We Sing The High Notes-Wrestling With Story

"Nobody cries at the end of a movie about a guy who wants a Volvo."-Donald Miller, A Million Miles In A Thousand Years

"The truth is that cancer was the best thing that ever happened to me.  I don't know why I got the illness, but it did wonders for me, and I wouldn't want to walk away from it.  Why would I want to change, even for a day, the most important and shaping event in my life?"-Lance Armstrong, It's Not About The Bike

The explosion is coming.  You strain forward in your seat, grip the popcorn box and bite the soda straw.  That’s why you paid the fourteen bucks.  It may not be the car or the bar, the girlfriend or the dog.  You know the main character will come under attack.  The plans she made will be disrupted.

I’m wrestling with story.  Not screenplay or novel—but life.  Donald Miller says that “the point of life is the same as the point of story…character transformation.”  Most of us lead lives that are reactive.  We seek comfort and peace.  We react when life doesn’t go our way.  We seek the way of least resistance.   We loudly react and are quietly desperate.  It should not be so.

It is collaboration in much the same vein as Simon and Garfunkel.  Simon writes most every song but Garfunkel gets equal billing.  We collaborate with God on our story.  Miller writes, “I believe there is a writer outside ourselves, plotting a better story for us, interacting with us, even, and whispering a better story into our consciousness.”  We should write our life so that it is the best story possible---a sacrificial story, a giving away of life, a living to the fullest.  This is difficult work and scary stuff.  We sing the high notes best we can but the writer and the story are bigger than us.

The explosion could in fact kill us.  They found cancer in my sister-in-law this week.  Armstrong writes, “…you don’t fly (cycling) up a hill.  You struggle slowly and painfully up a hill, and maybe, if you work very hard, you get to the top ahead of everybody else…..Cancer is like that, too.  Good, strong people get cancer, and they do all the right things to beat it, and they still die.”

We all die.  Oh to live loud.  I etch, scratch, write out my plot and learn to listen to The Writer.  Lost I stumble around the page.  The living Word whispers to me, models sacrifice for me.  Earnest prayers are made.  He who was led into the wilderness leads me beside still waters.  We watch on the big screen knowing too; the lion waits, the wolf stalks the sheep.  Events conspire and move us forward into the story.

Hope draws us forward.  The milquetoast male will find a spine.  The princess will realize the prince is pond scum.  Good will overcome evil.  Credits will roll.  We will walk up the aisle, feet sticking to the floor.   As the lights come up we catch a breath.    Good story does that.

“It’s a good calling, then, to speak a better story.  How brightly a better story shines.  How easily the world looks to it in wonder.  How grateful we are to hear these stories, and how happy it make us to repeat them”….Donald Miller

2 Timothy Chapter 3 Lovers Of Self

Lovers of Self, lovers of money
Boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents
Ungrateful, unholy, unloving
Irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self control
Brutal haters of good, treacherous, reckless
Conceited
Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God
Holding to a form—of Godliness; although they have denied its power.
Opposers of truth, depraved minds.
Rejected


A friend of mine once threw himself into the Grand Canyon. He was trying to escape the skin he was in; to escape the pain he was in. Paul writes that in the last days men will be…and then catologs their evil. Such depth of depravity, detailed, rips enough to cause me to hurl myself into an abyss or cast myself on the mercy of God.

If the soul of Satan were a dark star then chapter three would be the evil he filled it with. Oh to be a ‘lover of self.’ To live to please myself with no thought for the consequences. My fingers tremble on the keyboard as I type. From lover of self to lovers of money. Mega lotto anyone? What flows from the black hole; boastful, arrogant, revilers, haters of parents?

The self-seeking, self-soothing, self-filling boasts only in himself, but throws abuse; cursing, biting, bleeding blood from his lip as he shakes with rage. If you step back you see how it begins with disobedience to parents. He rejects this most basic authority. Ten more little steps to fullness; not the fullness in Christ who is the head, the richness of pleasure---the emptiness of God.

I scream with Paul, “Who will ransom me from this body of death?” Ungrateful, unholy, unloving. What a list! We are always right, you are always wrong; then the scariest phrase, ‘without self control.’

Those people that have hurt us deeply in violence and abuse, treachery and backstabbing; parents, wives, parishioners, brothers, sisters still have an echo in them of their creator, a glimmer of good that we can see past once we are in a safer place. ‘No self control’ is the moniker the monster wears as he seeks his pleasure. There is no hope for redemption there only a hunger and only the prey.

I see Paul typing away the blood coursing, coursing, coursing, pounding as he writes. Him who has gone the way of pure self shrieks in delight and emptiness. Sated on self he is rejected by men and god. There is no help. Where is the help?

He takes a deep breath and writes, “ All scripture is inspired by God and profitable…” Profitable to save from self and deliver into the hands of Him who created everything even the Grand Canyon.

2 Timothy Chapter 2-Suffer Hardship With Me

In shame I admit it---a life of pleasure, ease and self-gratification sounds wonderful. Character, integrity and Christ likeness are not my default. Not on the surface, not in the flesh. Not my natural choice. So the invitation grates against flesh, breath catches and comes up short, return to sender, I ain’t goin to that party. Perhaps Paul’s invitation caught Timothy off guard as well. “Join with me in suffering for the gospel according to the power of God.” That is the call. Do I answer in the affirmative?

I deserve to relax. Life is difficult. I pour myself a glass of wine and open up the dark chocolate pistachio toffee (thanks Trader Joes!). Perusing this passage I don’t see a pity party. The illustrations Paul uses are in opposition; hard working farmer, competing athlete, unashamed workmen, gracious bond-servant and chained criminal. Fully committed all.

From his prison cell Paul looks around and sees; through a crack, a hole, bars, a soldier, a farmer, a fellow criminal, a silver bowl. “What have these in common?” The silver bowl is for drinking; it’s not the commode. “In a large house there are not only gold and silver vessels, but also wood and earthenware, some to honor and some to dishonor.” Vessels useful for honor, pure, and specifically set apart.

Suffer as a soldier. Paul entreats Timothy a second time to suffer as a soldier set apart from everyday life---untangled, uninvolved in everyday life. The commander calls, He who enlisted you provides. Clarity comes. We camp overnight and move on in the morning. Active service, face like flint, moving forward, “let us strip off everything that hinders us, as well as the sin which dogs our feet…”

The invitation at its core isn’t to suffer. It is to come alive. To quote Eldredge, “What stirs your heart? The journey we face now is into a land foreign to most of us. We must head into country that has no clear trail…in the heart of every man is a desperate desire for a battle to fight, an adventure to live, and a beauty to rescue.”

Live we must. Commitment will cost us. Waffling will cost us far more. We gain our hearts perchance to lose our heads. Paul understood that. I suspect Timothy learned that. “For if we died with Him, we will also live with Him; If we endure, we will also reign with Him…”

2 Timothy Chapter 1-Meditations On Power, Love and Discipline

The boom-boom-boom of my heart accompanied the wail of the siren. Inside the car lit up, from dark and black to glowing red. My father pulled the car over. Certainly the policeman was going to put him in jail. Seven years old I was certain my dad was guilty of something. The policeman, pure and innocent, was going to put him away. As a child I misunderstood the law and failed to trust my father.

The deacons, handing out bread-and-wine were somber, sober and serious. In silence I prayed for forgiveness as plate and cup made their way toward me. I glanced up and out, viewing the congregants. I knew the scripture—those that took the sacrament unworthily were in danger of dying. At present all remained safe and straight in their seats. As a new convert I misunderstood law and missed the heart of my Father.

Where was Timothy’s dad? Paul indicates Timothy grew up under the faith of grandma and mom. Were there positive male role models in his life? ‘Power,’ in a male context could have scary connotations. Misappropriated power seen in the violence of a horse race, the dominance of a (bad) husband, the mercilessness of a Pharisee. When God gives a spirit of power what does that look like?

“Timmy, stop calling your sister names! Go to your room now.” Discipline as a kid means changing behaviour to earn approval. Law is seen as change in outward appearance in accordance with desired behavior. The heart need not be involved.

When heart seeks the law in a context of Dad’s love it acts holistically. We seek inner transformation to become like our father. Foster writes, “We must beware how quickly we can latch onto this work or that word and turn it into a law. The moment we do so we qualify for Jesus’ stern pronouncement against the Pharisees: “They bind heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with their finger” (Matt. 23:4). Our hearts should be stirred by law but moved toward God in grace.

“For I am mindful of the sincere faith within you,” “I am sure that it is in you,” “Guard the treasure entrusted to you,” Paul says to Timothy. Timothy doubted God’s strong presence in him. Note the scaffold—no fatherly input in childhood coupled with doubt that God loves and treasures you. A certain system for the creation of timidity.

Paul pounds his point into Timothy’s head, “You have faith, you are treasured, you are loved.” Understanding the whole picture sets the solid framework, “God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline.” May the boom-boom-boom of our hearts beat in tune with the Fathers’.

Hoover Dam and the Uncertainty Of Riches

“Since announcement of the construction timetable (to build Hoover Dam), hundreds of jobless men had been streaming into southern Nevada in caravans of wheezing automobiles, in Union Pacific boxcars, on horseback and even on foot…Most of the newcomers were greenhorns—unemployed factory workers, mechanics, salesmen, store clerks, lawyers, bankers and students---who had never performed physical labor or lived outdoors…”---Hoover Dam An American Adventure, by Joseph Stevens

Some seasons are simply paycheck to paycheck. We live in tension between need and want, living and longing. In my case, as of late, longing has given way to dissatisfaction. With discontent creep in goblins of greed whom do their best (and damned good they are) to steal joy and darken day.

I had a dog. For a season I had the Australian shepherd, the big yard and the gas barbeque. I miss the freedom ownership of a house brings. I long for the house, the garden, the storage---the stuff. I compare my stuff to the Joneses stuff. My stuff is older, smaller and less shiny. I get bogged down in the seeking of riches believing my contentment lies therein.

Hot showers and a full fridge are things I take for granted. I overlook the joy that flows out of a Sunday free from work---stretching out on the new couch with a good book and hot cup of Costa Rican. Wind on my cheek and warm sun, orange juice in the morning, buttered biscuits and bacon, the purr of my car engine, and even ‘hellos’ in hallways at work are deep riches to delight in.

I practice delighting deliberately. Sunsets in the desert can be beautiful. I walk outside to view a good one. Days off are spent with a loved one and started with hot coffee in a favorite cup—made more glorious today as cold wind and hard rain assail the neighborhood.

I am learning to enjoy all things. Riches, the prophet tells us, will surely sprout wings and fly off to the sky like an eagle. This week I am practicing satisfaction in the riches I already possess. Concurrently I am cultivating friendship with the Joneses in hopes that they’ll let me house sit while they leave town on vacation.

The Shadow A Thing Casts

I am squeezed dry---a big hand reaches down and wrings me out. Consistent with that no tears come. I slam the car door and cross the parking lot to the trail that marks the Big Morongo Preserve. God and I had met here before. I came hoping to hear him speak; knowing He’ll certainly listen.

The setting echoes my mood. Dry Alder and cracked Cottonwood line the trail, broken branches and cracked limbs scattered by wind without water in this dry California winter. The thought comes, “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours…”

Here’s the funny part. I am not going through an Elijah like dry period. It’s been a year of sun, rain and harvest. I just got married and every facet of life goes well. It’s the inner demons and shadows that cause the sunlight to flicker.

It is the shadow on the horizon that threatens. A friend fears his step-daughters moving in next month. She has struggled with addiction but is currently clean. Sunlight flickers. A neighbor watches his finances dwindle month by month. How fast until it is all gone? Star eclipsed. A sister will be released from her treatment program back into ‘real life.’ Clouds obscure. I wrestle with possible monetary loss. I question character issues I’m faced with. Dust darkens.

I come to the Preserve not for answers but for peace. In my own darkness the kitten at the door looks like the “lion seeking to devour.” Solomon was right when he said that the little foxes spoil the vines. I seek perspective. I look up from willows and alders hoping to catch a glimpse of Bighorn sheep. I look higher, to the hills ‘from whence cometh my help…My help comes from the Lord, maker of Heaven and Earth.” Like clouds blowing across the face of the sun peace evades. I catch a glimpse---and it’s gone again.

I walk back to the parking lot. I hang onto that fleeting glimpse of sun; a peace that is shattered when I focus once again on billowing shadows. Still it is that glimpse of the largesse of nature, a glint of Him who names the stars that energizes me.

“Then (Elijah) prayed again, and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit.”

“I pray for you, that all your misgivings will be melted to thanksgivings. Remember that the shadow a thing casts often far exceeds the size of the thing itself (especially if the light be low on the horizon) and though some future fear may strut brave darkness as you approach, the thing itself will be but a speck when seen from beyond. Oh that He would restore us often with that 'aspect from beyond,' to see a thing as He sees it, to remember that He dealeth with us as with sons.” –Jim Elliott

A Fiery Christmas

Forty years later and I still remember smoke pouring into the room. It was Christmas Eve. My sister and I opened the door and looked out the window over and over-again. I got so wound up that a major breathing attack was triggered every Christmas break. The tree was up and decorated, candles lit, fire burning, mom smoking. Not the ideal clear air quality for a little asthmatic kid. I wheezingly anticipated the arrival of friends and relatives.

Mouths watered as we waited on the viands. Kugel was coming, chopped-liver checking in soon, breads and fruits, crackers and cheese. Coffee percolated in the kitchen as cousins and friends began to arrive. Hors d'oeuvres were unwrapped and set out to eat. My dog Sam the Samoyed told, “No! Get in the kitchen.” He knew somehow that his persistence would pay off and was soon back amongst the food and the children.

The main course arrived later year after year. We were hungry for dinner and antsy for presents. Plus it was past bedtime-but tonight that didn’t matter. After dinner everybody adjourned to the big white couch in the living room. Mom and Aunt Rhoda fought the yearly battle over doing the dishes because ‘guests don’t do dishes.’

Every family has their gift-opening tradition. At our house the youngest passed out the gifts and we tried to open them one-by-one. Christmas music was turned down as Pacehelbel gave way to presents. I don’t remember what everyone got that year though that my cousin, ever into music, got a Neil Diamond record. As the evening wore on white Christmas faded into Hot August Night.

One by one the gifts were opened. Meanwhile the children began throwing wrapping paper into the fireplace. Different papers inspired flares of variegated colour; greens, blues and reds; big flames and fiery ignitions. Then it happened. A wrapping paper tube was set into the blaze. But only partially. Smoke, instead of going up the chimney, went up the tube and into the room. Children screamed for parents. Easily remedied the tube was pushed all the way into the fireplace.

Many Christmases have past since then with many changes, death and sickness among them. ‘Long lays the world in sin and error, longing for His appearance’. Fires of life and darkness of death have taken many family members over these forty years. This year I celebrate with different family and new traditions. Every year I still look to Christmas with bated (and still a bit wheezy) breath ‘A thrill of hope; the weary world rejoices.’ An opportunity for new and rich memories, and treasured old ones. And hope for the future.
‘For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn. Christ is the Lord!
O praise His Name forever,
His power and glory evermore proclaim.’

The Christmas Wars

Where are the faraway kingdoms of dreams?
They vanished in the mist with Saint Nicholas,
and lie scattered to the ghettos and the war zones.
Why? Why? Why?
I said, "Why? Mama, why?"
Why can't I sleep in peace tonight underneath the satellite sky? ---Mark Heard, Sattelite Sky

*************************

At the core of Christmas ever lies the tension between peace and war, self promotion and sacrifice. For while the angels were saying “On earth peace to those on whom his favor rests,” Herod was slaughtering every child under the age of two. At its core the Christmas manger lays in a field of battle.

“Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born.”

The Dragon slaughters and roars and makes war with the saints. It doesn’t feel that way though.

We get caught up in a storm of busyness. Presents are purchased, goodies baked, parties made, lights hung up, cards dispatched---and we become short-sighted. It is easy to lose sight of our service and our worship. We cuss out the woman who bumps into us in line at the store then get into our car and turn on the Christmas music. There is a disconnect between our actions and their purpose. We are in danger of losing heart and soul amidst the material.

The soldier learns to eat his MRE in the midst of battle and the ER doctor tells a light-hearted story while stitching up her patient. We sit in stuffed chairs and tell tepid tales of Santa Claus and reindeer as if the heavenly powers war over the identity of Kris Kringle. We give no thought to our own allegiance. We are content to bring our picnic baskets out to the battle and eat our cheese and crackers; “Oh I do hope the good-guys win.”

Good was won the day Christ was born. We live in the intermission. Though we may sing, “Give peace a chance,” the dragon will continue to roar and Herods will persist in persecution. Our call is to make known our allegiance and suffer hardship accordingly. Next time when you are out shopping and someone runs into you, or you hear that screaming child---listen and you may hear the dragon roaring. Do not be afraid for there is news of great joy, “Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth pace among men with whom He is pleased.”

Questions My Father Left Me

It’s said that children are great observers of life but lousy interpreters of information. The memories of my father are primarily negative. I knew him as a quiet, non-communicative man. So much so that his tombstone reads (in part), “A quiet but funny man.” In the framework of my father I’d wondered why he had gone away so long when I was young. Why he’d not written or called. Then last night, in a box of my moms’ stuff, I came across these letters. Many long letters where he chronicles his days, his struggles, his loneliness.


When parents die they leave behind cartons of memorabilia; boxes of questions we didn’t know we had. Going through mom’s stuff I came across a pile of letters dad had sent her. It was 1967 and apparently there was no local work in L.A. for a plumber so dad took a job in Rochester, NJ.

“ They knocked off the night shift. Come anyway and we will have a good time.” “You should get a check for $300.00 Live it up or pay off some bills. Buy a small bikini, or a girdle, or a dress.” “I have been staying at a motel but it is 5 dollars a day so it gets expensive.” “I move to the new apartment tomorrow.”

Then this: “It seems I will also have to send you some stationary. It has been two weeks since I received a letter. I think you can find a little time to write…..The apartment is big enough for the kids also. Explain again to me why they can’t come for the whole summer? See you in 14 days. Love, Len.”

The letters, only read now four decades later, and the man that lived in my house make me wonder what happened. My dad could be exceeding gentle and extremely violent. Yet I have no memory of his being communicative. There is this box of letters that shouts otherwise. How did he go from reaching out to shutting down?

There is no way for me to know the answer. Character flukes are evident in the letters; evidences of strengths and tenderness as well. The crisis my father faced began a life of shutting up and shutting down. May I respond to crisis with the heart of my father; being open, transparent and available.

Guns At Fifty

In fifth grade you don’t do ‘Guns at fifty paces, ’you race fifty yards. The memory still stings like a lead musket ball. We raced for honour and Susan Bronson. I am doubtful that in fifth grade we knew what either of those meant.

Erik had thrown down the gauntlet. At high noon, aka, lunch time, we would race for Susan. There we stood atop yellow lines painted on blacktop. The heat waves radiating from the tar, the pink bungalows in the distance, the small crowd of students standing still….waiting and watching.

I should not have worn long pants that day. Forty years later and I still don’t accede Erik the victory based on being faster. But won it he did. What would have changed if I had won that day? I wonder about that.

I wonder what would have happened if I had kissed Dawn McD when she made me that paper necklace in 3rd grade; “Kiss me, I love you.” Dawn went on to become a cheerleader in high school. I played violin in orchestra. Similarly I was surprised when at my 20 year high school reunion Amy told me that her interest in me went beyond the hours that I tutored her in English.

As a teen I’d resolved to live my life to the fullest. The principle reason was a poem I’d cut out of the church paper, “…wondering what would have happened if you had truly dared to be alive.” So I’d resolved to live without having to ask, “What if?”

My youth was concerned with girls and sating the hole in my soul. As I grew up I fleshed out this principle. Maturing widened broadened and brought healthier application to live life more aggressively.

Each of us screens decisions through a filter. Most are reactive, few are deliberate. A key component of my decision making grid is to make choices that add adventure and spice. Some will say, “That is how you are wired!” Au contraire. My default position is—be safe. I would rather retreat than risk hurt. I easily succumb to the “paralysis of analysis.” Daring to be alive is a tenet that drives me into a fuller life.

A famous coach once said of training that the process consists of, “buffet(ing) my body and making it my slave.” Let us be deliberate in our decision making. For the sprints and for the long haul.