2023-12-13T14:07:31+00:00

Deadlifts & Public Speaking, pt 2

December 13, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

(That’s where the first post ended, but now I realize it was unfinished.)

At a particularly tense high school basketball game last night, emotions (including mine) ran high. And I wrote this last week: “On the way home, I expressed to the Angel that I can’t continue to get so worked up, that that isn’t who I am. But the thing is, I immediately realized, it is exactly who I am. I am a fiery, passionate man who loves sports and competition. I get excited easily at everything, highs and lows and everything in between.

Then, the next night, after committing to being even-keeled and calm, I pointed out that one boy was pushing another in the back with both hands over and over and over. It should have been helpful to the officials, because the 3 of them were obviously having a lot of trouble with the speed of the game and their responsibilities. It should also have been lost in the noise of the crowd, but everyone got dead quiet at that precise moment and my voice was the only one in the gym. So, I am that guy.

After the game, a family laughed at me – kindly, but still… And they wondered if I was like that on Sunday mornings. You have no idea. The answer is yes, of course.

A real problem (in every space, maybe especially the church) is hypocrisy, being different people in different spaces, pretending to be the image the situation wants. You can make a long list of my faults, but this is no longer one of them. I am just me. But like everything else, there’s no such thing as “just.” And like most everything else, the best thing about me is also the worst thing about me.

A wonderful development in my life is how I’m finally meeting the real, authentic me, and finding that I don’t hate that person at all. In fact, he’s alright. I just wish he’d calm down a little at high school games.”

Now, what you need to know is that I do not get confused; I am well aware that this is high school sports, and has no bearing on anyone’s worth or value, and has little consequence on a grander scale. Of course, that’s not to say they are meaningless. We could sing the praise of sports forever, detailing the endless positives we can all learn – about ourselves, others, gifts, teams, and our lives together.

So in these posts, the point was to be deadlifts & public speaking, and not hating ourselves because we’re not squats or scrapbooking.

BUT…

After last night, I was gripped with what can only be called regret, very low level, but regret nonetheless. My mission is to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ, does this sort of behavior build walls or bridges? And the truth is, I’m not sure. Maybe for some, I’m a lunatic and this erects a thick wall, but for some, it might make me relatable and authentic and easier to approach. I am a lunatic in lots of ways, but an authentic, approachable, easy one. Those are all true. It’s the best and worst about me.

But the conviction quietly knocking, what about that?

I reached out to two trusted friends to ask, but didn’t need a response. The question was enough. We don’t ask what anyone thinks of drinking water or eating vegetables.

What if I’m not supposed to be a deadlift anymore. What if the Spirit is asking me to be a kettlebell swing? Should I continue to say, “I am a deadlift,” and isn’t that the opposite of humility and growth?

This is why a relationship with Jesus is so important, why true, working wisdom is vital to our lives. Maybe 2 weeks ago, the lesson was to love and accept me where I was, as a deadlift. But now, today, maybe the lesson is to not resign myself to always being a deadlift. I am a fiery, passionate man in the service of The King, not in the service of me, or “that’s just who I am.”

Lots of work in a meaningless pursuit is just plain silly, but which is the meaningless pursuit: change or acceptance? I can love the me God so lovingly created, and I can be transformed.

It’s almost New Years, a life of faith requires examination, what are the things to hold on to, and what are the things to leave behind? What is the work to do? I don’t need to be everyone’s favorite song, but the song I am must not be rooted in pride and rebellion.

Sports teaches a million lessons, this is just another one. I’m very thankful I have a Guide, and a community like you to walk alongside.

Deadlifts & Public Speaking

December 12, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

My favorite physical activity is a deadlift, and yes, I have given speeches and spoken on a stage. (These are my answers to the last 2 days of site prompts)

When asked, people are more afraid of public speaking than death. This seems strange at first, but I lost my house and everything in it in a flood in 2011. Many of us did. Others had inches or feet in their basements and first floors. The ones who lost everything put all of our ruined things on the front yard for dump trucks to pick up and haul away, and the house was bulldozed a year later. We didn’t have to deal with too much of the physical clean-up. The psychological, emotional and spiritual clean-up was a different story. Home can (and should) represent safety and security, and that was drowned with the carpets and doorknobs. You can buy a new end table, no stores sell peace. And watching your possessions scooped up onto industrial equipment as garbage is not a picture that quickly fades.

Anyway, the others with less water had to hire restoration companies, mold remediators, they had to replace their things, carefully watch weather reports… Yes, of course, no one’s house goes underwater, except ours did, and it certainly doesn’t twice, but try to sleep with statistical improbability when you’ve woken up to impossibility. In lots of ways, they had to deal with the catastrophic disaster in a much more present manner. Like public speaking. If you are terrible, you have to look at those faces again and again, they may remember and feel embarrassment for years.

Dying, like our experience, is walking away into a new blank space. We remember where we came from and what happened to our home, who knows if dying is like that? But we won’t have to look into the audience’s eyes and watch them struggle for comforting words. It’s why you don’t write a poem for your special lady and read it to her. You hand it to her on your way out the door after dinner and a goodnight kiss.

Love poems and death aren’t exactly the same, but the analogy holds up, I think. The vulnerability can feel like dying, and that’s what we’re afraid of, probably. Opening ourselves up to another, waiting in agony to see if we will be accepted or rejected. Will they like our speech and it’s content? Or will they like us, our personality, our way?

I quite like it now. Not everyone likes me, not everyone has to. That’s a new development, that I don’t have to be everyone’s favorite song. Some don’t like me at all. An old man left before the closing prayer like his hair was on fire after one Sunday sermon. I have some sharp edges and disagreeable positions, but that’s also why I might someday be somebody’s favorite song. Nobody cares too much about white bread, it’s nobody’s favorite, nobody’s worst. It just is fine. Like McDonald’s. It’s fine, kind of gross, but not gross enough to really matter.

Walking is fine. Bicep curls and lateral raises are good enough, but nobody hates them, so nobody loves them, either. Deadlifts and squats, on the other hand… Mention Leg Day to your gym buddies and you will hear one of 2 responses. “I LOVE Leg Day,” or “I HATE Leg Day.” You either wake up early or look for any excuse to miss.

My brother can’t stand the sound of Morrissey’s voice. Nobody hates Coldplay. We all say we do, but that’s just for show. Coldplay is white bread. We don’t send sandwiches back because they’re on white bread, we don’t turn the radio station when “Yellow” comes on.

I don’t know what the point is. Maybe that we could be deadlifts and public speaking, if that’s what we are, instead of Coldplay and Applebee’s, manufactured to be sterile, inoffensive, and reach the widest audience. We can be exactly who we are, flaws, faults and rough spots, and many will love you just like that. Of course, many will not, and some people will even tell you that they don’t and why.

Perhaps the point IS absolutely to be deadlifts and public speaking, to open our hearts and souls and show vulnerability as whole, realized human beings, because to pretend to be anything else is just too much work. And lots of work in a meaningless pursuit is just plain silly. We have other things to do.

Youth Sports, Pt. ?: Crazy People

December 4, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The site prompt is to list 5 things I’m good at, but I won’t do that because the high school basketball season began last weekend. My son plays and is quite good. The team won two games by what others might consider comfortable margins, but they weren’t comfortable for me. You see, as embarrassing as this is to admit, I am the crazy person of the title.

The officiating in all sports is, by all accounts (except perhaps by the officials themselves…perhaps), terrible. Saturday’s game featured a referee that was convinced the tournament was a showcase for him, that no one had come for the kids or the sport, but only to marvel at his creative facial hair and overall cool factor. He aggressively confronted the players and stopped the game several times to do something – we didn’t know what the somethings were but they were clearly very important somethings.

He’s not this story, he’s just bad at his part time job. So are the rest. But lots of us are bad at our hobbies and side-gigs. I love to dance, and I do it any time I can, but I’m not what you’d consider a talented dancer. Big deal that we’re incompetent, right? Big deal that the officiating is always unfortunate. If the definition of insanity is expecting different results with the same variables, then I am an insane person.

So, Friday’s game was frustrating to watch. The kids were being pushed and thrown down with no calls and others were barely grazed with angry whistles, and some parents and spectators were incredulous. Loudly incredulous. Of which I was one.

On the way home, I expressed to the Angel that I can’t continue to get so worked up, that that isn’t who I am. But the thing is, I immediately realized, it is exactly who I am. I am a fiery, passionate man who loves sports and competition. I get excited easily at everything, highs and lows and everything in between.

After the game, a family laughed at me – kindly, but still… And they wondered if I was like that on Sunday mornings. You have no idea. The answer is yes, of course.

Current Favorite

November 28, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

Yesterday’s site prompt was, Who are your current most favorite people? It’s an strange question, feeling clunky and slightly unsettling. Most Favorite People should surely be capitalized, as if a title or award that is bestowed on the deserving. However, the inclusion of the word “current” implies that this title can also be rescinded. What is earned can be taken away.

Current MFPs are Chris Evans and Bong Joon-ho, star and director of the dystopian nightmare (yet still hopeful) Snowpiercer movie. Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, who is expecting a baby with his girlfriend Sarah Jane Ramos, is, too. Why do I know who his girlfriend is? Or especially that they are pregnant? Is this really important for us to know? I’m not certain that all lines between public and private should be erased, but that’s a little strange for me to say as I sit in my living room chair writing a blog where I share all of the personal, sometimes intimate, details of my life with you. But I get to choose what is shared. Maybe Dak Prescott or Ms. Ramos issued a press release, but very often the breaking information/news is clearly not for me. The social contract of fame, whether I like it or not, has a very high cost.

What is unsettling to me about this question is the conditionality of it all. If Snowpiercer was terrible, would Joon-ho make this list? I wasted an hour of a Netflix movie, 6 Underground, before I had to turn it off with extreme judgment, and that director isn’t an MFP. Dak has been awesome lately, but the next time he throws 4 interceptions, or loses another playoff game, will he, his girlfriend, and his baby still be Most Favorites?

Nev Schulman, Max Joseph, and Kamie Crawford – hosts of Catfish – are perpetual MFPs. That sounds right. If they are truly our Favorites, they should remain favorites, right? Not all episodes of Catfish are great. In fact, most new episodes aren’t.

Morrissey is the best example of this contrast. He often says regrettable, problematic things, not every song is an A+ anymore, some solo albums are admittedly average, but he will stay my #1 MFP forever.

I’m so far considering celebrities or famous artists I’ve never met, but the temptation to carry this idea of currency is insidious, infiltrating our actual relationships and lives. We commit to our spouses, children and friends with the same level of faithfulness as our quarterbacks, and directors. If we don’t feel it right now, we move on, they were a current love, but that’s over and we’re down the road onto the next “current.”

Fidelity means “the quality or state of being faithful or loyal,” and maybe the term hi-fi shouldn’t apply only to our stereos. Maybe we should be hi-fi. Currency is fine for singers and sports teams, but not families and communities. I wonder how everything would change overnight if the impulse to disconnect, leave and find a new current based on this moment alone, were left behind. If our MFPs were never again current, and just remained the favorites they are now. Maybe we could just give our love, based not on performance, covering over the metaphorical interceptions and 6 Undergrounds. Maybe we could begin to choose hi-fi over why-fi, and just see what we could build.

2 Songs For Thanksgiving

November 21, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

Bruno Mars, in “When I Was Your Man,” breaks all of our hearts with: “I should have bought you flowers. And held your hand. Should have gave you all my hours. When I had the chance. Take you to every party ’cause all you wanted to do was dance. Now my baby’s dancing. But she’s dancing with another man.”

We all know this feeling, but maybe it’s not because she’s dancing with another man. Maybe it’s because she’s gone. Maybe it’s because she can’t dance anymore. But the feeling of, “if I only knew,” is real, and universal. We all understand “should have,” right? I should have held your hand one more time, when I had the chance.

The opposite is illustrated in Thomas Rhett, in his song, “Notice,” who sings: “At that party last night. Baby, I don’t know why. I forgot to mention. You were looking drop-dead. Not even a contest. Center of attention. If I had to say every time you looked amazing. You’d think I was joking. But I brag about you. When I’m not around you. You don’t even know it.. You think that I don’t notice. How you brush your hair out of your green eyes. The way you blush when you drink red wine. The way you smile when you try to bend the truth. You think that I don’t notice. All the songs you sing underneath your breath. You still tear up at a beach sunset. And you dance just like you’re the only one in the room. You think that I don’t notice, but I do.”

I have lots and lots of faults, too many for me to count (or to list), but one thing that cannot be said is that I do not notice. The Angel played this song for me, and the truth is that it’s not something I like too much. But I do like that she does. I love how she sits when we look at her phone while it plays, how her mouth moves to the lyrics. She knows I notice, and that’s why she curled up into my arms to listen to it with me.

I didn’t always (and, if we’re honest, I probably don’t always.) There were so many old, dead relationships where I was way more Bruno Mars than Thomas Rhett. The thing about the Mars song is that it isn’t to send us down a spiral of regret and self-loathing. Instead, it is a string around our finger, a reminder that nothing is to be missed. Both of these songs are sisters of Genesis 28:16, where Jacob laments, “Surely the Lord was in this place and I was unaware.”

Thursday is Thanksgiving, and this reminder is an invitation into a new reality that begins any time we say it does. But it is Thanksgiving, and it’s a very good time to say it does.

Of course, we should have held her hand one more time, but we can’t do anything about that now. Guilt doesn’t give us that one more dance, and neither does regret. We honor those moments we chose something else besides bringing flowers or giving our hours in a different way: by choosing to not miss the hands and hours that are here now. These gifts are precious and sweet.

There will be turkey or tofurkey, filling and apple pie (which my mom, for some reason, is now calling apple gazette), and people who are absolutely the very best and can be absolutely the very worst. When I talk about my sister, you will know she has always been my hero, and she has often been my nemesis, and my heart aches thinking about how much free time I haven’t spent with her. But what I will do is soak in Thursday on her couch with my mom (who is now calling apple pie apple gazette, and so will we), brother, nephews and my favorite dog ever, I will thoroughly enjoy every second.

The Rhett song has a line, “Baby, I don’t know why. I forgot to mention. You were looking drop-dead.” The conviction we feel is to not forget to mention ever again.

Look into their eyes. Hold their hands to pray, to say thanks. Say thanks for them and for the God who created us all and gave us to each other to make these days so full of wonder and light. Kiss too deeply, hug too long, laugh too loud, and eat as much apple gazette as you can, get sick on joy and love. It’s Thanksgiving!

To Skip Or Not To Skip

November 15, 2023November 15, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

Today’s site prompt is, “What part of your routine do you always try to skip if you can?” and that fits pretty well with what I was thinking about right now.

First of all, what does “if you can” mean? It is my routine, I decided it was important, and made it a practice. Now, if this means work, in general, or specific tasks at work, I misunderstand the assignment. I could skip them, but it probably also means I am skipping employment, and that seems like a different question. But if it’s my routine, I can skip it if I want. No one is making me live the way I do, I am mostly free to do or not do.

The right answer to the prompt is Leg Day. I lift weights, separating days into Push (chest, shoulders, triceps), Pull (back, biceps), and Legs. This morning was Leg Day, and now my legs, back, buns, feet and toes hurt, my neck and head are heavy and tired. I know tonight I’ll have to go to bed, and that means I might have to crawl up the stairs. Maybe I’ll sleep on the couch down here. Sleeping next to the Angel is wonderful, but my legs.

My routine is made up of items like feeding the many pets in this house, working out, showering, eating breakfast, brushing my teeth, reading the Bible, lunch, dishes, writing, picking my boy up from school, and lots of other things I don’t remember now. But the number of things or even what they are aren’t the point. The point is that I created this routine.

We decide what’s important, what we value, and then we (hopefully) implement them. We brush our teeth because clean teeth matters to us. We eat breakfast, or we don’t, because we’ve given assigned a heavy weight to either one. None of them are necessarily convenient, but they are the blocks we use to intentionally build our lives.

I sat in my chair this morning with precisely this situation in my lap. Of course, I didn’t want to. I know what Leg Day is, and I no longer love it like I did even a few years ago. But I wouldn’t skip it, any more than I’d skip getting dressed. I am a man who lifts legs. I like that I am that man, it means something, it says things about me. It says I’m consistent, reliable, that I do hard things. Legs aren’t really the point, those characteristics are, and legs are how I remind me of them, and the man I want to be. I’m not always reliable, don’t always do the hard things, but getting up early on Wednesdays to lift legs without choosing the easy excuses moves me further along the path towards who I will be.

I can skip Leg Day, but why would I compromise on future me. We too often settle. I too often settle. And I guess I think part of reclaiming our worth as human beings is not settling for the crumbs that fall from the plate on the way to the trash, when we belong at the table.

I could be consistent most of the time, when it fits the schedule or the company. I could do hard things, unless it’s too hard. And I can do leg day, except for those days I don’t feel like it. But I’ve settled for a very long time. I am already well aware of the boy “when I feel like it” makes. I can’t wait to see what happens, to find out who I become, if I stop settling for so much less.

Cover Songs

November 8, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

Earlier this week, a cover of “Killing In The Name,” came across my “You Might Like” playlist. I have been very open with my acceptance of the fact that Amazon absolutely knows what I might like. I’ve even embraced the omnipotence of The Machines, if it means I get new songs by new bands on a regular basis.

“Killing In The Name” is a Rage Against The Machine song, from their first eponymous album, and it is perfect. Everything about it is perfect. Rage Against The Machine was awesome, especially for a 17 year-old boy who was socially frustrated and angry (like me).

The cover version is from something called Sueco, and it’s a shot for shot remake, like that equally superfluous Gus Van Sant Psycho remake. The problem with this sort of cover of this sort of song is that the decision to make it a carbon copy (with the only difference being the people playing it) is a guarantee that it will be worse in every way. For example, whoever sings for Sueco (maybe Sueco is his name?) is decisively NOT Zack de la Rocha. Instead, he’s a sad substitute. When I tried to look this up, I discovered that Machine Gun Kelly made the same mistake in 2020. It’s also faithful, which also just makes it worse.

If “Killing In The Name” (or any Rage song, really) is going to be covered, the artist has to be wildly different, like Tori Amos or Sarah McLachlan. That would be interesting, right? New, different aspects would be emphasized, words we missed before might be noticed, it could reach an entirely new audience. And that is the point of a cover song.

What does Sueco or Machine Gun Kelly’s version add to the world? Literally no one would listen to theirs when the perfect Rage original is available. Why would they? (Maybe Sueco’s mom would, but moms are like that, it’s like a beautifully pure form of maternal insanity.)

I care for lots of reasons. First, because I care about music and art and I care about what it says about us, individually and as a culture.

And the second is because it makes me think of the Bible. The Great Commission of Jesus is that we spread the Gospel. This Gospel never changes, but the way we present it does, based on who we are, our personalities, the things we like, and gifts & talents we have received. And as we are different, our audience is, too. We’re like walking, talking, loving cover songs, playing the original (in this case, the Gospel) authentically, from our own unique design.

What if we try to play our version by trying to sound just like somebody else’s? What if we are Sueco, playing a Rage classic, while bringing nothing that is strictly Sueco’s. It’s simply unnecessary, which makes it offensive, if you happen to care about our individual creative sparks, which I do, very much.

Maybe Sueco is terrific? Who will ever know, as long as they are trying to play somebody else’s songs, just like that somebody else? Maybe they should cover “Love Is A Battlefield” instead, but this time like Sueco, not like Pat Benatar. I’m assuming Sueco is a hard rock band, but what do I know? They could sound more like James Taylor on their originals. Now I’m assuming they have originals. The point is, they have been given something that we will never experience as long as they’re trying to be someone else.

And as far as the Bible, I can reach certain types, but I can’t reach some people that you can, or that my sister can, or that my neighbors can. But they need to be reached, so now what? How about if we all stop trying so hard to be someone else, doing what someone else is doing, the way they’re doing it, and start doing it the way we do? We’re the only ones who can – you’re the only one who can play it like you, who can love like you. And if you don’t do it like you, not only are you making pointless Sueco covers that no one will hear, but you’re not making your own songs. And we desperately need your songs, our story can’t ever be completely told without them.

One Thing

November 2, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The prompt today is “One Thing I Think Everyone Should Know,” and I’ll get there in a minute.

First, last night I watched this documentary on Max called “Last Stop Larrimah,” about a missing (likely murdered) man in Larrimah, Australia. Larrimah had 11 residents, now it has 10, and no one knows who did it or why. Anyone could have done it, all 11 simultaneously liked and hated each other. But the review I sort of read referenced the often blurry line between telling a story and making fun of the subjects. The Larrimanians, well, they live in a town of 11 in Australia, so they’re quirky and odd. They are not like the people we see at the Whole Foods or high school basketball games.

I finished Birdman this morning, which plays like a documentary of the making of a Broadway play. It isn’t a doc, it’s fiction, and it won an Oscar several years ago. Birdman sounds/looks exactly like a movie I would LOOOOVE, except that it wasn’t. I didn’t like it at all. The performances were outstanding, especially Edward Norton’s, but left me standing in my living room, wondering why I felt nothing at all but sad. The story was, more or less, about the artifice of the industry – the only things that were real was the insecurity and desperate need for validation. Maybe they were on the other side of that same line, maybe they were making fun of their subjects, too. Maybe it was intentional.

An awful lot of things, on film and IRL, walk that line. We all carry that insecurity & desperation, we all have our quirks and personalities. As we walk around, feeling the friction of others who are nothing like us (or who are too much like us), how do we respond? Are our emotions and judgments celebration of another’s unique strangeness or are we laughing at the labels we place on them, labels that obscure their hearts but emphasize everything else.

I liked Last Stop Larrimah, and didn’t like Birdman, for pretty much the same reason: I really love people. This isn’t always an easy position to take, there is always violence and evil. There is never a shortage of examples of inhumanity. But in the face of the never ending avalanche of mistreatment and de-valuation, we simply have to persevere. Otherwise, those examples will continue, ad infinitum.

Birdman didn’t like it’s characters, and thats ok, I suppose. They didn’t, either. This tension between who they were and who they thought they should be or who they were trying to prove they were drove every plot point. Their self-loathing motivated every twist and turn. And I can’t help but think the critic who viewed Larrimah through the lens of ‘otherness is less, which makes it a punchline’ felt the same. He (or she) wanted them to be like us, cool and oh-so sophisticated, with the same hopes, dreams, decor and jeans. Wanted them saddled with the same self-loathing – and when they didn’t wear that on the outside, he branded them with it.

So, what do I want everyone to know? That we are amazing and wonderful. That we don’t have to be any of the should’s, that we don’t have anything to prove, that we don’t have to live like that for another second. That differences are just the best. That there’s nothing to make fun of, there’s nothing to mock. That we are who we are, and that is so much more than good enough. That’s what I want everyone to know.

Sunday the 22nd of October

October 23, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

Yesterday wasn’t my favorite day. We’ll get to the site prompt (“What are you most proud of in your life?”) in a minute, but not yet.

Yesterday began in the middle of the night – I have’s been sleeping very well lately. There is quite a bit swirling in this empty head of mine, lots of emotions, responsibilities, sadness, concern. The world is burning and so are our communities. Usually, I know that’s true, but am able to see the beauty and manage to hold all of it in both hands. I can’t right now. So I don’t sleep so great.

In the middle of the night I turned on The Ringleader: The Case of the Bling Ring, which is a Max documentary on Rachel Lee, the “mastermind” of the salacious story of teenagers robbing celebrities’ houses. It was ok, I don’t know if she is actually the ringleader the title suggests, I don’t have any idea if any of the people involved have ever told the truth. Based on as many times as Ms Lee referred to “her truth,” it’s impossible to know if she knows what it is.

Then my family and I helped to clean up our local park after their annual Halloween/Fall Fest & haunted walk. Halloween is less than 2 weeks away and it can’t come and go soon enough.

Then I went to the Sunday service at our faith community and gave a sermon that went surprisingly well, given my mental/physical state. I think I might be getting sick.

Then I watched football on the RedZone and perhaps took a short nap. Then, in the evening, my beautiful family took a run at me, after I expressed a certain vulnerability. We can talk about that particular vulnerability and their particular run another time, but this is not the point of this post. (Although, neither was the Bling Ring, but I gave that a few more sentences than it warranted, in the bigger picture.)

Appreciation is for children, mostly. When you’re a million years old, as I am, you need a pat on the back far less than a 6 year old does. It’s nice, obviously, but hopefully, by this time, we have a sense of who we are that isn’t totally dependent on the opinions of others, even runs from your family. And that’s the answer to the site’s question.

There was a time where an attack from those closest to me would have been a wrecking ball that left me in ruins for weeks. My insecurities would have run wild and I might have wondered what I was doing and why I was such a bad everything. Those days are in the rear view. I did listen, and what I have learned is that all people, even those who love us the most, sometimes speak out of their own interest. I do it, and so do you. Sometimes criticism isn’t about the person to whom it’s directed, and growth is being able to tell the difference.

I remember 2 years ago a woman scolded me, in great detail, over my many faults. She hadn’t seen me in several years before that, and we had connected over a bagel for a half hour before she gave me her diagnosis. I do have many faults, but not the ones she perceived. So we let those go and move on.

My family wasn’t exactly wrong, they do know me and my weaknesses, and they doubtlessly love me to the mooooon and back, but last night’s run wasn’t meant for me. There simply isn’t anything to do with it.

But what I did see is something cool. One of the primary values in my life is the ability to create safe environments for people to take necessary journeys of discovery (of themselves, others, and God). The fact that my family was safe and able to express themselves so fully without lasting repercussion from a fragile ego, with the benefit of hindsight and a few minutes of space, served as my answer to this site. I am happy. I happen to believe and follow Jesus (if you don’t, you can call it whatever you like, I don’t mind) and have listtened to His answer to the BIG QUESTION of who I am. I am grateful, more than anything else.

I am a human being with enough faults & failures to spare, but I am growing. I am not who I was, not who I will be, but this man I am now is not so bad. The weather is nice here, I just wish I could sleep a little.

saviors

October 19, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/1 Comment

Yesterday I finished the 3 episode Savior Complex documentary on what used to be HBO, then HBO Max, now just Max. As far as documentaries go, it was pretty perfect. I think we could discuss it for days and days. That is probably the best compliment I could give to the art form.

As I write the word “discuss,” I am fully aware that discussion isn’t what we do too well in our current cultural environment. Discuss implies discourse, listening, careful consideration, and a respectful give and take of ideas and perspectives. None of that is in vogue. Outrage is. None of the earlier words apply to outrage: listening, careful, consideration, give-and-take, and certainly not respect. The most glaring lack in outrage is empathy.

Outrage finds it’s deepest roots in selfish myopia.

Political outrage requires an aggressive inability to see another’s perspective. The other side has to be full of ignorant, heartless, brainless monsters. Once it isn’t, once it’s full of moms and dads, friends and fellow Dallas Cowboy fans, who might also be educated and kind, but just happen to arrive at different conclusions, things get very complicated.

All of the intricacies and nuance are impossible to detail here, especially because the facts of the specific case aren’t our subject at all. Renee Bach and Serving His Children (her Christian mission organization) did great work, and saved many malnourished children. This is true. Renee Bach and Serving His Children used questionable tactics, which probably resulted in the deaths of other malnourished children. This is also true. There is terrific conversation to be had about the purpose of the No White Saviors action group. There is also terrific conversation to be had about those who operate No White Saviors, and if that purpose has been obscured by vanity and outrage.

I don’t know the truth. Knowing would mean that I could see hearts and motivation, which I obviously cannot. I know people do beautiful things that go spectacularly wrong and result in pain. I know that because it has happened to me. Many times, I thought I was doing the right thing, and people were wounded, given scars that could last a lifetime. I still can’t say if those things were the right things. The simple fact of negative consequence doesn’t automatically mean that they weren’t. Were the lives saved enough to sufficiently outweigh the deaths? Is 1 death too many to ever redeem the positive impact?

I don’t know the answers to these questions. I’m not outraged by anyone’s actions. I might disagree, or hold different opinions, but I understand them. I heard both sides in the documentary and I can truly understand why they might have done what they did. (Maybe it wasn’t actually why they did them, but I simply can’t ever state with absolute certainty what their why was. Maybe they can’t, either.)

Outrage is not passion. Passion can drive a tremendous amount of change that reinforces our shared humanity. Passion, or conviction, rooted in love tirelessly fights injustice and seeks to end all of the -isms that plague our species. Outrage drives Facebook clicks and paychecks through the promulgation of fear. And fear isn’t love.

There aren’t easy answers, nor are there easy questions. Empathy isn’t easy. But if we’re ever going to end the division that is killing us all, we have to try. Easy got us here, it won’t get us out.

Love With A Capital L

A journey towards living an inspired life of love in the modern world