Monthly Archives: May 2019
“Morality and Feeling Good After”
“What is moral is what you feel good after.”
—Ernest Hemingway
Hemingway had a reputation as a hard-drinking man who liked the ladies. Sometimes, it is the people who struggle the most, and who are don’t always win, who know and say what is real. No matter what you or I or anyone thinks of Hemingway, he has captured a very important principle in a very few words.
A good question to ask ourselves before we say or do anything is this: “How am I going to feel about this word or action in fifteen years, fifteen days, fifteen minutes, or fifteen seconds?” You might call this “the fifteen questions.” Of course, there are two tricky things about these questions.
The first trick is to answer them honestly. Yes, my wife made me some bread pudding. But should I really have two small pieces—or one big one? Yes, I could binge on Netflix, but how am I going to feel about that afterwards? Could I say something clever (but cutting) to my sweetheart? Sure. But am I going to regret it in less than fifteen seconds?
The second trick about asking “the fifteen questions” is even more difficult, because it is an actional question: “What am I going to actually do in response to the questions? Telling myself the truth is essential, but not sufficient. You would think that, once I’ve decided that I am not going to feel good after making a certain decision, I would have the good sense not to make that decision. You would think. And often, you would be wrong.
Robert Fulghum has a wonderful book titled It was on Fire When I Lay Down on It.” In the brief musing that gives the title to the book, Fulghum acknowledges his very human tendency to know that something or someone is trouble, but not to avoid that trouble. Fulghum is not alone.
Well, I am going to feel better if I post this on my website, and eat some good, nutritious (and tasty) bean soup. Then, I’ll have a wee bit of bread pudding, and go out and mow the lawn and clean the gutters. (Thanks for the bread pudding, Babe! You’re the best!)
“Fair Distribution of the Land and ‘Those People’ ”
The Old Testament has a lot to say about “foreigners.” (Where I grew up, in Adams County, Ohio, we called them “foregners.” This word referred to anyone from the next county over.) But, however you spell and pronounce word, the Old Testament has a lot to say about “those people.”
And often, it is “those people,” with the emphasis on the word “those.” They are the others, the ones not like us, the outsiders.
I have been something of an outsider all my life. When I was in grade school, my fellow students would ask me, “Where you from?!” in a tone of voice that was more an accusation than it was a question. The truth was that I lived on a farm, about four miles outside of town. Apparently, this was far enough to make me one of those people.
So, the Bible warns against intermarrying with foreigners. Even the great (and wise?) King Solomon married a bunch of foreigners, and started worshiping his wives’ gods. He went so far as to sacrifice some of his children to these gods. We need to acknowledge that relationships with outsiders can be quite problematic. This was known long before “those people” began flying airplanes into skyscrapers.
However, the Bible has other, more positive things to say about foreigners, too. I stumbled across one a couple of days ago when I was listening through the book of Ezekiel. I thought that I had heard it wrong, but I went back for another look (including in Hebrew, the original language of the Old Testament), and it was absolutely unequivocal.
It is in a vision that Ezekiel had of the restored boundaries of the land of Israel. Many folks from Judah were in exile in Babylon. Israel (which was what the Northern Kingdom was called after it had split off from Judah in 930 B.C.) had been gone for 150 years.
And yet, from the exile in Babylon—which Ezekiel shared with his people—Ezekiel looked forward to a restored Israel and Judah.
“So you shall divide this land among you according to the tribes of Israel. 22 You shall allot it as an inheritance for yourselves and for the sojourners who reside among you and have had children among you. They shall be to you as native-born children of Israel. With you they shall be allotted an inheritance among the tribes of Israel. 23 In whatever tribe the sojourner resides, there you shall assign him his inheritance, declares the Lord GOD” (Ezekiel 47:21-23, English Standard Version).
What?! The foreigner is supposed to get an inheritance, just like the Israelites?! You’ve got to be kidding me!
Nope. That is what it says.
Now admittedly, this is a vision, not a description of immediate reality. But before anything can become a reality, it has to be a vision. And to become reality, I must act on the vision.
I’m not quite ready for completely open borders. In any case, it is not likely, with our current anti-immigrant mindset, that I will have a huge impact on national policy. But I can begin where I am. I can begin by sharing the little inheritance that I call “mine”. I can be generous with my wife’s and my house. I can share the produce from my garden—assuming that it actually produces some.
Visions are big. Beginnings are small. But we all have to begin somewhere.
“Irish: A Mother’s Day Tribute”
Mother’s Day is really hard for a lot of people. Many people have (or had) a really rocky relationship with their mothers. Some mothers are estranged from their children, often through no fault of their own.
I am one of the lucky ones. My mom and I got along very well, generally speaking. Of course, like most little kids—especially boys—I got into my share of trouble. When I was little, I kept the forsythia bush trimmed. Mom would make me cut my own switch.
Of course, I played all the angles. I would bring her such a small twig that she couldn’t have killed a fly with it. She would send be back for another switch. Then I got really smart. I discovered that, if you get a big older sprig, it would be hollow and break on the first whack. However, Mom knew that too. I don’t think she even switched me in the end, at times. The trauma of cutting my own switch was enough to reduce me to a puddle of tears.
My dad called Mom “Irish,” because she was. She was red-haired and had the Irish temper. But she also had the Irish playfulness about her.
One of my favorite memories was chasing her around our house with a rolled-up pair of dirty socks. This happened on numerous occasions. I think I usually started it, but she almost always had the last throw of the socks. She couldn’t outrun me, so she would eventually just hide somewhere. Inevitably, my curiosity would get the best of me, and I would try to figure out where she was. “Mom, are you hiding behind that door?” She would be quiet, and I couldn’t stand not knowing.
Whap! Dirty socks up-side my head—again!
My mom worked hard. She was a farm wife. When the hay’s baled and in the field, and rain is coming, you don’t care much about a person’s sex or age. You just try to get the hay in before it rains. Despite her small stature (five feet, two inches), my mom was a workhorse. She could throw a sixty-pound bale of hay up on a wagon, three or four rows high.
But she knew how to have fun, too (as the story about the dirty socks demonstrates). When I was very little, sometimes before I would go to bed, I would say, “Mamma, could you read me a story?”
“Well, I need to get these dishes washed,” she would say. But then she would look at my pitiful little face and say, “Oh, we’ll let the elves wash the dishes!” And then, she would read to me.
The next morning, when I got up, the dishes would indeed be done. “Look, Mama!” I would say. “The elves did the dishes!”
“Why, yes!” she would say, “They did!”
I don’t know if I believe in elves these days, but I do believe in Irish.
“We’re All in this Thing for Ourselves, and We’re All in this Thing Together”
“If you are wise, you are wise for yourself;
if you scoff, you alone will bear it.” (Proverbs 9:12, English Standard Version)
“Whoever heeds instruction is on the path to life,
but he who rejects reproof leads others astray.” (Proverbs 10:17, English Standard Version)
Have you ever noticed how proverbs, ancient or modern, tend to travel together in pairs. Nevertheless, these pairs go in opposite directions.
“Look before you leap” is balanced (or contradicted?) by “He who hesitates is lost.”
“A stitch in time saves nine” is countered by “Don’t cross a bridge until you get to it.”
So much for modern parables. What about the proverbs in the biblical Book of Proverbs? The same dynamics are present.
The classical example of this phenomenon occurs in Proverbs 26:4-5.
Answer not a fool according to his folly,
lest you be like him yourself.
Answer a fool according to his folly,
lest he be wise in his own eyes. (Proverbs 26:4-5, English Standard Version)
The two verses that lead off this post, Proverbs 9:12 and 10:17, make very different points. Proverbs 9:12 states that wisdom and foolishness are personal choices with personal consequences. Here, the Scripture emphasizes the personal character of our life choices.
Proverbs 10:17, on the other hand, turns a spotlight on the fact that our choices do affect other people. The first half of the verse uses the metaphor of a path. “The one who guards instruction is on the path of life.” A hearer or reader of this proverb might suspect that the second half of the verse would say something like, “. . . but the one who rejects instruction is on the path of death.”
However, that is not what the verse says. Instead, it says, “. . . but whoever ignores correction leads others astray.” The King James Version has “. . . but he that refuseth reproof erreth.” This ignores the fact that the Hebrew verb for “errs” is in the hiphil, or causative, stem. The one who refuses correction (reproof) doesn’t simply suffer himself. He also causes other people to suffer.
Go back for a moment to the first part of the verse, which speaks of “the path to life” that those who heed instruction travel. Think about that metaphor for a moment. Paths are meant for walking. But there are paths, and then there are paths.
My wife and I went for a short walk the other day at a park near our house where we had never gone for a walk before. There were several different paths, some paved, some grassy, and some muddy due to the rains we had been having. All the paths were inviting, but I did not want to get muddy, so we stayed away from those paths.
All the paths in the park had been made by people. They were also made broader and deeper from people walking those paths. We may assume that a path is fine, just because others have tramped along it. Not necessarily.
One of the paved paths my wife and I walked down ended at a steel gate that opened upon a main road. As far as we could see, the path did not go on across the road. We retraced our steps. Fortunately, no one had followed our lead.
Whose lead are you following today? Who will follow your lead? We’re all in this thing called Life together.
“The Humility of God”
“You have given me the shield of your salvation,
and your right hand supported me,
and your gentleness made me great.” (Psalm 18:35, English Standard Version)
My pastor preached a sermon on pride this past Sunday. I can’t speak for others, but his sermons almost always give something to think about and act upon for at least the week. That’s about as long as I can concentrate on anything, so I do need to attend church at least once a week.
And then, in my Scripture reading today, I stumbled across this verse in Psalm 18. (Psalm 18 is a royal psalm. It is very similar to 2 Samuel 22.) And in this royal psalm, David proclaims that God’s gentleness has made him great. The word translated “gentleness” is a Hebrew word that is usually translated “humility.” Apparently, most of the translators did not have the courage to speak of God’s humility. God’s humility seems to be an odd concept to introduce in the midst of a psalm which is so filled with God’s power and God’s empowerment of King David. While there are some translational problems here, I suspect that the main problem is that we simply find it difficult to think that the powerful and empowering God could be humble.
A good friend of mine, a Catholic priest, studied for a while in Italy. Since he was already ordained, he was asked to go to small group of nuns, The Sisters of Charity, and celebrate mass occasionally. On two occasions, Mother Teresa of Calcutta was present.
I asked my friend if he was a little nervous during his homily. He said that he couldn’t remember a single thing he had said. But then he added, “But I’ll never forget something Mother Teresa said on the way out of church. She said, ‘You know, I’m now so much impressed with the power of God as I am with His humility.’ ”
When you turn to the New Testament, you find Jesus who was most certainly a great teacher and prophet. Some of us (I among them) believe that he was actually God with skin on, and with skin in the game. He said,
28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30 English Standard Version)
Jesus was a burning, laser-focused point of humility. He called his disciples to follow him, to learn from him, to be like him. It is God’s humility that makes us great. It is also God’s humility that gives us the pattern to follow to help other people to become great.
“Giving Ourselves What We Deserve”
My wife went out to run some errands yesterday. One errand was to return some clothes that did not quite work for her. She called me a couple of hours after she had left, and sounded rather frustrated and apologetic. I don’t remember the exact conversation, but it went something like this. “I haven’t gotten anything done,” she said. “I’ve just wasted time trying on a bunch of clothes. Do you want me just to come home and fix dinner?” She knows that I like to eat dinner early, whereas she doesn’t really care what time she eats.
Now, you must realize that my wife is not a compulsive shopper. Quite the contrary! She buys what she needs if it’s on sale or on the clearance rack, and then makes it last a long, long time.
So, it wasn’t really being a stellar husband for me to be a little nice. “Just go ahead and do your other errands, and we’ll eat whenever you get home.” Even though, given my wife’s nature and style, it wasn’t a big thing for me to be a little kind, it was a big thing for me to do. Hey! Lighten up on me! I’m a beginner at being thoughtful!
So, this morning, I read the following words from Melody Beattie’s book The Language of Letting Go:
“Wednesday, May 8
Giving Ourselves What We Deserve
‘I worked at a good job, making a decent salary. I had been recovering for
years. Each morning, I got into my car and I thanked God for the car. The
heater didn’t work. And the chance of the car not starting was almost as great
as the chance that it would. I just kept suffering through and thanking God.
One day, it occurred to me that there was absolutely no good reason I couldn’t
buy myself a new car – that moment – if I wanted one. I had been gratitudeing
myself into unnecessary deprivation and martyrdom. I bought the new car – that
day.
—Anonymous’ ”
It is good to be grateful for what we have. However, there are times when we deprive ourselves when there is no good reason. This is especially true of us addicts. We know that we don’t dare go for immediate gratification. We know that gratitude for what we have—and even what we don’t have—is extremely important.
However, as addicts, we also tend to turn every good thing into an addiction. Some of us get addicted to deprivation. Perhaps there should be a twelve-step group called “D.A.” This would stand for “Deprivation Anonymous.”
The Apostle Paul has a wonderful little instruction for Timothy, and indeed for all of us. He says,
“17 As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.
18 They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share,
19 thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.” (1 Timothy 6:17-19, English Standard Version)
Yes, we are to trust God. Yes, we are to be generous with others. But did you catch a couple of words at the end of verse 16? Let me highlight them for you. “. . . God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.” Not abuse, not hoard, but enjoy!
I hope that you enjoy your day!
“Of Self-Control and Spontaneity”
My affirmation for the week is as follows:
“Today, by God’s grace and through God’s empowerment, I am welcoming the gift of self-control. I am consistently using that gift for my own well-being, the well-being of others, and for the glory of God.”
My sponsor responded with a thought-provoking, one line reply: “Self control can be spontaneous or a good game plan.”
My reply to my sponsor was as follows:
“That is a good thought, and provokes other good thoughts in my own noggin.
I think that, if self-control is my game plan, and if I work that game plan, then I am positioning myself to be spontaneous.
My wife is an excellent example of that to me. She is one of the most organized, proactive people I’ve ever known. She is also one of the most spontaneous and free-spirited people I’ve ever known.
I used to think that was a strange combination. Now, it makes perfect sense to me.”
I once knew a lady who trained girls—and some courageous boys—in the art of etiquette and the social graces. I had never been that interested in etiquette. I thought it was for sissies and the “refined.” I didn’t want to be a sissy, and I flat-out wasn’t refined.
I once confessed to the lady who trained these young people that I had never really seen the point of training in etiquette. Now that I look back on it, I realize that I was being very insensitive at that point. (If someone said to me, “I don’t see the point of biblical scholarship,” those would be fightin’ words.)
She was very gracious in her response, and did not answer a fool according to his folly.
“If you are at a formal dinner, and you don’t have to think about which fork to use for your salad, that frees you up to relax and have a good conversation with your companions.”
Self-control is indeed a good game plan for getting things done. It is also a good virtue to cultivate if I want to practice the fine art of spontaneity!
DOWN TO EARTH BELIEVER
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- “The Process in Miracles and the Miracle of Process” March 11, 2024“2 Kings 5:1 Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master and in high favor, because by him the LORD had given victory to Syria. He was a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper. 2 Now the Syrians on one of their raids […]
- “The Power of Encouragement—Even for Old People” March 10, 2024“But encourage each other every day while it is ‘today.’ Help each other so none of you will become hardened because sin has tricked you.” (Hebrews 3:13, New Century Version) Yesterday, I was walking at a nearby park. There was a large group of young people some of whom were running while other young people […]
- “Endurance” March 10, 2024“For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised.” (Hebrews 10:36, English Standard Version) “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us […]
- “The Limits of Non-Judgmentalism” February 24, 2024“Matt. 7:1 “Judge not, that you be not judged. Matt. 7:2 For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.” (Matthew 7:1-2, English Standard Version) This morning, in my virtual 12-step meeting, we discussed the topic of judgmentalism. There were many wise […]
- “Delighting in Being Told What to Do?!?” February 23, 2024“Psa. 112:1 Praise the LORD! Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, who greatly delights in his commandments! 2 His offspring will be mighty in the land; the generation of the upright will be blessed. 3 Wealth and riches are in his house, and his righteousness endures […]
- “Character is the Real Lesson” January 19, 2024I am often confused about what lesson I’m really supposed to be learning. For example, this morning I was trying to knock out several Spanish lessons. My intentions were a lot better than my internet connection. I’ve done three lessons. Or rather, I’ve done two lessons. One of them I did twice because the internet […]
- “The Year of Becoming Un-Planked” January 1, 2024Each year, I try to come up with one word or a short phrase for what I intend to work on in the upcoming year. 2024 is “The Year of Becoming Un-Planked”. What?!! What does that even mean? So glad that you asked! Jesus said to his disciples, “Why do you look at the speck […]
- “Searching for the Noble One” December 26, 2023My wife and I were reading Luke, chapter 2 on Christmas Day. Luke 2 talks about the shepherds being told to look for this very special child—in fact, this King—in a stable. I prefer the word “barn”. I grew up on a farm. I know what a barn is. A stable is entirely too biblical […]
- “That Don’t Impress God Much” December 14, 2023DTEB, “That Don’t Impress God Much” “That Don’t Impress Me Much” (Song by Robert John Lange and Shania Twain) Micah 6:8 (MSG) “But he’s already made it plain how to live, what to do, what God is looking for in men and women. It’s quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor, be […]
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