Beyond Sentimentality to Action

Postmodern culture has been rightly criticized in recent decades for its relativistic approach to morality and ethics. Relativism is the belief that in our world nothing is objectively, universally, or eternally right or wrong, just different. Right and wrong are simply expressions of our culture’s preferences only, not objectively true moral categories. The problem with this view, however, is that it can never be consistently lived out. Experience, history, and personal conscience all point to the existence of absolutes in morality and ethics, even if they are not always agreed upon in detail. Now, it may be true that absolutes have been used as ramrods or clubs to abuse others, but the pendulum of culture is wrong to say, therefore, that such absolutes do not exist.

The pendulum of culture, especially in the university setting, always swings to extremes, and in its reaction to the abuses of modernist moral categories, postmodernism has shunned propositional truth to the extent that a work of literature or classical history is now seen not in light of the truth it conveys or the intent of its author, but solely in view of the affect it has on the reader. In other words, this “reader response” approach to truth asks not “what is the book trying to teach me?” but “what response does the book evoke within me?” Reader response is valuable, but it should not be considered to the exclusion of the objective meaning behind the book.

As with any cultural trend, Postmodernism gets it right in some significant ways too, however. The Postmodern focus is upon story over propositional fact, anecdote instead of statistic, and experience over textbook. I find this corrective helpful in many ways. Have you ever noticed that certain fictional books, articles, movies, or songs stir your heart about injustice and prompt you to care for others in ways you had not before? Good literature and cinema will do just that. Story has a way of connecting our hearts, creating empathy between otherwise disconnected souls.

One of my favorite stories has always been Dicken’s Christmas Carol. This fictional account, though ‘way out’ in its view of the world—chained souls roaming the night haunting the living at all hours of the night—conveys like few other stories what a transformed life can look like. In the Victorian England of Dickens, where the poor and handicapped were so ruthlessly forgotten, marginalized, and victimized, the story of Scrooge’s transformation touches the soul with a compassionate conviction that could never be produced by a hundred classroom lectures. Sometimes, story will stir us more readily than cold facts. I believe this is a quality of human nature and always has been.

You and I have seen some films and read some books that miss this mark, however, by being overly “sentimental.” Author Philip Fisher defined sentimentality in his book, Hard Facts: Setting and Form in the American Novel (1985) as “all that is cheap, self-flattering, idealizing, and deliberately dishonest.” Sentimentality is a shallow, artificial form of consciousness that is like a tumble weed, here today and gone tomorrow. Sentimentality uses a formulaic or contrived story that unrealistically produces flimsy emotions in the audience. These emotions may seem deep and stirring, but their short duration is evidence of their lack of value. They may draw a tear, but they never put our feet in motion. The proof is in the pudding of meaningful action or inspired life change from our emotions. When story is used well, it moves us beyond sentiment to action…

The Immersion Method

I went to the theatre
With the author of a successful play.
He insisted on explaining everything.
Told me what to watch,
The details of direction,
The errors of the property man,
The foibles of the star.
He anticipated all my surprises
And ruined the evening.
Never again!—And mark you,
The greatest Author of all
Made no such mistake!”

–Christopher Morley,
“No Coaching,” The Questing Spirit.

Living in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado is a unique, soul steeling experience. Last summer, while getting my mail on the mountain road one overcast afternoon, I felt a gray tunnel of clouds swirling overhead. BOOM! A deafening peel of thunder clapped right over my head, making me feel as though I were right in epicenter of the storm. I wasn’t under it, but in it. It was the difference between being a spectator and being a player.

Feeling this stormy sensation made an impact. An immediacy, a sobering closeness, a reminder of my own insignificance, but also a focus entirely off of me and immersed in the direct experience of nature. In some ways, I felt catapulted deeper into what praise and appreciation are all about. To appreciate beauty is not to do so as a distant bystander, but as a practitioner. At times when I’ve kept appreciation of nature, of people, or of God on the intellectual plane, at arms length, I have forfeited the true value and wonder of the experience.

When my family moved to a different state while I was in high school, I transferred from a German class in my old school that was taught in the traditional method—rote memorization and written assignments. In the new school, I plunged into a class where the teacher used the “Immersion Method” of language learning. Students were expected to converse in class, to be stretched by the constant strain of mental gymnastics—searching feverishly for vocabulary, verb endings, and grammatical structures to talk to each other and the teacher. Grace under pressure. I found it to be overwhelming, but became convinced it is the best way to learn a language. Appreciating God’s world is best done through the immersion method.

Author Ravi Zacharias, in his book Recapture the Wonder, writes that the first destroyer of wonder is anything that steals the mystery of life. Indeed, there is a legitimate place for mystery and enchantment, and to allow for them, to appreciate and even embrace them is not to destroy learning and knowledge. To the modern scientific mind, bent on finding quarks and strings and ultimate, all-explaining theories of everything, we shudder to think that there would ever be a legitimate place for the admission that we do NOT know something.   The quest for ultimate meaning and explanatory theories is commendable, and many who have engaged in such a quest have admirably done so maintaining a sense of passion and wonder.  However, our pop culture has grown, in the context of such advances, yawningly complacent where passion is concerned.  I would argue that part of the beauty, majesty, and artistry of God’s world is its mystery.

I once read the transcript of a debate about the existence of God between a Christian philosopher and an atheist. The atheist, a brilliant microbiologist, boldly asserted that if he were to fashion the human body, he could design it to work more efficiently than it does. For example, certain organs, he insisted, do not function as smoothly as they could, and the appendix is still a deep mystery as to its purpose. The theist responded by affirming the possible truth of this observation. “But,” he replied, “your position assumes that efficiency is God’s highest value. What if it were not primarily efficiency, but artistry that God was after most?” Indeed. Our modern lenses are too steeped in analytical quantification and efficient mass production to appreciate the artistry around us.

Love As THE Motivator

“Our ‘behavior’ will not be changed long with self-discipline, but fall in love and a human will accomplish what he never thought possible. The laziest of men will swim the English Channel to win his woman. …by accepting God’s love for us, we fall in love with Him, and only then do we have the fuel we need to obey.”
- Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz

Most often, when we think of love for others, we think of virtue, noble deeds, and kind words. We think love is simply something we ought to do, or feel, or say. Indeed, love is demonstrated through both actions and words; action offered alone bespeaks cold, unfeeling duty; but words in isolation are empty unless shored up by meaningful action. These are all crucial, profound thoughts where love is concerned. Yet, rarely do we consider that genuine love is not only a goal to achieve, but also the foundational motivator for all that is good.

Love enters my heart, suturing the soul, overcoming my fears and then, motivates all that is good in my life. Love continues to challenge me, stoking a fire of passion to reach beyond my instinctive selfishness to God’s higher purposes and others’ betterment. It is no coincidence that when Jesus of Nazareth was asked by the religious elite of His day what was the greatest commandment in God’s moral law of the Old Testament, He replied, “Love the Lord Your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, and with all of your mind. And the second one is like it—love your neighbor as yourself.” Love for God and love for others. Notice, He was asked for ONE command, but He answered with two. Or did He? This is the crux. Love for God and love for others are not, nor can they be in competition, separated, or placed in different categories. Love of God is meant to breed love for people, and love that is genuine and thorough for people needs to flow out of the love of God.

What about when religion goes awry? The loss of love, or at least its marginalization, is the tragic core of religious corruption. When dutiful obedience rules overshadows the underlying motive of love, all is lost. Condescension, rejection, shame, and judgment walk hand in hand onto the central stage of religion when love for God and others departs from our lives. Love is indeed THE motivator for all that is good. Anything less than love as motivation is corrupting.

Now, don’t get me wrong, there are appropriate standards, rules, guidelines for a moral religious life. How does the presence of standards tie in to love as the motivating force? One author has put it this way—for every “No” I say in life, there should be a bigger “Yes” burning inside. We may ask if an action, word, thought is good. The answer can be found in whether it compromises love for God and love for others. My reason for saying “no” to immoral practices, profane language, and dishonest behavior is because they stand between love for God and love for others. Love is the bigger “yes” burning inside.

Saying No To War Talk

“The lust of blood grows with its satisfaction, there is no satiety: the crowd had seen a hundred noble heads fall beneath the guillotine to-day, it wanted to make sure that it would see another hundred fall on the morrow.” –Baroness Emmuska Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel

The quote above from The Scarlet Pimpernel captures in vivid terms a wrenching reality evidenced in the French Revolution– of the insatiable cruelty of the human heart. In our modern age, some are tempted to believe that such cruelty is behind us, that humanity is getting better and better, that through education and technological and moral advancement we are improving ourselves. Yet, given that the 20th Century was the bloodiest century in all of human history, and given that unspeakable atrocities continue today throughout our world (The Sudan and Myanmar are just two examples), alas, we come face to face with the fatal flaws of the human heart.

I had the privilege while studying history in college to attend a full day workshop on the Holocaust taught by Dr. Ronald Smelzer, who at the time was one of North America’s leading scholars on the subject. As one might imagine, the workshop quickly reached beyond the scope of academic scholarship into the stirring emotions of loss and unspeakable evil. One of Dr. Smelzer’s warnings was this–never should we think that the evil of the Holocaust was merely an anomaly in history, an oddity never to be repeated. We are tempted to believe the Nazi regime was a strange abstraction representing the worst evil of which humanity is capable. Yet, in Dr. Victor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning, this Auschwitz survivor tells another story. Frankl recounts how upon liberation from Auschwitz, he observed some of his fellow Jews treating each other with the same base brutality, cruelty, and evil. He was ashamed, and awakened to the truth that evil lurks within the heart of each one of us, not just a token few.

In my Holocaust seminar, with very sobering terms, Dr. Smelzer displayed how the Nazi propaganda machine systematically de-humanized an entire race of people for one reason—to make their extermination palatable to the human conscience. If those with whom we disagree are less than human, then punishing them, exiling them, or even systematically killing them are all acceptable and even advantageous strategies toward the betterment of society. Or so the thinking went. Such thinking was apparent within the slave trade of England and America as well. “Slavery is good for blacks, giving them a sense of purpose and a place of protection.” Much of the slavery propaganda spoke of black people as less than human, even less than animals. Such talk was a salve for the potentially troubled heart of Anglo culture.

I hear war-talk on both sides of issues both morally and politically. Caricatures, ad-homonym attacks, and slanderous misrepresentations abound. Now, mind you, old school politics has always been filled with this sort of rhetoric; yet, I observe this brand of propaganda used by the person on the street in our highly polarized culture. Sweeping conclusions formed about someone based upon hearsay or soundbytes, name-calling and statements of dismissal because of nothing more than words a talk show host stated or even implied. Where has civility gone? Honest disagreement and open dialogue about such disagreement is one thing, but this kind of careless and cruel slander is another. I will never forget Dr. Smelzer’s analysis of the Nazi machine painting the ‘enemy’ as sub-human to make their marginalization and even extinction acceptable. Let us be very careful that our words about those with whom we disagree don’t descend into indignity and evil.

Allowing Words to Stir Us

In many ways, the most powerful place in any community is not the police station, the electric company, or the military base, but the public library!

The power of words is undeniable. Words can inspire us, challenge us, discourage us, or scar us. If you and I were asked to recall a spoken word that cut us deeply as a child, we could most likely do so within a few seconds; in moments, the entire setting and mood of the hurtful incident would come flooding back into our emotional landscape. On the other hand, we could also easily remember those choice words from a parent or teacher that blossomed us, gave us hope, or inspired us to press on toward higher achievement. Words carry great power.

When we are young, words from authorities bore special meaning. As a parent, I have become keenly aware of how my words can make or break my child’s day. But as we grow older, we often grow numb to the affect of words in our lives, perhaps due to busyness, or maybe self-protection. Though some self-protection is necessary as we grow with experience, I cannot help but feel that our layers of emotional scar tissue keep us from the blessed inspiration and stirring insights that may be the vehicle for great change in our lives. My most dramatic life lessons have taken place, both drastically and subtly, through the words of God and others written or spoken in my times of struggle or trial. Sometimes tracking me down. Other times patiently hanging out within a familiar text and turning on gradually like a small light in a darkened room. Mulled over within my head and heart, savored, relished, prayed about, acted upon.

One of my favorite authors speaks with great passion of how his life was forever changed in a revolutionary way while standing, in all places, within a used bookstore. He was in graduate school at the time, and one afternoon he walked into an old used bookstore simply to browse. He happened to pick up a torn copy of C.S. Lewis’ book, Reflection on the Psalms, and begin reading at random. One particular paragraph in Lewis’ book—an explanation of what true fulfillment is all about– shot off of the page, piercing his mind and heart like a laser. He said his life path was forever changed by this encounter. All stirred through the intense power of good words!

As a lover of history, I have always admired a passion for the lessons and ways of the past. In fact, I never enjoyed history as a subject in high school, primarily because it was conveyed yawningly by some teachers who believed the dutiful memorization of dates and political figures constituted the entirety of historical treasure. But, in my first year of college as a chemistry major, I took a large, generally-required class in American history and my academic life changed. Why? The professor loved history, with a joyful passion. For Dr. Goldberg, It was the words of those in the past, the stirring actions, the ways of living, that intrigued and challenged us in the present. I promptly switched my major to history and have been an avid fan ever since. One of my favorite movies is National Treasure. In the movie, Benjamin Franklin Gates, a history-loving treasure hunter steals the Declaration of Independence to save it from another, ruthless treasure seeker who may destroy the Declaration if he gets it first. At one point in the film, Ben, played by Nicolas Cage, quotes with awe-inspiring passion one of the famous lines from the Declaration. It is refreshing to see such a love for good words portrayed on the screen today. Being stirred by true and good words is inspiring. And rare. Do we allow pain from the past, busyness in the present, and apathy and fatigue rob us of the joy and inspiration found in good words? Join me in hunting down words that shape us today.

Living The Restful Life

o Karoshi—the Japanese term for “death from overwork”
o The most common causes of Karoshi are heart attack and stroke
o The first case of Karoshi was reported in 1969
o The Japanese Ministry of Labor began keeping yearly statistics on Karoshi in 1987
o Some ten thousand deaths per year are now attributed to Karoshi

– Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz, The Power of Full Engagement

Japanese workaholism has grown in recent decades to epic proportions. One case study involved a Japanese assembly line worker at a Mazda plant who died suddenly at the young age of forty-five. Immediately prior to his untimely death, the man had worked for thirteen consecutive days, including night shifts. He literally worked himself to death. Though extreme, such an example of overwork sobers us. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, and can even kill him! We are designed to cultivate periods of effective rest into our day, week, month, and year.

On the other hand, we have also seen examples in American culture where people die at an early age for want of something meaningful in which to invest their lives. Documented evidence shows that, upon retirement, many people shorten their lives due to a lack of meaningful involvement and engagement. In her excellent book, Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders, Dr. Mary Pipher writes, “The loss of work has killed many a person. For men who have few interests outside of work, the first few years after retirement are critical. They must find new ways to structure their time, new ways to be respected in their families, and new ways to be useful.” We are designed to cultivate investments of productive and useful time and energy for the good of others.

Author Mark Buchanan captures the classic American Trap in his fine book, The Rest of God. Buchanan observes that American culture has come to value endless luxury and leisure as the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. In fact, many of us get trapped in what cultural historian Witold Rybczynski calls “Waiting for the Weekend,” an attitude that endures work only as a mind-numbing interlude to where life is really lived—on the weekend. In this mode, we believe that life should be one big weekend. “If only every day were Saturday, nothing but leisure,” we think. But sadly, endless leisure leads only to apathy and even hopelessness. Leisure is useful and even essential, but only when placed in contrast to meaningful work.

I am convinced that a life well-lived is one marbled with both responsible and meaningful work as well as guarded and deeply enjoyable rest. Pervading this life should be an overarching sense of rest, however. In other words, rest is not just a day of the week, but a quality of living. Such an attitude of rest sees both work and leisure not as obligations, but as opportunities. Hardship and meaningful struggle are woven throughout recreation and leisure. Of course, working to secure the good of others should always be the backdrop of such as life. Such a life sees the ticking of the clock not as a cruel taskmaster of obligations, but as an array of opportunities. It positively asserts that we can make the best of circumstances with a grateful and creative attitude. A life well lived is driven not by dutiful tasks and cold responsibilities, but by a passionate desire to make the most of each season of life for the glory of God and the good of others.

We would do well to learn a lesson from Aslan in C.S. Lewis’ classic novel, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. After his tragic death at the hand of the White Witch, the kingly lion Aslan conquers death and is greeted again by the dear children, Susan and Lucy. What is the first thing the majestic Aslan does in their tearful reunion? He plays…

‘Oh, children,’ said the Lion, ‘I feel my strength coming back to me. Oh, children, catch me if you can!” He stood for a second, his eyes very bright, his limbs quivering, lashing himsel with his tail. Then he made a leap over their heads and landed on the other side of the Table. Laughing, though she didn’t know why, Lucy scrambled over it to reach him. Aslan leaped again. A mad chase began. Round and round the hilltop he led them, now hopelessly out of their reach, now letting them almost catch his tail, now diving between them, now tossing them in the air with his huge and beautifully velveted paws and catching them again,and now stopping unexpectedly so that all three of them rolled over together in a happy laughing heap of fur and arms and legs. It was such a romp as no one has ever had except in Narnia; and whether it was more like playing with a thunderstorm or playing with a kitten Lucy could never make up her mind. And the funny thing was that when all three finally lay together panting in the sun the girls no longer felt in the least tired or hungry or thirsty.

–C.S. Lewis, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe,

quoted by Mark Buchanan in The Rest of God.

Life Is An Action Verb

Have you ever met someone in the “winter” of life who engages with others and exudes a sense of purpose and mission? They are always learning, always growing, always striving to get better. Such people are refreshing to me. Though they may have retired from their careers, they are golden examples of what I call “Living life as an active verb.”

If you remember back to the good old days of English grammar, there is a difference between a passive verb and an active verb. A passive verb is one where the actor is receiving the action—he or she is acted upon. “I am carried,” “Jane is overcome,” and “Paul was hit,” are all examples of phrases using passive verbs. What is living life as a passive verb? It means being a reactor to events around you, never taking the initiative, being carried by the currents of life, letting others serve you. In the February, 1998 edition of Reader’s Digest, an article profiled a couple who had taken very early retirement (at ages 59 and 51) to live in Punta Gorda, Florida and do nothing more than cruise in their 30 foot trawler, play softball and collect shells. These three hobbies represented the sum of their reason for living in retirement. Please understand, I have nothing against boating, softball, and shell collecting, but it saddens me that these three activities represent the gist of this couples’ existence. No more vision for help to others, no more making a difference, no more profound meaning and purpose than these three simple hobbies.

An active verb, on the other hand, is one in which the actor is performing an action. “John rode the bike,” “Susie read the book,” and “Ben climbed the mountain” are examples of phrases using active verbs. What is living life as an active verb? It means responding aggressively to life around you, injecting energy into others, making a difference, serving and not just being served. It is an active life of engaging in issues, looking for chances to help others, volunteering, making an impact. Certainly, such a life contains fun hobbies, recreation, and much enjoyment, but it is not a life of passive television watching and “checking out.”

Recently, I read some research that bears out the health advantages of living life as an active verb. A Baylor College of Medicine four-year study found that those who live inactive, passive lives had a significantly lower blood flow to their brains. Neurologist Richard Restak writes, “No matter how old you may be at this moment, it’s never too late to change your brain for the better. That’s because the brain is different from every other organ in our body. While the liver and the lungs and the kidneys wear out after a certain number of years, the brain gets sharper the more it’s used. Indeed it improves with use.” –Quoted in The Power of Full Engagement, p. 101.

Further, an extensive study of nearly seven hundred people over the entire course of their adult lives by Epidemiologist David Snowdon revealed that those who maintain attitudes of love, hope, gratitude, contentment, and servanthood tend to live longer and have significantly less depression and Alzheimer’s disease! Why would this be true? I believe God has wired you and me to live lives of purpose, direction, and love for others.

In fact, I observe this same action verb principle in the teachings of Jesus. You may not be aware that there was a contemporary of Jesus named Hillel. An admirable and insightful teacher, Hillel taught something that, upon first reading, appears remarkably like the Golden Rule of Jesus’ teachings. Here is what Hillel taught…

What you do not want done to you, do not do to others.

Was Hillel teaching the same Golden Rule of Jesus? Look again. Hillel’s instruction was passive, not active in nature. That is, one could sit idly in a corner and obey Hillel’s injunction just fine. Simply refraining from hurting others was the goal. But consider the teaching of Jesus:

Do to others what you would have them do to you.

Jesus’ teaching was revolutionary because of its action. It is not enough just to refrain from hurting others in God’s economy. No, we are to go out, actively, aggressively, taking great pains to secure the good of those around us. This is the epitome of life as an action verb.

A Call To Full Engagement

Each year, when Thanksgiving rolls around, I consider the profound nature of gratitude in daily living. There are certain spiritual issues like gratitude that I like to call bedrock. In other words, there are elements of the spiritual life that are so central, so foundational, that when we work on them we see progress in many other areas as well. Forgiveness is one of these. Generosity is another. Gratitude is also bedrock. It is difficult, if not impossible, to be deeply grateful and also proud, arrogant, negative, sarcastic, or demanding. To work on gratitude is to see a domino effect of progress throughout one’s life.

Recently, I’ve witnessed a real breakthrough where gratitude is concerned. Gratitude is not merely a spontaneous overflow of acknowledgement if I happen to notice something good in my life. No, gratitude is a spiritual discipline. Gratitude is a heart decision to count my blessings. Further, thankfulness is not simply a mood I awake with each day. Gratitude is an attitude cultivated throughout my day. Each moment is to be embraced with a thankful heart to God as the good giver.

What is one of the ripple effects of cultivated, moment-by-moment gratitude? Full engagement. I am finding that when I work to foster gratitude as a discipline throughout my day, I have a more aggressive engagement with people. Even mundane interactions can take on a form of blessing I never thought possible. Yes, even those interactions that seem to be interruptions, nuisances, speed bumps in the otherwise smooth operation of my day. Gratitude as a discipline can change my heart, seeing these nuisances as blessings instead, and prompting me to embrace them, pursue them with intention and care, and see even more opportunity as a result.

Recently, I took two of my children for a winter swim at a local pool. While sitting on the edge of the water, I was struck by the lifeguards working around the facility. Externally, the lifeguards are not doing very much—sitting there, lifelessly looking around, or walking quietly around the pool perimeter. Not much action. But, inside, they are hard at work. Constantly scanning for the unsafe situation, the child in need, the need to intervene. The good lifeguard is fully engaged. Gratitude as a discipline makes us fully engaged like the good lifeguard—each moment, hunting for the blessings God gives us, accepting each encounter as an opportunity to pay it forward into the life of another. Here’s to embracing the blessings in your day…

Reaction Vs. Response

Endless invention, endless experiment,
Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness;
Knowledge of speech, but not of silence;
Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word…
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?
—TS Eliot

When I was in college, a favorite history professor of mine commented that one of his graduate students was strong at knowing information, but weak at sorting it. Strong at knowing facts, but weak at sifting them into helpful categories. The former involves knowledge, and the latter requires wisdom. At times, I see this same dynamic at work in my own life—recognizing the truth, analyzing it, mulling it over and over, pontificating about it, but then failing to apply it to my life. This is like the man who looks at himself in the mirror and then walks away, forgetting what he looks like (James 1:22-25). It is the difference between textbook knowledge and the school of hard knocks. Indeed, truth must be applied, and this application requires wisdom.

Growing in wisdom is a complex mystery. But I have come to see that it involves a marbling of objective knowledge with empathetic compassion and other qualities. Wisdom is a dish whose ingredients include truth, grace, compassion, justice, and righteousness mixed thoroughly and baked in the oven of time. Growth in wisdom is an aspect of growing older that I relish—the increasing ability to learn from mistakes and bring a better blend of ingredients into the recipe of wisdom.

When too much information without wisdom floods our lives, we react in what I call the pendulum principle. The pendulum principle is our tendency to swing in extremes in reaction to excesses of ourselves, others, society, history, etc. Often, even legitimate reactions to extremes or oversights of those who’ve gone before us turn into over-reactions, producing similar excesses, which in turn need to be corrected by those who come after us. And so on. And so on…

In academics, we react to excesses of testing by abandoning all tests; in nutrition, we react to excesses of fatty foods by abandoning all fats; in history, we react to the excesses of the modernist emphasis on knowledge by abandoning all truth and knowledge claims. We see it in our individual lives as well—this tendency to overreact in extremes, throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Exercise is all good, requiring ten days per week, or all bad, to be avoided like the plague. A political figure is either all good, leading us to the Promised Land, or all bad, to be denounced and soundly rejected. A particular author is either the standard-bearer for all truth and insight, or the Pied Piper leading us down the path of falsehood. Wisdom, however, generates an ability to recognize both strengths and weaknesses. Growing in wisdom is the humble, ever-present, self-checking discipline of considering truth, compassion, love, and justice with an eye to personal application. In this way, wisdom trains us not to react as the pendulum, but to RESPOND in careful consideration. Response is the careful overflow of a life of wisdom.

Finally, wise response is the discipline of recognizing our motivations. Mark Twain wrote of a slave named Jerry he knew as a young man. Jerry was a preacher/philosopher of sorts who was fond of saying, “You tell me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I’ll tell you what his ‘pinions is.” Twain elaborates:

..a man is not independent, and cannot afford views which might interfere with his bread and butter. If he would prosper, he must train with the majority; in matters of large moment, like politics and religion, he must think and feel with the bulk of his neighbors, or suffer damage in his social standing and in his business prosperities.

–Mark Twain, Corn-Pone Opinions.

All of us have biases, assumptions, and harmful reactions. Wisdom requires the courage to recognize them, sort them out, and live with the ambiguity, the lack of control, or possible rejection honesty might bring.

Musings on Beauty

Nobody sees a flower– really– it is so small– we haven’t time– and to see takes time like to have a friend takes time. If I could paint the flower exactly as I see it, no one would see what I see because I would paint it small like the flower is small. So I said to myself– I’ll paint what I see– what the flower is to me but I’ll paint it big and they will be surprised into taking time to look at it– I will make even busy New Yorkers take time to see what I see of flowers. – Georgia O’Keeffe, 1931

The ability to appreciate beauty intrigues me. Beauty attracts, but also inspires. There are different forms of beauty—physical, spiritual, artistic. Of course, our culture is enamored with physical beauty. Sometimes I fear we have settled for such stated, doctored, and even base forms of beauty that our souls are dulled to the subtle, more inspiring forms of beauty God has given us. Beauty dwells in a heart touched and healed by God’s love in a time of unique need. Beauty lives in an expression of care in tune with the fears and insecurities of a hurting soul. Beauty lies in an inspiring idea captured in words that give proportion and a path to compassionate action. All such things are laden with beauty.

Though we see, hear, feel beauty around us every day, we don’t always recognize or appreciate it. Georgia O’Keeffe captured the imagination and appreciation with her larger than life perspective of nature’s beauty. In so doing, she stretched our understanding of art and its purpose. She sought to augment and exaggerate for emphasis, for impact. The pace of modern living makes us dull of such observations and, therefore, appreciation. We must train ourselves to relish beauty.

One of the most impacting realizations I came to several years ago was the need to develop an appreciation for God’s subtle beauty in the world around me. Early in my spiritual life, everything was concrete, tangible, quantifiable. Yet, largely through the teachings of Jesus, I’ve come to appreciate subtlety and ambiguity. Sometimes the most powerful things in life are the least packaged. There are not always easy answers for every question. The process of discovering beautiful perspective is at least as important as the process.

I am the pastor of a small mountain church called Whispering Pines Church in Coal Creek Canyon, Colorado. In our men’s breakfast at the church last month, we discussed the following question: “If you were asked to write a book entitled, ‘What I learned about God because of living in Coal Creek Canyon,’ what would you write?” For me, one of the aspects of life here in the mountains I have relished in is the subtle, more individual working of God in the lives of people. The relational connections, the unique beauty that can be forged in loyal friendships—these are the crucible within which God mixes His most colorful pigments.