you today?

Josephine: Very good, thank you. A beautiful morning outside today.

POE: Wonderful. Now, what are wanting to do today?

Josephine: I'd like to top up my MetroCard.

POE: (typing in the computer) So you go into the city a lot?

Josephine: I'm at university.

POE: What are you studying?

Josephine: Chemical engineering.

POE: Wow. Not many girls in that, are there?

Josephine: (stays quiet but grinds her teeth and smiles)

POE: Are you passing?

Now, everyone person who reads this, or even hears the story, has already had the narrative prepared in advance for that which should occur next. This is just what we do in the 21st century.

Step 1: Be offended.

Step 2: Take offense and tell the Postal Employee that his outdated, ageist, misogynistic ideas are shameful in the current century. Half of the students in her class are women, than you very much.

Step 3: Post her frustration and outrage online. Everyone should know about this episode. Social media should be invited to take part in the outrage party and eventually, if  there is enough public shame frenzy whipped up, this postal employee should get fired (or cancelled, in this present age).

Step 4: Continue to stew over the event and feel victimised by the moment. 

Step 5: Perpetuate the pain of offense inwardly until it alters the way she looks at other people, especially men, in general.

Okay, so you've followed with me in this over-exaggerated, step-filled process. When I first heard her retell the story, I found myself wanting to march down to the Post and give him a piece of a father's mind: women have every opportunity and every ability to do chemical engineering. But when I looked into my daughter's face, I found wisdom well beyond a parent's protective response.

Josephine had stopped the narrative after step 1.

Josephine had every right to be offended. She had every right to be angry and affronted by the naivete of this man and his outdated understanding. Being offended is one of the few ways that we experience enough frustration to speak out and change what's actually wrong.

But step 2 is the killer.

Once you take the offense, you pack it into your bag and you carry it with you. The offense is acidic and it eats away at the entirety of your joy. When you take offense and worry over it in your mind, it becomes something even more significant in your daily life. You find that what used to bring you happiness sits chained in the shadow of that offending moment.

Thus, here are three ways to break the chains of offense in life: (these are not exhaustive)

Leave the Offense Where You Found It

Like a coin glittering in the pit of an outhouse, the offense is nice and shiny and seems to have value. But really, retrieving it and polishing it up is actually not worth the effort. It just makes you holding... well, something covered in... um... someone else's issues.

In Josephine's story, imagine if Josephine would have gone off on the postal employee who, in some ways, was just asking a question about how Josephine was doing in university with her classes. In berating him, she leaves herself wide open for a negative response. She also slams the door on being able to offer a moment of education to him - like women in engineering was not just a thing of the present, but also of the past. She might even begin the next part of the conversation with, "Yes, I'm passing, and I love it. I want to follow in the footsteps of great chemical engineers like Joan Berkowitz who helped solve problems with pollution and waste." This might even intrigue the Postal Employee to immediately Google 'Joan Berkowitz' right after she leaves (which I hope you do also).

Solomon had something to say about this, too. Proverbs 19:11 A person's insight gives him or her patience, and their virtue is to overlook the offense.

A helpful virtue to have.

Kick the Offense into the Gutter

Taking offense serves no purpose whatsoever other than to stir up difficulty in one's own life. Once you have moved on to Steps 3-5, you open yourself up for hypocrisy. 

And, hypocrisy is a murderer of most good things.

All of our lives are exposed to media, recording, visual reminders that we are being watched constantly. The moment we post something entirely negative about an offense taken, there is always a person we have offended in the past who rolls their eyes, points a finger and says, 'Yeah, poor baby, but what about the time you...'

Ecclesiastes 7:21,22  Don't pay attention to everything people say, or you may hear your servant cursing you, for in your heart you know that many times you yourself have cursed others.

Soon, the offense you took and posted online has suddenly become a dagger in the hands of an old enemy and it is plunged straight at your back. You never even saw it coming.

Kick that offense right into the sewer so that you can...

Move On

It's forgiveness, not forgetness. When we move on, we are allowed the gift of forgiveness which might be less for the other person and more for ourselves. We won't forget that moment of offense. We won't forget the times when someone said something inconsiderate or unconscionable.

But it can be a henna tattoo rather than an ink one.

Move on. 

Don't stare into the gutter where you've kicked the offense. Keep going. Enjoy the very things and gifts that God has given you to do. 

Colossians 3:12,13 Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a grievance against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you are also to forgive.

If God can move on, we can too.

I pray that you can break all chains of offense in your life.

The Wild Silence

There is a place on the Onkaparinga River, just past the chattering rapids, just beyond the clamouring spindrifts where the currents and the cataracts copulate, where the water makes no noise. Most hikers do not spend much time in this silent place. Their eyes, ears and thoughts are on far busier vistas - perhaps waterfalls around the next corner, or billowing trees swinging in the wind. No, most people do not pause at the still place where the eddies have turned and flipped making it seem as if the river is running backwards.

I wondered to myself at that moment why we don't stop in these quiet places. Is it because we are so captivated by movement and sound that we cannot be bothered to stop? Or, is it because the silence speaks louder to the mortal soul, whispering, ever so slightly, that the river of time is as unstoppable as the Onkaparinga?

In this wider place, the quiet seemed to catch the hands of time and slow them down, and I was grateful. I was thankful that I could find refuge in the wall of silence and think. 

Just think.

This inability to pause is a product of the world in which we live. The human species alternates between needing space and needing attention. We withdraw into the cocoon we've spun, a coffin of self-interest, fed intravenously by the internet while excreting the byproducts of our neuroses - these unconscious and automatic ways in which we attempt to deal with our individual and collective anxieties. We distract ourselves from the knowledge that none of this, and none of us, is permanent. Through the manipulation of endorphins, or dopamine, entertainment, sex, drugs and rock and roll, we wend our way through life pushing noisily from one thing to the next but often missing the very thing that makes life worth living.

Meaning.

We miss it. In our constant search for adventure, the longest pause we take is for a selfie on top of Blueberry Hill where we've been searching for a thrill that was never up there in the first place. The thrill is actually in the valley, in the wild silence, where our thoughts and imaginations are given room to grow. 

You see, we've tamed the towns and the cities and the urban wastelands. Inside the city limits, almost all things are controlled, from what we eat to what we wear, what we say to what we see. The limitations placed upon our thoughts are a weedmat for what we believe. They actually produces the very things we are most anxious about:

I am alone. I am valueless. Life has no meaning.

Yet when we push down into the gorges of our life, pausing, yes, to see the rapids and the foaming beauty brought about by the recent rains, we could enter the wilderness of silence. Here, we can imagine the moment of creation, the beauty of the human soul and how much better life is finding meaning.

I have people to walk with. I have abilities and talents that other people need. There is a greater good in the world than the parameters we've been given. Suddenly, I realize that I don't need noise. I don't need the next best thing, or see what's around the corner. I suddenly understand, that this second in which I live is permanent and fixed and I can find beauty in it. Whether I am happy or in pain is irrelevant. 

Our rapidly moving world which never halts, never breaks off its endless march to be more efficient, pushes us to the tenuous limits of our exhaustion and we wonder, 'Why am I always tired?' Isn't it because we never stop not only to smell the roses, but their beautiful cousins next door? If I never get off the treadmill, I'll never rest.

So today, as we walked back from that place on the Onkaparinga River, that stretch beyond the big boulder where the brown water seemed to flow backwards, I felt better. I went into the wild silence and found rest.

Where is your place of wild silence?

Monger

Throughout my life I (and I'm guessing you) have encountered a lot of people who have tried to sell me something. Through this process, I've developed a pretty healthy sense of scepticism when someone says to me, 'This is not a sales call..."

Yeah, right.

It's not that I don't understand economics, marketing and selling, but it seems like business is so, I don't know, invasive, you know what I mean? Telemarketers, television advertisements, thousands and thousands of promotions in my email box and on the web pages I visit. Heck, supposedly my phone is listening to me (that is so weird to write) to eavesdrop so that businesses can get a headstart on what kinds of things I might buy.

This is frustrating beyond belief. I've come to a point in my life when I'm pretty happy with the things (and the amount of things) that I've been fortunate enough to place into my house, but every time someone tries to see me something, I get this... itch that I can't scratch. I have this worm that wriggles through my conscience that says, a little bigger TV would make your life better, a better bottle of wine, maybe a vacation in a galaxy far, far away.

So, I give into the temptation to listen to TVmongers, winemongers, vacationmongers, any kind of mongers that will distract me from the despair that seems to grip the world and squeeze the love out of it. The current and best selling monger is the fearmonger. 

Let's face it: fear sells, and it's very convincing.

As Christians it can be very easy to buy into this. When Jesus said that there would be persecutions, struggle, and lives rife with pain, death and loss, it's easy to fork over a lot of emotional and relational capital to build walls of safety. But the great lie in this advertising is that the purchase does not actual inoculate you from any of these things. It only reinforces the reality that life is short and the things we purchase are for less valuable than the people we share them with.

The opposite corollary is what we, as the human race, should be selling. Actually, we should be giving it away.

We should be hopemongers.

The fearmongers circle like buzzards hoping that this present generation will give into fear. They hope that the corpse of collective humanity falls down, pulseless, stricken dead by the despair-pill it has swallowed. But as Christians, we understand the polar opposite, that the life giving force of the Gospel written in Paul's words gives hope: "You are a new creation. The old has gone, the new has come." 

In Christ, fear doesn't have to control us. Our selfish natural tendencies don't have to buy into the fear mongering. Satan has no power over the one who has already been made new.

Here is hope. And I give it to you for free.

Notice how Paul speaks to the people of Rome who suffered exactly the same things that we are today - even more! Persecution, sickness, temptation to give into idolatry, fear of the future:

Therefore, since we have been declared righteous by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. We have also obtained access through him by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

And not only that, but we also rejoice in our afflictions, because we know that afflictions produce endurance, endurance produces proven character and proven character produces hope. This hope will not disappoint us, because God's love has been pour out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit given to us.

Hopeongering in a world full of the opposite. And it's not even for sale - it's given away for free because the price was paid for by the giver of hope.

If there is anything worthwhile holding onto today, I hope you can take hold of the hope in Jesus.

The Wrestler

The foam mat was semi-squishy, kind of like my nerves. 

After lacing up my high top shoes, donning my plastic ear guards and turning to my coach who was doing his best to pump me for the match, I noticed that his enthusiasm lacked authenticity. His smile kind of hung lopsided on his chin and his eyes had kind of a cringy look, as if he was already thinking a little further into the future.

You see, I was an undersized, underdeveloped, frightened twelve-year-old wrestler who wanted to be doing anything - anything at all, even homework, or the dishes - than facing off in a spandex singlet grappling with another twelve-year old, underdeveloped and frightened boy. 

It was the last match of the year. I had participated in seven of these contests. Pretty much after the first one I wanted to quit, but quitting was not acceptable in the Matthias family. If you said you were going to do something, you did it. But the coach's reservations about my abilities were real: I had won one match. Generally, I was finished off by the end of the first period; if I was lucky, I'd make it through the second. These three periods, each a minute in length, seemed interminable. The minutes stretched into eons as we entered the circle and into the fray, faced each other, one foot forward, hands ready and raised. Frankly, I just wanted it to be over, but my competitive nature did not allow me to simply flop onto the ground and pin myself.

The referee would blow his whistle and we would grapple. Mano y mano. Hand to hand, man to man - there was no outside assistance.

Once locked into the struggle, I knew I was losing. The other boy obviously had a strength (and will) advantage. My main tactic, as far as I can remember, was to attempt to escape the circle. Generally, ones who do this lose points for stalling, but I didn't care. Unfortunately, my opponent was quite good at counteracting my best move of running away.

He just kept dragging me back in.

It feels like the year 2020 is the same kind of opponent. Bush fires, coronavirus, riots, protests, political insanity. This year has stretched interminably - minutes have become locked-down hours; hours have become isolated days; days have become weeks of worry. There have been times when I've wanted to throw in the towel, but more often I just wanted to escape the circle for a while. I wanted a breather - and frankly, I just wanted 2020 to get off my back.  

But the year keeps dragging me back in.

I can't even imagine, then, what Jacob felt like during his wrestling match written about in Genesis 32:

Jacob was left alone and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. When the man saw that he could not defeat him, he struck Jacob's hip socket as they wrestled and dislocated his hip. Then he said to Jacob, 'let me go, for it's daybreak.'

But Jacob said, 'I will not let you go unless you bless me.'

There are all sorts of things that I wonder about this story:

1. Why was there a wandering wrestler in the wilderness?

2. How could they possibly wrestle all night? A minute was long enough.

3. As Jacob pulled the man back into the circle, he pinned him down so that he could be blessed. How did Jacob know how to do this?

If I think about it, this year is very much like this story. For all the years of comfort we've grown accustomed to, 2020 arrived very much like a strange, wandering wrestler. Entering into the circle of our comfort, 2020 pulled some moves we weren't expecting: fires, viruses and general global unrest. 2020 dislocated us, not just upsetting our comfort, but truly stopped us from moving. 2020 arm locked us down, and strangely, it's felt like the referee doesn't feel good about stopping the match. 

And now, we have a choice:

We can try to just drag ourselves to the end of the year, tap out and hope that 2021 is far less aggressive, or we can hold on tight and find the blessing of this year - fight until the daybreak of December 31st and marvel that we have, as a global community sought to find meaning and life in the midst of all the struggle.

What blessings are you holding (on) out for? What have you struggled with already? Are you tired out? Are you stronger? Are you blessed? 

Singing Home

It was hard not to have a tear.

It's even harder to distinguish whether the tear had materialized because of sadness or joy, because both are found in equal proportion.

I heard people singing this morning.

Sure, I hear music on the radio. I hear heavily manipulated voices resonating beautifully, reverbed to perfection, highlighted by dulcet backing vocals. These songs play well through speakers and I tap my hands on the steering wheel to the beat.

But nothing compares to human voices surrounding you in unison, singing the song of home.

We had staff devotions and prayer at the school this morning. The staff, lead by a group of teachers, sang songs of hope, songs of lament, songs of joy as they were designed. I wasn't really prepared to be moved by it, nor was I completely aware of how much I missed it. I realized that I'd taken group singing for granted.

Throughout history, people have always sung, and they've done this for a variety of reasons. Recently, most singing is done for entertainment; we plug a playlist into an app (or now, the app knows us better than we know ourselves and chooses for us) and we passively enjoy the music that someone else sings to us.

Before this, though, singing almost always took on a different purpose. Not for entertainment, but for remembrance.There is something intrinsically beautiful and deep about whatever place you call home. There is a profound echo in our modern perspectives that, if we just listen closely, we can hear home sung for us.

Call to mind the Sound of Music if you've ever seen the movie. When the von Trapp family are about to leave Austria, what do they sing? They sing a song of home. For many, this is a scene that resonates deeply, a desperate longing to return to times and home before.

Think about the Israelites in exile...

By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat done and wept when we remembered Zion.
there we hung up our lyres on the poplar trees, for our captors there asked us for songs,
and our tormentors, for rejoicing:
'Sing us one of the songs of Zion!'

How can we sing the Lord's song on foreign soil?
If I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill.
May my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you,
if I do not exalt Jerusalem as my greatest joy.
(Psalm 137:1-6  CSB))

They needed to remember home, so they sang about it. They didn't want to forget.

What about the people of the Reformation? They fashioned hymns to talk about the great things that God has done in the world and will continue to do. These hymns, a final end to strife and war, injustice and sadness, they spoke of a people longing for 'home' - the eternal place of God.

And the Spirituals sung by slaves in agony? Who cannot be moved by these lyrics by Thomas A Dorsey?

Precious Lord, take my hand
Lead me on, let me stand
I am tired, I am weak, I am worn
Through the storm, through the night
Lead me on to the light

Take my hand, precious Lord
Lead me home
When my way grows drear
Precious Lord, linger near
When my life is almost gone
Hear my cry, hear my call
Hold my hand lest I fall

When the darkness appears
And the night draws near
And the day is past and gone
At the river I stand
Guide my feet, hold my hand

The people sang to be reminded of a home they could never experience again other than the one that God had planned for them. These are the words of humanity.

As we have entered a new age, a new era (and I will not say a 'new normal') singing home is all that we can do. We cannot return to the way before, but in singing about it, we are transported to the feelings of it and the memories can sustain us until our Precious Lord leads us home.

Sing loudly into the darkness. Sing as the dawn comes.

9 Criteria of Success

This poem is attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson:

How do you measure success?

To laugh often and much; 

To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;

To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;

To appreciate beauty;

To find the best in others;

To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a redeemed social condition or a job well done;

To know even one other life has breathed because you lived

- this is to have succeeded.

There are times when all of us struggle with self-worth brought on by perceived valuations by other people. I don't make enough money. I haven't met a deadline. My schoolwork is lacking. I missed three notes in my recital. When I look in the mirror, I don't see beauty, I hear voices picking me to pieces.

When I read the poem above, something shifted inside of me - scales-fell-from-my-eyes sort of thing, and I began to see that perhaps this is a better/best definition of success that is both achievable and enjoyable. Rather than reducing success in the frying pan of life down to status, money, self-promotion and glory (i.e. creating a perfect brand for myself), here are ten things that I can do every day to be a success.

1. Laugh often and much.

On my walk yesterday, I saw a woman attempting to put on her mascara while she was walking using her phone as a mirror. I don't know why I found this so funny, but it reminded me that my own efforts to look better must be humorous sometimes. I can only imagine what some would think as I attempt pushups. Laughter is essential to experience the goodness of life.

2. Win the respect of intelligent people. 

There is a man I meet with regularly who is intelligent, generous, insightful and attentive. When we get together, we share stories of the past, laughter of the present and exciting hope for the future. When we are done, this incredibly intelligent man thanks me for my time. Thanks me! How is that possible? And yet when he does, I feel ten feet tall.

3. Win the attention of children.

I marvel at God's sense of humor not only when showing me the beauty of my own children, but the inevitability to be recharged by the sense of wonder of all children. Part of my role as pastor is to work with an Early Learning Centre. As I was sitting with some of the children reading a book, one of the girls reached up and touched my bald head. Her words: 'Your head is lumpy.' Every time I am with kids and teachers, I find I am inspired.

4. Earn the appreciation of honest critics.

Some of the most important people in my life are critics - not that they are being critical, but that they are helping to shape my own path in life so that it aligns with personal and communal health. To be a successful leader requires that we receive honest feedback and share struggles with critics. No successful person in the world can be surrounded by 'yes-men.' Nothing will ever change for the better. That person only becomes more and more self-absorbed until they find themselves utterly alone.

5. Endure the betrayal of false friends.

The success is not in that ones friends betrayed you, but that you were able to surround yourself with others, and discover the intestinal fortitude to keep moving despite the betrayal. How often in life do I define my success on the opinions of others who, if I'm honest with myself, I wouldn't consider to be at the Round Table of my life. To endure it, though, is to succeed and be stronger and better prepared for future relational struggles. This is a guarantee in life.

6. Appreciate beauty.

Have you looked up today? Have you looked out? Have you looked toward? The skies, crystal blue renew our sense of awe that this world and the universe beyond, are creatively and imaginatively made just for beauty's sake. Have you noticed, today, the faces of others, the color of their eyes, the hue of their skin, the line of their cheeks, the crease of their smiles? How beautiful they are!

7. Find the best in others.

This one, more than any of the others, is hardest for humanity, because we are constantly and consistently told (and sometimes shown) that it's a survival-of-the-fittest world. Thus, we look at others' actions for negative motives and waste precious relational time trying to figure out what they're trying to take from me or I might be losing. Here is a great turn of phrase from Martin Luther's catechism from the 8th Commandment (You are not to bear false witness against your neighbor):

We are to fear and love God so that we do not tell lies about our neighbors, betray or slander them or destroy their reputations. Instead we are to come to their defense, speak well of them and interpret everything they (say and) do in the best possible light.

To do this is not only to succeed, but to cause others to find success.

8. Leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a redeemed social condition or a job well done.

An incredibly appropriate reminder in the contemporary climate, both in nature and humanity, that our actions and our words can bring about successful transformation. I love Waldo's thoughts not simply about picking up trash or using less plastic, but being part of sustaining a world where children, society and business are thought of as opportunities, not drudgery.

9. Know even one other life has breathed because of you.

This word 'breathe' has come out in a multitude of ways in the last two weeks. How is it that I can be part of helping other people breathe new life, freedom, security and joy?

These nine criteria for success are unlike anything that is expounded by our consumer cultures. Take a moment today to reflect on how 'successful' you are today. 

Disquiet

I have many fears at this time.

I fear that this disquiet will go unabated for quite some time.

I fear that this disquiet will end too quickly.

I fear that people all over the world will succumb to hopelessness and tear everything down - not simply physical things, not man-made temples, nor palaces built for kings, nor edifices built to reflect idols of avarice, pride, envy, anger and lust, we could throw sloth and gluttony in there, too - but a demolition of love and trust, care and community.

I fear that we will live in a constant state of terror and chaos, not because we have to, but because we choose to.

I fear that we will remain unmovable, stuck, frozen in the latest way to hate other people.

I fear that we have reached this place in Isaiah 32:6,7

For the fool speaks folly, his mind is busy with evil. 
He practices ungodliness and spreads error concerning the Lord;
the hungry he leaves empty and from the thirsty he withholds water.
The scoudrels methods are wicked, he makes up evil schemes to destroy the poor with lies,
even when the plea of the needy is just.

It would be quite easy to appropriate this verse and place it squarely on the shoulders of one man, one leader, one government - it might even be just to do so. We are all this 'fool' at times. But the one who points to another and calls him or her a 'fool' is in danger... as Jesus says, so I will refrain from inserting the name of a fool, and point to our foolishness, because truly:

Our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God so that when the day of evil comes you may be able to stand your ground.

It would be quite simple to vilify the 'other side' and create that person, that group, that race, that profession, that political party to be the enemy. In that difficult simplicity, we are divided and a divided people is much easier to conquer. Going out to violently protest, riot or even become a novice news reporter by doing live updates on social media only encourages, to some extent, a need to make this an event rather than a transformation. All change must come through pain, but this painful protest, encouraged and even discouraged, does not allow the vision for the future to actually be spoken.

Here is a glimpse of the Kingdom of Righteousness and what the rulers of the Kingdom will be like:
See, a king will reign in righteousness and rulers will rule with justice.
Each person will be like a shelter from the wind and a refuge from the storm.
like streams of water in the desert and the shadow of a great rock in a thirsty land.
Then the eyes of those who see will no longer be closed
and the ears of those who hear will listen
The mind of the rash will know and understand, and the stammering tongue will be fluent and clear.
No longer will the fool be called noble nor the scoundrel be highly respected...  (Isaiah 32:1-5)

Is it not the vision for the Kingdom of God to be where God's will and power reign, not thirst for personal power over and above others who we have labeled the enemy?

For some, this might sound too religious or to soft, but we can only speak that which is written for us and the Word calls out to all people to remind us -

The fruit of righteousness will be peace; the effect of righteousness will be quiet confidence forever.
(Isaiah 32:17)

Let us all rise up together to struggle for perpetual justice, righteousness and peace.

Rage Against Asphyxiation

I sat on a small plastic green chair yesterday as school chapel was about to begin. It is a weekly moment. It used to be (how often do we use those words now) that the entirety of the school would gather together in the sanctuary to sing, dance, talk, listen, pray, but now that the worship world has paused, we are separated to classrooms to watch worship take place on screens.

The call to worship was spoken: the leader's hand was raised in the air for blessing - 'We begin in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.' - and she made the sign of the cross towards the screen. We had invited God to be involved in the process.

I looked around as the invocation was being spoken. The room was chock full of four and five-year-olds, their eager expressions redolent with joy. Worship was an exciting departure from what could sometimes be mundane. Their little heads, faced forward, expectantly awaiting what would come next, seemed to bob in anticipation.

And then, without warning, a youtube advertisement came up. As always, it is without warning, without choosing and generally without tact. A video game character, a menacing man garbed in black with an equally menacing automatic machine gun, popped up and began shooting. Because the children were only meters away from the screen, the reality shocked, started and scared them. I felt so badly for the teacher - there was nothing he could have done - but he stretched out in front of the screen, protecting the children and their eyes that were now scarred from a world that constantly confronts them with violence. The teacher turned the TV off, and a minute later, after the violent video game ad had passed, we resumed worship with a gentle song about God's love in the world.

This hyper-reality truly shocked me. It was an electric jolt, an awakening, to the present reality of this world which has experienced the same jolt in Minneapolis.

Most people, or white people (myself included), have been meandering through life oblivious to the present reality that faces the non-white world (which is most of the planet). If I am honest with myself, I invite God into my life not to transform my thoughts and beliefs, but to confirm them and my place in the world. I want to live a life blessed by comfort and then move seamlessly on to worshiping the God who has dispensed this comfort upon me (or so I make-believe).

And yet the truth and true reality of this situation is that God seems to be particularly worried about and for, all people who are persecuted, and God's judgement against those who are asleep, or worse yet, have closed their eyes to injustice and persecution, is written in large black ink many times throughout the Bible.

Take care of the widow, the orphan and the stranger. Do it.

Some people look from the outside at what happened to George Floyd and have made immediate judgements about it. I'm not talking about the situation in general, but the reality at large. Because I currently live in a different country than the United States, there are whispers both spoken and written online - 'Thank God we don't live in America' or 'I'm glad we don't have those kind of problems here.' Instead of feeling empathy, we have a warped sense of nationalism, that somehow our country is better than that one. Insert whichever nation you want, not just America. Instead of speaking out about the problem that all people of privilege, we instead turn a spiteful eye and pray 'Thank God we can get back to the normalcy of our lives.' I hope this is not a time where middle to upper class white people hole up in their middle to upper class homes to binge on Netflix until they can feel safe to come out of their middle to upper class caves to get back to their middle to upper class lives.

In a month, the media will have turned the page and their attention on to the next tragedy, the next horror story, the next shallow pool of fear in which we dive. We will get on with our lives, or that's what we want, and we will forget what happened to George Floyd.

That is exactly what we should not be doing. We should be experiencing George's last words, 'I can't breathe.' We should be fighting against the suffocating knee of injustice pressed against the throats of the world, instead of worrying about national interests. We should be inciting our governments to riot against this vicious, poisonous evil of racism - not to 'look into it,' but to do something - our leaders need to humble themselves, get down on that knee of choking privilege and beg forgiveness and respond with compassion, justice and grace.

The country in which I live, Australia, has had racial issues in the past. In the last decades, they have made public admissions and public apologies to the very people they had attempted to suffocate in the past. For this, I am amazed and grateful. I truly continue to pray that our words are not just puffs of air issuing from our throats and lips, but true calls to action.

Let those apologies be not just words, let it be a new reality and a new truth, that all people are created as equals. We are no longer valued by the countries in which we live or the countries from which we come, but valued because the air we breathe is precious to our identically shaped lungs, and the blood which collects the oxygen is exactly the same colour. We are valued because we are human brothers and sisters - borders and biases are irrelevant and unnecessary.

So today, I can't breathe. I'm suffocating on the sorrow of the people in Minneapolis - the community and its collective conscience. I want to be with people in this fight against injustice, but I have to get past the desire to shut my eyes, turn off the computer and look forward to the next week of my life when all this will be in the rearview mirror.

We must all stay present and focussed in this fight against asphyxiation.

Family Feud

The Bible is replete with tragic heroes.

Some of them appear as rugged individualists bent on conquest and pushing into the land that God promised, while others show up unfiltered in their thoughts and reflections, men and women who struggle with the thought of a God who they believe is omnipotent yet strangely absent in times of greatest need. These heroes desire a different life and different view of this all-powerful God: they want to feel and experience the presence of the omni-loving God.

God does not always appear when most wanted, but when most needed.

For we who are neither biblical figures or particularly heroic (although it feels somewhat daunting to stay in lockdown), the need to connect and be loved by both God and family is still present. Especially in uncertain times, to feel valued is an important way to deal with isolation and separation.

I think this is seen most poignantly in the life of arguably the most tragic heroine in the Bible: Leah, the first wife of Jacob.

As the story goes, Jacob meets Rachel, the love of his life at a 'wishing well,' where, after falling in love at first sight, he gallops off to her father (his uncle Laban) to ask for her hand in marriage. After consistent trickeries and deceptions, not only does Jacob work seven years for the love of his life (cue Freddie Mercury).

Instead, on the wedding night, Laban substitutes the older daughter (Leah) for the younger (Rachel). While most of this story does not seem correct (certainly politically, but also from a choice perspective) in the 21st century, this was Laban's wish. It is not the custom in this place to give the younger daughter in marriage before the firstborn. (Gen. 29:26) Thus, without knowing (due to darkness, clothing and whatever else the tradition stipulated on wedding nights) Jacob married 'Leah (who) had tender eyes.' (Gen. 29:17)

While we who read with 21st century spectacles might think this is an insensitive and shallow way of describing two daughters (Rachel being shapely and attractive) Hebrew scholars have said that Leah's tender eyes were a compliment to her. John J. Parson's writes,

Leah's eyes were weak or tender from crying her eyes out becasue of the prospect of marrying Esau. The adage of the town was: Two sons to Rebecca and two daughters to Laban - the older to the older and the younger to the younger... She wept to be the mother of the righteous. And it is through Leah that the lineage of David comes (Judah).

Jacob ended up with both sisters, but '...he loved Rachel more than Leah.' (Gen. 29:30b)

It's a very cold world to be in competition for love. Siblings sometimes feel it, whether it is a true competition or not. To be a success, to receive accolades from parents, to be loved - these are the things that give life meaning. When praise is lavished on one child over another, often the one who feels snubbed will rebel to at least receive some kind of attention from parents. But imagine living in a culture of bigamy? What happens when you feel underappreciated?

From this heroic story of Leah, we don't get a sense that she complained to God. There is no dialogue between the omnipotent Creator and the older wife, but the tears may have continued because she felt unloved.

When the LORD saw that Leah was unloved, he opened her womb; but Rachel was unable to conceive. Leah conceived, gave birth to a son, and named him Reuben, for she said, 'The LORD has seen my affliction (being unloved); surely my husband will love me now. (Gen. 29:31,32)

Twice more she conceives and gives birth, At last, my husband will become attached to me because I have borne (eventually six) sons for him.

To be in a home which is constantly defined by competition for attention and love is one of the most difficult places to be. Now, in 2020, in some places, that competition is catastrophically magnified because of the lockdown. Families who had found a tenuous balance of existence because of freedom for distance and space are now thrust into a situation where that fight for the (seemingly) limited resource of attention is omnipresent.

How do we work through this struggle of lockdown? What are the practicalities of the life of the heroine, Leah?

1. Paying attention is one of the only free things in life. You can give it away and never run out. In giving attention to our kids and our families, we strengthen bonds so that when we are apart, life is not about competing against, but striving together for something.

2. Honour the value of our relationships. This it not about what they do, but the mere fact that they are a gift.

3. Realise that God's perspective of timing is different and wondrous. While this is difficult and too often clichéd, tears and patience are often a powerful elixir to sensing God's presence in life.

4. Lastly, and hopefully most significantly (I hope), diversify relationships. Even in times of lockdown, reach out to others whether through social media or phoning. Don't place all of your social happiness in one basket. This is good for you and for your family.

Social Dis-connection

I like to walk - to feel the breeze on my face before the chill of winter hits, and to see the glittering blue sky, gem-like over the eucalypts - I am aware that I am not alone: dozens of people are feeling the necessity to do exactly the same thing that I am. Escape from the isolation, and yet strangely, the isolation lingers because we have been told that we cannot interact with other people.

We must keep our social distance.

If there is any one phrase that I want to deliberately scratch from my reality, it is this one. Social Distance. Social disconnection.

Let's be honest, we've been socially distancing for years, we just called it something else. We called it take away food, or conference calling, or even connecting via social media. Each of these carries with it a sense that being in physical presence of others is a dangerous thing - we could catch something.

We could catch something, all right. We could catch on to the fact that relationships, although fraught with possibilities for difficulty, are the only things that truly make life worthwhile. Have we sublimated personal, physical touch, or verbal communication for efficiency and expediency so that we can maximise the time that we have managing information and resources? Have we lost a grip on meaning?

I'll give you an example:

Before this 'New Normal' (another phrase which causes me to gag) of social distancing (retching sound), I drove to the airport to pick Christine up from her flight. As I was turning onto the airport drive, an elderly man was crossing the road in front of my car. Because he wasn't really watching for traffic (and seemed not really to care about the inconvenience for me), I had to step on the brakes quickly so that I didn't hit him. My first response was one of impatience and I almost honked the horn at him. How dare this old man get in my way? I'm in a hurry! I've got things to do! He's lucky I'm such an observant driver.

It is the monologue of our pre-COVID 19 (Ugh, gag reflex) culture that anyone who is in the way of our efficiency and expediency is an obstacle to be removed. As I drove by myself, isolated in my own car, listening to the kind of music that I wanted, I wanted that old man out of the way so I could park and walk quickly and briskly to the terminal. I knew that once I arrived there, I would be surrounded by similarly impatient people, ninety-nine percent of them impatiently awaiting the arrival of impatient fliers. We would stand next to each other, but we would be separated by an immeasurable distance caused by our phones. I knew that I wouldn't be talking to anyone. I would find a comfortable social distance.

And yet, God decided my eyes (and ears, and heart) needed to be opened.

After parking my car, I walked briskly to the airport along the path. Lo and behold, in front of me was the elderly gentleman I'd almost run down at the roundabout.  Truly, I wanted to pass on the right with efficiency and expediency. I wanted to, not run him over, but run by him - I was a man on a mission.

Then, I got a message from Christine saying that her plane was delayed forty minutes. Rolling my eyes in frustration, efficiency and expediency were now bound up in the fickle ETA of Qantas, I slowed my pace. Suddenly, I found myself almost parallel with the old man. Looking to the skies, I waggled a metaphorical finger: I see what you're doing, God. Very funny.

So, I strolled up beside him and inquired about his day.

He looked at me as if I had spoken in some kind of Martian language. As if unaccustomed to conversation, he cocked his head and stopped. He asked me to repeat the question, and it became immediately apparent that I was speaking a different language. He was Greek. Through the next ten minutes of walking, of asking questions, I found out a lot about Tom - or, Anastasi as he was called in Greek.

Tom and his wife, who suffers greatly with dimension, had lived in Australia for fifty years. Recently, they had celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary, but because of his wife's illness, and the fact that they had been 'jailed' in a retirement/nursing home village, the celebration was difficult. As Tom pushed these words from his mouth, his accent, thick and beautiful, caused me to listen intently.

Because Tom was translating his words from Greek into English, and this process was very difficult for him while walking, he would stop every ten steps or so, put a hand on my arm and bring us to stasis.

We had to stop moving so that we could communicate in the same language.

"No one ever talks to me in English," Tom said. "I live with Greeks, I am surrounded by Greeks, my children live a long ways away, but when they come home, they want to practice their Greek... You are the first person who will talk English with me." This sentence took almost a minute to come out and be translated by me. He smiled and said, "You have an accent. You must be from England."

Well, there's a first time for everything. I've never been accused of being English before.

Tom's journey around the airport was a nightly occurrence. Escaping his 'jail' and the struggles with his wife's disease, Tom would circle the airport perhaps subconsciously wishing that just one of these days, one of the planes would fly him back home - back to a place of comfort and safety, where he knew everyone and things made sense. He wanted to go back.

We reached the front footpath of the airport and I made a snap decision to invite Tom to wait with me and another friend for the arrival. Unsurprisingly, Tom agreed. "But," he said putting a hand on my arm, "You buy the beer."

I wasn't prepared for my encounter with Tom. In fact, I would have been more comfortable in pushing past that encounter to get on with my speedy life, but as we sat in the airport bar, sipping large schooners of pale ale, Tom listened intently, smiling and nodding (whether he understood the English conversation around him is beside the point). Occasionally, he would put his hand on my arm and ask me to repeat (because of my thick English accent!), and we would pause the conversation.

We were socially connected, not distanced.

At the end, I placed my own hand on his forearm - he looked shocked, as if he hadn't been touched in a long time - and I gave him my business card. He read it, smiled and flicked it against his fingers.

"Okay," he said, "I call you. I call you and say, 'This is Greek Tom. You come back to the airport.'"

We've been extrapolating at length how God is teaching us new things in this New Nor... (I won't write it) new period of human existence. Yes, some of it is slowing down, but I think the greater priority for us is to stop and ask questions, be blessed by, and value the stories of others - stories of people who may normally be overlooked.

I feel like going back to the airport.

Are You Lonely Tonight?

Some of the loneliest people I know come from the largest families.

It seems counterintuitive, I suppose. If there are lots of people, lots of blood relations, then relationships should be easy to come by and to maintain. But the more I talk to people, the more I begin to see the pattern: the bigger the family reunion, the scarcer the attention.

Here is an example.

I'm not sure how old I was when my parents were invited to 'Ye Olde Family Reunion.' For most kids, the words 'family reunion' are a source of trepidation. To engage with the extended family was not what young people would call a good time. To mix with long lost (or never met) relatives, eat hotdogs and chips and gather together at the end of the day for the dystopian family photo where seventy-five sweaty people are crammed together in a kind of multi-layered genetic sandwich (so everyone could have a photo of great grandpa and grandma with all their progeny before they died) was not what I would have called an optimum way to spend a summer afternoon. 

On that day, going to my dad's cousin's house, who none of us could have picked out of a police lineup, we packed a potato salad, a watermelon and a two liter of Sasparilla into the back end of the station wagon and drove two excruciating, hot hours to Cousin Eddy's house.

Everything went as predicted: the adults mixed and visited (my least favorite word) while the next generation of children, very few the same age, tried to engage in various nefarious activities to gain the attention of the adults, even just to hear them yell, "You kids, get out of the grain wagon! You're going to get stuck and then I'm going to have to come in there after you!" This would have been a great source of amusement to watch Cousin Milo shush us out like rats in a basement.

For the most part, extended family reunions are lonely places because in general, kids just want the approval and attention of their parents. That's why (unknowingly) they spend a decent amount of time running back and forth from aforementioned activities to a parent's side tugging on their sleeve and pointing to say, "Mom, Dad, watch me! Watch me!"

We've always simply wanted the attention of our parents, and the more people there are, the harder it is to attract that attention.

Thus it was in Jacob's family.

Jacob desired to have his parents' approval. Already, his mother was willing to give it to him, but his father steadfastly desired to favor Esau, the older. This required Jacob to (in essence) tug on his father's sleeve and say, "Dad! Watch me!"

When the boys grew up, Esau became an expert hunter, an outdoorsman, but Jacob was a quiet man who stayed at home. Isaac loved Esau because he had a taste for wild game, but Rebekah loved Jacob.

As the story goes, it seems as if Jacob is so desperate for his father's attention that he robs his brother of his birthright over a bowl of soup. Because of this paternal isolation, Jacob drives an even larger wedge between Esau and himself. Instead of solidifying the relationship with compassion and brotherly love, Jacob lives out his jealousy by making Esau despise his own birthright. We begin to understand how difficult the relationship is for these twins. They are both lonely, both seeking approval and both having a difficult time feeling love from their father because they believe that their father's attention only falls on them when they are productive.

In large families, the children often establish a pre-disposed system of dominance and attention grabbing techniques. I won't go into birth-order dynamics, but let's just say some of them fit pretty well. Each child, no matter birth order, desperately desires to be noticed and to be loved by their parents. Each child wants to hear, "Oh, aren't you clever, or witty, or talented, or..." fill in the blank, while at the same time they want to feel, "I love you no matter what you do simply because you are my child."

But human parents and human families are limited by both space and time. Divvying up attention and encouraging words is taxing. It's a very hard thing to be a parent. But some of the most basic and fundamental responsibilities of parenting are being present and being loving. Finding - no, making - time for each child and reminding them that they are loved is time well spent.

In the book of Genesis, in the narrative of the patriarchs, we find that the larger the families get, the less present and less attentive the parents are, or seem to be. Perhaps in Isaac's case, permanently scarred from his near-sacrifice ordeal, his ability to trust was perpetually stunted and this passed itself down the line. I'm no psychologist, but we see an amazing lack of trust in the life of Jacob. In the next few blogs we will explore how this lack of trust (and selfish deceit/ambition) lead to ruined relationships and loneliness - especially in the lives of Jacob's wives (his cousins!) who are sisters.

Then, as we close our discussion on the Patriarchs, we'll see how incredibly similar large families and large churches act and react in similar ways.

This will be interesting and fun. Please feel free to comment, if you wish. There are always ways we can learn from each other.

He Grasps the Heel

My mother found out she was having triplets a week before we were born.

As the story goes, she went in for a routine check up for her twins. Back in 1973, ultrasounds were just beginning to be widely utilized (but not in Blue Earth, Minnesota). As my mother trekked into Dr. Schotzko's office, she wondered with him about some of the movements inside of her. Her twins seemed awfully active.  The doctor ordered an X-ray, which was the method of in vitro sight in Blue Earth at least, and was surprised to discover a fourth backbone: one mother and three children.

My mother thought it best to tell my father in a more subtle way so she wrote him a note. I can see my mother's smirk now as she, a twenty-four-year-old teacher, handed the envelope to the front desk at the school where my father, a twenty-three-year-old teacher at Rake High School, taught. Supposedly it was delivered in person to my father in the staff lounge, a pistachio green basement filled with both fake leather sofas and cigarette smoke (it was the 70's after all). As he opened the epistle, his face turned ashen and his co-workers, all the teachers who knew that this young, rosy cheeked newbie teacher who was about to have twins, wondered if he was all right.

Pacing back and forth, my father put one hand on his hip and one on his thinning hair. "I've got to find another crib. I've got to find another crib."

Most families don't grow in this way. Incrementally they generally expand by one, but in the most blessed cases (I say that tongue in cheek) by two or more. I have always wondered how my parents dealt with the expansion. Were they overwhelmed by noise, or mouths to feed, or inconsistent sleep (if any at all)?

My guess is, they were all of those. Even with single children, a disruption of sleep, a disruption of meals and a disruption of quite solitude can be a challenge. But multiples offer a distinct other pressure.

As we find out from the story of Jacob and Esau.

To be honest, there aren't many biblical families that suffer more loneliness than Jacob's family. Prone to fits of deception, selfishness and fear, Jacob profiles to me as someone who you really want to like, but can never quite get there because you can't trust him. In essence, Jacob finds a way to isolate himself from almost everyone important in his life and his (and their) loneliness is apparent in the book of Genesis.

Right from the beginning, at birth, Jacob doesn't want his brother to get anything that he doesn't have. As Esau is exiting into the world, Jacob is grasping his heel (which is what the name 'Jacob' means - 'He Grasps the Heel'). Esau gets his name from his redness. Supposedly when he was born he had a full carpet of red hair and a shining red face. I think it's interesting that couples back then seemed to wait until their kids were born and then named them, rather than going through the lists of most popular names for the year 1840 B.C. and thinking, hmmm, we're really stuck between Mephibosheth and Maher-shalal-hash-baz.  What do you think?

I suppose it's best to point out the obvious at this point: family dynamics prove that there is no such thing as a 'normal' family. Throughout the scriptures, families struggle to thrive and survive in a harsh world and sometimes the difference between success and failure is putting oneself in the right place for blessing regardless of one's right to that blessing. Rebekah's chosen son, Jacob, who comes across as a beautiful, impish momma's boy, was about to be left out of the inheritance to his hairy red brother, Esau, who was Isaac's favorite.  Thus, Rebekah, forces the hand of her almost blind and slightly-deaf husband.

Perhaps it's just me, but I get a sense of loneliness in Rebekah and Isaac. In the midst of their wandering through the wilderness of life, we aren't told much about their interactions. Abraham gets roughly thirteen chapters to tell his story; Jacob gets about twenty-five. Isaac gets roughly three. Yet we find a pulsing narrative devoid of large amounts of speaking. This couple doesn't seem to talk and it repeats itself in Jacob's wives later on.

But for the moment, the twins don't really seem to get along. Their differences seem to be too great. And so these differences in interests, family dynamics and tradition all seek to cause a wedge of distance between them.

For Jacob and Esau, the stick that breaks the donkey's back is the deception over Isaac's blessing. On a very important day, Esau was to go out and bring back some wild game with his bow and arrow, prepare it for Isaac and then his father would download his blessing onto him. Did you ever wonder why the rest of the family was not invited to this momentous occasion? It feels like Rebekah and Jacob should have at least been invited to be in attendance, but from Genesis 47, it seems like this was a father/eldest son kind of meeting.

Would Rebekah have felt rejected that her favorite son would receive nothing? Would she have been lonely? Would Esau have felt isolated from his mother and twin brother? Perhaps those are 21st century questions placed on the backs of 19th century B.C. people. But it seems like this penetrating scourge of rejection, abandonment and isolation incubates an epidemic of loneliness that causes people to make difficult (and not always positive) choices.

As we continue the story of Jacob and Esau through the next days, reread these texts and begin to look at these narratives from the perspective of isolation: What would this text have looked like if the narrative told us about Isaac and Rebekah's journey in marriage which included mutual respect and communication? What would this have looked like if Jacob would have sought his brother's well-being rather than cheating him out of his birthright for a bowl of soup?

In my isolation, what are the things that cause me to be selfish instead of looking out for others?

The Issue of Isolation

There is a spectrum that is starting to reveal itself in these days. I'm thinking of calling it 'The Isolation Spectrum.' Each person who has ever lived has traversed the spectrum. The positioning changes from day to day, sometimes hour to hour, but we far too often recognize where we are on it and what it means for our life.

Now, this is something that I've made up. I am not a psychologist and certainly not an anthropologist, but I, like many people, have an awareness of others' placement on this line, but first, perhaps we'll take a shot at putting some points on the continuum.

I'll be using the life of Jesus as a template for loneliness. No one in history has run the full gauntlet, so it will look something like this:

Solitude - Testing - Self-Isolation - Cultural Isolation - Familial Isolation - Outcasting - Exile

____I_______I___________I_____________I______________I_______________I_______I____

From left to right, the difficulty of being alone worsens. From Solitude, a purposeful, self-chosen short term event to Exile, an indefinite utter external rejection and abandonment by all. This spectrum allows us to see where we are at various times, what might be occurring spiritually and emotionally and then some opportunities to discuss ways to work through being isolated.

There are many other spots on this continuum that we could label, but to keep things manageable, let's have working definitions from these seven and place Jesus at those moments.

Solitude: Although the dictionary states that solitude is the 'state or situation of being alone,' I think it falls short in the fact that solitude, especially self-chosen, is one that is necessary and functional. There is a reason that Superman went to the Fortress of Solitude and not the Fortress of Isolation. Solitude carries with it a necessary 'aloneness' so that one can find oneself and have some space to understand the future.  (Mark 1:35)

Testing: If, when you were in any kind of class, testing was often done solo and separation was necessary. Think back to whatever test, written or oral, and the difficulty of relying on one's own resources to bring about success. In this time of isolation, we get a feeling of who we are and where we are in preparation for the future. (Luke 22:39-46; Luke 4:1-13)

Self-Isolation: This phrase has become a catch phrase over the last months in an attempt to gain control over the spread of the coronavirus. Interestingly, the person in Self-Isolation often is more connected with others because of an internal response of being deprived of communal interaction.  (Matthew 14:22-32)

Cultural Isolation: Administered by the community, or the government, one who offends the ruling body, or the power of the corporate is isolated from most aspects of society including clubs, religious institutions, economic opportunities and events. The person isolated by culture might still have the support of family and friends. (Matthew 23)

Familial Isolation: On this part of the spectrum, it is not only the surrounding culture which has rejected the person, but his or her closest relationships. As these relationships break down, the one who has been isolated from family and friends feels abandoned and emotionally shipwrecked on a deserted island. Still, the one isolated may make connections with others who are in the same circumstance. (Mark 3:20-35, 6:1-6)

Outcast: Like a leper, not only is the outcast alone, but only allowed contact in scarcity. Seen as a blemish on society (and is often of the same opinion) the outcast must skirt the edges of human relationships. Scorned and derided, the outcast finds a spiritual, emotional and psychic fence between him/her/other outcasts and the rest of society. (Luke 22:47-62)

Exile: No one chooses exile. It is abject and utter separation from all things and all people. Once one is given the sentence of exile, despair is often experienced. All connections are severed - it is the ultimate expression of loneliness and hopelessness. (Mark 15:33-41)

In the next weeks we'll ponder the ramifications of isolation. We'll ask questions like: Where is God in my loneliness? Even though I am isolated, how can I maintain connection with others? What do I pray for? What don't I pray for?

As we look through some biblical stories, we'll place the episodes on the continuum and ponder what the people are feeling, learning, doing and hoping. Then, perhaps, we may begin to shed some light on what our own 21st century opportunities of isolation offer us.

As of this moment, where are you on the Isolation Spectrum?

Isolated Incidents

The one who isolates pursues selfish desires; that one rebels against all sound wisdom.  (Proverbs 18:1)

I had to chuckle at this verse as it was the first one of my devotion this morning. This translation, from the Christian Standard Bible, may be true in the general idea, but for our 2020 thoughts about COVID-19, I'm not sure that self-imposed isolation has anything to do with selfish desires, but communal necessity and good.

But, the Bible verse does start us on a quest for understanding: What is the difference between isolation and solitude? Can we develop a theology of isolation? Imprisonment? Solitude? Exile? Can we do this together?

Throughout the Bible, various people ranging from prophets to prisoners, kings and their cousins, Jews and Gentiles, have been unceremoniously cast out of their every day lives to exist in either self-imposed or administered exile. I've been trying to make a list of Biblical figures who fit these parameters, and the longer I think, I wonder if every character did not fit the bill at one point or another. Not all were exiled from each other, but certainly, in the beginning, Adam and Eve were isolated physically from God, perhaps even his voice was muffled (and not even because the computer microphone was muted).

Noah took the last boat.
Abraham was a stranger in a strange land.
Joseph was exiled from his family in Egypt.
Ruth defied logic to self-isolate from her people.
David found cave-life to be difficult.
The prophets of God were outcasts from their people.
Mary found herself 'blessed' by an 'impossible' pregnancy.
The early Christians were imprisoned for their faith.
Jesus was cut off from everyone, even the Father.

And so we find ourselves in government imposed self-isolation, quarantine, whatever terminology that we never thought we'd be using as an entire world. Like all of the faithful people of the past, we are confronted, literally assailed, by the thought of being separated from others. This is a scary thing, an itch that cannot be scratched. Somewhere in the back of our minds, or at least my mind, is this echoing, reverberating thought:

Will there ever be an end to this isolation, or separation?

One of the greatest movies every produced on this theme of isolation/separation/exile would have to be Castaway. Tom Hanks, FedEx bigwig, finds himself on an airplane across the Pacific Ocean. While boarding the plane, one of the flight attendants asks Tom Hanks' friend about her battle with cancer. Tom looks surprisedly at his friend, unaware that she had been sick. It seems that Tom had never enquired about the deep things of life. They had not connected beneath the surface of everyday life to talk about the scary things swimming underneath.

This kind of connection hadn't been important to Tom. Work, business, travel all seemed to take precedence.

But then, after being separated, stranded on a deserted island, we're taken on a journey of exile. If one watches closely, one gets an understanding that survival can occur with the basic necessities, but what is the one thing that Tom most desperately desires?

An end to isolation. He wants connection with humans and to hear their voices, to see the creases in their skin, to smell their deodorant...

In the beginning we are all created for connection, but we all encounter dis-connection (isolation, separation and exile) at various points in life.

For this week (at the very least) we'll look at some of these biblical figures in their times of isolation/exile/separation and gaze at them through theological lenses. What is God teaching them in their time of isolation? What are they hearing, learning or experiencing that will help later in life?

Tomorrow we'll start Jacob and his relationship with Esau. If you have a chance, read Genesis 32 and 33. We'll do a brief overview beforehand and then get into meat of it.

Over the Fence

I walked down the street in the brilliant sunshine with an aluminum pan. Unfortunately, no one was watching because most people have been asked to stay inside, but if they would have questioned me, I would have told them I was a delivery guy.

My delivery was a pasta bake which Christine, my wife, had whipped up in the morning. In fact, she had fashioned four or five meals for delivery because cooking is one of the things that she loves to do. Amazingly, when people tap into their God-given gifts, joy seems to bubble up from beneath the bedrock of routine life. A fissure of hope allows this joy to reach the surface, and I could see it in Christine's face that she was expectantly excited about having this food end up in the hands of people who can really use it.

So, I walked up the street, sun glinting, a blinding reflection off the tinfoil. I approached the house of the elderly couple whose wedding I had officiated two years before. When I reached the gate to their backyard, I could see through the small portal where Jurgen and Marienne were sitting on their verandah reading the Bible and having devotions.

I called out to them, but they couldn't tell who it was, even with my accent. This was because the gate reached to the very top of my nose and all that they could really see, even with a small portal, was the top of my shiny head. As Jurgen approached, it was very much like the show 'Home Improvement' where I had become Wilson.

Once Jurgen and Marienne figured out who I was and why I was carrying an aluminum pan, they chatted amiably up and over the fence. Marienne wanted to show me her devotions, 'The word the Lord had shown her that day,' which was from Psalm 121.

I lift my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from? It comes from the Lord.

The entire psalm speaks of God's protection in the midst of troubled times. For many, the Psalm reads and sits perfectly in the midst of a turbulent and tumultuous time in earth's history, when many are seeking both help and protection. Where does this help come from?

Not a location, but a Lord.

Jurgen smiled as his wife spoke excitedly about the scripture, but I'm sure his memory was sent back to our last discussion. It went something like this:

Jurgen: I went to church last Sunday.
Me: Which church?
Jurgen: Our church.
Me: But... but... it was closed.
Jurgen: No kidding. But I went anyway because that's what I do. That's what I've always done. I go to church on Sundays. And now that there are no worship services in the... (Jurgen's eyes began to fill with tears)... you can see I'm pretty emotional about it.
Me: I'm very sorry, Jurgen.
Jurgen: It doesn't matter. I'm okay with emotion. Anyway, I went to the front doors of the church and I got down on my knees and prayed. And I cried.
Me: (My mind was recreating the scene of this 80 year old man on his knees at the front entrance of the church weeping, praying to God to 'Let us back in, please.') It has been hard, hasn't it.
Jurgen: But it has taught me one big thing.
Me: What's that?
Jurgen: God is with me out here. (He pointed to the ground on which he stood.)

It would be a simple thing to think that the church building doesn't matter; and intuitively, we know that our help does not come from the hills, the high places or the temple itself, but for Jurgen, the actual place we gather was important because it symbolises the place where God comes to us. Even though we know that God is with us (point to the ground) out here, that gathering place is a refuge in the storm. And, as much as I'd like to think I'm good in front of a camera for live streamed worship - I'm not. I think all of us are better in person no matter the place.

I also think that when this whole thing is over and we begin streaming back to the building rather than live streaming into our homes, we'll never take for granted the opportunity to worship together. Or at least I hope we don't.

As I waved to Marienne and Jurgen over the fence that had to separate us, I realised that even in the midst of this struggle, our protection and help comes from God, but we are part of the assistance wherever we are. Enjoy serving others!

Just Don't...

The first car I remember my parents owning was a forest green, early 80's, wood-panelled Family Truckster station wagon. My parents were so proud to be driving the same kind of wheels as the Griswalds (of the National Lampoon's Vacation fame). The plush interior, green fake-leather seats and adjustable headrests for the parents, along with an am/fm radio with SIX! programmable buttons for radio stations created a supreme sense of luxury.

My parents would sit like royalty in the front bench seat; we three young kids (my little sister wasn't born yet) would either sit in the back seat or crawl over into the luggage compartment area where we could move around. Because this was before seatbelts, the blessing of not sitting next to my brother or sister was wonderful.

On long trips, though, the luggage area would be jam-packed with necessities for our trip to Wallyworld, and we, the kids, would be crammed like pre-pubescent sardines into the non-airconditioned backseat, heads thrust toward the half-opened safety windows for a breath of fresh air. Sometimes, though, we would get along quite well. Chatting amiably, we three would tell stories and my parents would smile, satisfied at having such nice, well-behaved children riding in the back seat of their station wagon.

Invariably, though, one of my parents would make the mistake to turn their head to look backwards and say, "Oh, it's so nice to see you kids getting along."

I mean, what does a kid do when his parents encourage him about his ability to behave? He misbehaves. Perhaps he thinks: Am I missing something? If they are enjoying my good behaviour, maybe I'm actually supposed to be misbehaving?

Somewhere deep inside me, I know that I want to do exactly the opposite of what my parents tell me. If they say, "Don't throw your peas at the ceiling," I think, Why not? Is there something to be gained by tossing my food above my head?

If they say, "Don't climb onto the roof of the chickenhouse," I think, Why not? Is there something up there that I need to see?

If they say, "Put on your seatbelt," I think to myself, That's just because they're old. I'm too good of a driver. There must be something exhilerating about driving without restraint.

Throughout history, God has given his people commands. This is what a good parent does. They put boundaries on their children because not only do they know what's best for them, but they know what creates healthy relationships. But think about all the times in the Bible when God, knowing what's best for us, says, "Just don't..."

"You can eat of every tree in this garden, just don't eat this one." God points to one in the middle; it looks like it has really nice, juicy fruit, and now that God has pointed it out, that's all I can think about. Maybe God wants to keep all the fruit for himself? Maybe there's something about it, something I'm missing out on if I don't eat it. Maybe God doesn't want to share knowledge.

"Just don't make any other idols for yourself." God knows that there's no life, no power, nothing in things made out of stone from human hands. But now that he has pointed out idols, that's all I can think about. There is something really enticing about worshiping something I've made. I have control over it. Maybe God just doesn't want to share power.

"Don't do anything out of selfish ambition, or vain conceit, but in humility, consider others as more important than yourselves. Everyone should look out not only for their own interests, but for the interests of others." There is something really enticing about living in my own castle surrounded by all the stuff that I've earned. The thought resonates in our egos and we begin to look at others who do not have the same kind of stuff, or ability to get it, and we deem them not as 'capable,' or 'lazy' or 'not as valuable.' Suddenly, humanity is dripping with self-ish ambition, vain conceit and a lethal dose of pride.

God knows that from the moment sin entered the world, the heart of humankind has always been rebellious. Lurking at the core of the human heart is the need to be like God, the need to have power over our environment and our lifestyle.

And this is definitely manifesting itself in 2020. Restrictions from authority have come to us. "Don't touch or even come near other people." What is the first thought that comes to us? But all I can think about is seeing other people now. The government can't tell me what to do. I'll show them. Yesterday afternoon, we witnessed six people who had pulled a container of beer across the street and were playing Finska in the middle of the walking path. Social distancing and isolation didn't seem to apply to them who had little chance of becoming ill from the disease.

"Don't panic." This is the worst of the lot. As soon as this command comes from authorities, people will panic. The captain of a cruise ship begins her message before entering the storm, "Don't panic. Our ship is big enough to withstand this." But everyone panics. Imagine the pilot of an airplane saying, "Don't panic."

Governments who lead with, "Don't panic," have guaranteed it. I hadn't thought about panicking, but if they are telling me that I shouldn't, well there must certainly be something to panic about.

If only governments, nations, churches, people of faith could hear and speak first with these words - this command - from 1 John: God is love and the one who remains in love remains in God and God remains in them. In this, love is made complete with us so that we may have confidence on the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out all fear, because fear involves punishment. So the one who fears is not complete in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, 'I love God,' and yet hates his brother or sister, they are a liar. For the person who does not love his brother or sister whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And we have this command from him: the one who loves God must also love his brother and sister.    1 John 4:16b-21

The command 'let us love one another' (4:7) is not actually a command, but an invitation. Thus, we don't have to feel the need to rebel from it. The command is an invitation to a fullness of life in community that we may have never felt before.

In 2020, we are invited not with 'Don't do this...' but 'Let's do this. Let's love one another.'

Let's keep physical distance for a while, so that love is shown.

Let's buy groceries for our neighbours as well as ourselves because they are part of the blessed, short existence we have.

Let's hoard our collective joy, hope, love, patience and peace and distribute it unconditionally and freely to a scared world. Let it be more valuable than toilet paper or pasta.

Let's stand together.

Mid-Week Break

The afternoon blazed with beautiful sunshine; the grass radiated healthy-greenness; the wind was warm for those of us who were outside for school recess. Children's voices, loud and jubilant, floated on the same warm breeze. With yellow vest wrapped around my shoulders, I tilted my face to the sun and not for the first time wondered if all of this difficulty was just a bad dream.

My lunchtime guard duty was in the dusty patch of space called Deborah Grove. Meeting me at the gate were a dozen children all wanting to erupt into their play space, but one of them, Millie, met me with a joyful smile. She held out her hand to me, as always, and wanted to take my hand. Frustratingly, I had to tell her that we aren't allowed to have our hands connect - no high fives (or in her case, a low five). Millie shrugged, smiled her big gappy smile, one tooth missing and another ready to eject from her mouth, and said, 'Okay. But watch me. I'm going to do a handstand.' Then, with nimble ease, she transitioned from the disappointment of disconnection to using her hands for stands.

She, along with all the children at the school, are the purest of all creation. And, I think that God has always, always, always had a special place in his heart for the little ones. Maybe that's why he came to us as a child and not immediately as an adult.

One of the most amazing things about Jesus, the king of all creation who has power over wind, sea, storms, sickness and even death, seems to be powerless against the innocence of children.

"People were bringing little children to Jesus in order that he might bless them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, 'Let the little children come to me. Don't stop them, because the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly, I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.' After taking them in his arms, he blessed them."

What does it mean that 'whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it?' When do we stop being a little child? How do we recapture that?

Instead of entering into a dialogue about the struggles of life, the fear and the threats that chip away at the 'outer child' turning us into an inner child, Jesus instructs and leads us to experience the world in a way that seeks him and seeks others. This kingdom of God experienced by a child is one of wonder and learning, a deconstruction of difficulty and one of faith, guided by questions.

How are you, as a little child, feeling today? Are you, like the small, little boy who encountered me on the playground at lunch, excited about a beautiful day? He looked up at me, pushed his glasses further up onto his nose and exclaimed, 'Pastor Reid, I love life.' Or maybe you are in the same place as the ten-year-old boy who said five minutes later, 'Pastor Reid, it feels like we've lost everything. This covid-19 is really messing up my life.'

Ten. He's ten.

How are we, adults, bringing people into the blessing of Jesus so that they can experience the present kingdom of God right here and now without fear, but with a simultaneous sense of awe and respect? Can you talk with kids about their fears and about their hopes for the future? Can we help little children hear just as much about the love of God as the fear of the virus?

God give you wisdom and joy as we keep moving.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

My friend, Cees, (pronounced 'Case') is Dutch. Well, that's where he was born and raised; his speech still has tinges of the beautiful Dutch accent, but now he lives in Australia and has for almost forty years.

Cees is a butcher by trade, and a very good one. Cees is also an exceptional pastoral carer and helps far and wide (even in the butcher shop) to bring peace into places of discord. This morning, Cees and I got together (where two or three are gathered...) and had a chat about the past, present and future.

The past...

Cees' father, Willem, grew up during World War II. As Holland was overrun by the Nazis, this took an incredible toll on the people of Willem's village. One day, when Willem was in school, he heard a terrible noise. As the children gathered at the window to see what had happened, they noticed that the Nazis had climbed the steeple of the village church and had removed the large church bell from its perch far above the town and had pushed it over the edge where it had made a terrible noise as it hit the ground. That large bell had been ringing out over the countryside to call people to worship for years; the symbolism of the bell being tossed ingloriously over the side - a silencing of the church's voice - was evident to the entire village.

The church's use of the bell was to summon people to gather; the Nazis wanted to melt the bell down to make bullets out of it.

Interestingly, this episode was significant in Willem's life, and throughout the next weeks, the people of the village knew when worship was supposed to occur, and actually showed up in even greater numbers without the bell tolling. The symbolic act of ripping out the vocal cords of the church created an even deeper indwelling of spiritual need. The silence actually caused people to sit up and listen for what was missing. In the ensuing months, Willem's family hid numbers of Jews in their barns - a true testament to their faith. Even when the bell stopped ringing, faith was strengthened.

The present...

What is the symbolic bell for the Church today which has been thrown from its lofty perch? How has this current virus changed (if at all) the communication of the gospel?

If then there is any encouragement in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, make my joy complete by thinking the same way, having the same love, united in spirit, intent in one purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. Everyone should look out not only for his or her interests, but also for the interests of others.     (Philippians 2:1-4)

For centuries, and rightly so, the church has been the light on the hill, an illumination in the midst of the darkness of past crises. During the plagues, Christians were some of the first to step out from their homes to bring soup and sustenance to those suffering through the isolation and pain of disease. Unified in love, fellowship, affection, mercy and purpose, the Church continued to bring hope in very practical ways. Worship services were secondary to health services. The average Christian put his or her faith on the line.

In 2020, perhaps this is where we are again? As the epidemic of disease, fear, panic and discord grips the planet, the average Christian, because of unity in the Spirit (and of love, affection and mercy), will put his or her faith on the line. This primary focus of faith makes the online worship service a secondary focus. As much as we would like to go back to the way things were, even just three months ago, this is a new reality. Although we long for worship in our congregational buildings, the construction of personal and corporate faith must go back into the trenches to be the light where darkness has dug in. How does this look?

The future...

In the book, For Whom the Bell Tolls, Ernest Hemingway writes, 'For what are we born if not to aid one another?'

Central to the book is the core of finding people, often people very different to oneself, in the midst of the battle of life. It is here, in the trenches, that we encounter not atheist or believer, but human souls all seeking connection in spite of fear, fatigue and fatalism.

For what are we born if not to aid one another? For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to his good purpose. Do everything without arguing or complaining, so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God who are faultless in a crooked and depraved generation, among whom you will shine like stars in the world by holding firm to the word of life...  (Philippians 2:13-16a)

What is the near future of Christianity? To aid others. Yesterday, a man named Peter came to the church building. He was part of the team that creates a space for connection on Monday nights. This team, part of Meet 'n Eat, makes meals for the community but just as importantly creates space for people to listen to life stories as they eat. This is a simplified retelling of what occurs, but the people that share life together would consider it a privilege, honour and blessing to be together.

Peter went to the kitchen to retrieve some meals that had already been prepared. Within minutes, I saw that Peter and Ros were driving away with the meal to take to one of the Monday night community members. This woman had contacted the social media page and called for help. Not surprisingly, these two faithful people were two of the first to volunteer. As the bell rang out for help, they raised their hands to enter the fray.

It is a beautiful thing to see how God is working in his people to work according to his purpose.

A Break from Reality

The reality is, there is no escaping.

I'm not talking about the virus, per se, although some might say this is inevitable; I'm writing about the inescapable difficulty not to be thinking about the coronavirus. Everything we are engaged in, whether media, social isolation or common conversations, are infected with fear.

It's hard work to be afraid all the time. Blood pressure rises. Anxiety increases. Brain function seems to slow because all of our senses are attuned to threats of exposure. It's like a computer that's trying to do routine calculations, but in the background, a six hour video is trying to upload to the internet. All because we can't take a break from reality.

The government's reality is that we are bombarded with COVID-19 rules: don't gather here, don't have too many people, if you've come from somewhere else, stay home for two weeks, wash your hands, etc... If you're anything like me, your head is spinning trying to do the right thing and still feel guilty if you sneeze into your hands.

In some ways, it's eerily similar to a biblical episode in the life of Jesus:

On the Sabbath, Jesus was going through the grainfields, and his disciples began to make their way picking some heads of grain. The Pharisees said to Jesus, 'Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?'

After giving a biblical precedent, Jesus turns to the Pharisees and says, 'The Sabbath was made for humans and humans for the Sabbath. So, then, the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.'

In other words, God can do whatever God wants to do any day of the week, including keeping his disciples healthy.

I could go into the background of this passage and the innumerable laws laid down for God's people, but I won't today, because Jesus' important words are about the purpose of the Sabbath. The goodness of this day, a day of rest and refraining from work, is a gift from God to his people. Because they have worked themselves to the bone for six days, there is nothing better than to rest, to put one's feet up, even to have discussions about faith, family and everything in between. Jesus is Lord of this day as well of the other six.

To rest on this day allows the body to resettle back to equilibrium so that the next workweek can begin.

Now, in 2020, it seems that the intention of the Sabbath morphs into something entirely different. Instead of refraining from the labour of our hands, we rest the fear in our minds, the anxiety of our hearts and the constant adrenaline that stimulates our blood to move faster. During this time, we need a Sabbath more than ever, to take a break from the reality (or unreality) of the situation in which we live, to stop, pick the grain nearest to us and stare into the faces of people we love to chat about important things.

How can we do this? How can we have a Sabbath from fear? This isn't rocket science. It's not even seventh grade biology, but it's still good for me to hear:

1. For an entire day, keep the TV, radio, computer turned off. This seems counterintuitive to protect ourselves, but I think the break from immersion of media will be far more helpful than detrimental.

2. Take a bath. As I write that, it sounds funny in my ears. But baths cause us to slow down and soak. Light some candles, put some music on in the background, and relax.

3. Read a book. You can do this while in the bath, but maybe save it for afterwards. Honestly, if you have a real-life book with pages and everything, it will do your sense good to flip the pages rather than swipe them.

4. Lastly, Connect with someone you haven't talked to in a while. For most of us, this means turning on the phone, and the temptation to check the news might be too great, but I say, pick a number between 1-50 and call whoever that is in your phone contacts. You never know what might come up. If you can help it, don't talk about the coronavirus or anything associated with fear. Maybe talk about your history with them.

There are so many things we can be doing on our Sabbaths, but try these four. See what happens. See how you feel at the end of the day. God bless you as you take a break from reality.