Reblogged from celtic straits:

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I am a mutt, it seems, of mixed-spiritual heritage. I was raised a Methodist in a integrated inner-city church. I became committed to Jesus in a high school Young Life club. I find my theological home in historic Reformed theology, and I am an ordained Presbyterian minister (EPC).  I teach leadership and spiritual formation at an Evangelical seminary.  I love to read the ancient writings of the Church Fathers, most of them Catholics or Orthodox priests.

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The best view of the parade.

After dinner, a man was asked by his children to tell them a story.

“What would you like to hear?” he asked his children.

“A story about a giant!” his youngest son exclaimed.

“Yes. Yes! A big giant!” exclaimed the kids.

After a short pause, the dad began his story.

“Once upon a time there were two small boys who asked their fathers to take them to see the great parade that passed through the village every ten years. The fathers, remembering the parade from when they were boys, quickly agreed, and the next morning the four of them set out together.

“As they approached the parade route, people started to push in from all sides, and the crowd grew thick. When the people along the way became almost a wall, the small boys became pinned in the forest of legs and backs.  So each father lifted his son and placed him on his shoulders.

“Soon the parade began and as it passed, one boy was so caught in the moment that he forgot his father completely, except for a shouted complaint every few minutes: “Lift me higher, higher, higher, so I can see.” The father, loving his son, strained his muscles upward, struggling to give his young son the best view.  The son hardly noticed. “Higher!” he cried.

The other boy, too, watched the parade from his father’s shoulders. But this boy kept telling his father how wonderful it was and how spectacular were the colors and images. He shared his perspective with his father, describing in detail every band uniform, every float, and every clown. The father, blocked from seeing by the press of people, smiled and took in each word of his son. In his mind, he remembered the parade he had once watched as a boy. “Oh, Father, Thank you!” the boy said. ‘If only you could see what I see.’

With a smile, the father answered, “I can see it fine, my son.”

The family had been listening to the story with rapt attention. Then, as if he had finished the story, the man stopped speaking.

“Is that it?” said a disappointed girl. “We thought you were going to tell us a story about a giant.”

“But I did,” said the dad. “I told you a story about a giant.”

“We didn’t hear about a giant,” squealed the children.

The dad answered, “One boy in the story was a giant.”

“Which boy?” asked one son. “Maybe one was taller,” replied his brother.

“A giant,” said the dad, “is anyone who remembers we are all sitting on someone else’s shoulders. And that what we have in front of us is really a gift given to us from another.”

“And what does it make us if we don’t remember?” asked the youngest boy.

“A burden,” answered the dad.

God has brought down the high from their thrones, but has lifted up the humble. (Luke 1:52)

Enhanced from a story by Steve Moore, “A Graceful Goodbye” Leadership (Summer 2002), pp.41-42

As one victim of the Aurora theater shooting, Petra’s miracle story has been an incredible one. Over 1.6 million people have read the blog post. From nearly all places on the planet, we have received kind notes and encouragements. Many people have graciously donated. Most importantly, people have been praying for Petra and all the victims of the shooting.  Please continue beseeching the Heavenly Father to bring more and more good from this evil night, and to help heal those families who suffered great loss. As Christians, we do believe God answers prayers.

Over and over, people have asked me to blog updates on Petra. Many of these updates are now at the bottom of the original story, but all are collected here, too. I have laid them out in their order of appearance. Thank you for your participation in our lives, across miles and oceans. We could not do it without you.

The Ultimate Journey

July 24th, 2012:  Petra was moved from ICU yesterday. She continues to improve. Please keep praying.

July 26th, 2012: Petra is recovering well today, although she is still very weak and unsettled. She is talking with us, moving about a bit, and even eating some. Thank you for your prayers and support.

Medical update. As well, the neurosurgeons involved have reviewed post-surgery MRI brain scans, and clarified Petra’s injury to the family. The channel was not a “defect,” as we originally understood it to be. As the family understands it now, it is more of a fluid-filled pocket which starts right where the bullet entered Petra’s brain.  Everyone has these channels, it seems, in random places. According to her doctors, the miracle is not that Petra’s brain was different from others, or deformed. The miracle is that the bullet hit Petra exactly where this fluid pocket occurred in her brain, and then traveled a journey through her brain missing all the vital areas. With the family’s permission, one of Petra’s doctors, Dr. Michael Rauzzino, was interviewed for NBC News today:

“If the pellet had wavered a millimeter, really in any direction from what it actually took, then she would have likely either died or been severely injured. I would say this is definitely a miracle…It would be hard to create a path similar to this where it goes all the way from the front to the back and misses every single blood vessel, doesn’t bother any of the major structures, and leaves her able to talk and move everything and not be paralyzed or dead. Never in my entire career have I seen a case where a bullet has traversed the entire brain like this and not caused severe damage or death.”

(For the full story by Amanda Leitsinger, you can go to “Shotgun pellet’s ‘miracle’ path spared Aurora victim’s life” at  NBCNews.com.)

July 28th, 2012:  It is hard for us to believe it was only eight days ago that Petra had two brain surgeries after being shot in the head. For the family, it has been a blur, like trying to see faces in the windows of a train passing by at high speed. Or trying to stand in the center of a playground merry-go-round, with people spinning it faster and faster. In the blur, one thing remains clear: we have been blessed. We have been taken care of by wonderful medical personnel at the Hospital. We have found friends all over the world interceding for us. Yesterday afternoon, a week after being admitted, Petra was released from the hospital to go to a rehab hospital. Unbelievable. We are rejoicing. Still, Petra is weak, and has much healing ahead. But she is anxious to get her life back on track, and to move ahead. Please keep her in your prayers.

August 1, 2012:Petra has been doing very well in the rehab hospital. She is learning to move and think again. We are proud of her dedication, and her desire to get on with her life. She listens to her music, and has even been surprised by her boyfriend playing his clarinet for her. One newspaper reporter wrote:

“Each morning for the past few days, Austin Hogan has carefully pulled out his clarinet, put in a reed and played music in the hospital room. His audience, lying on her back, is quiet and lets it wash over her. The first day he did it, Hogan played something from Mozart. The next day, she asked for something faster. For Petra Anderson — whose survival is nothing short of a miracle, says her doctor — the music delivers something the tubes snaking into her arm from the IV drip simply can’t. It feeds her soul.”

(For the full story from David Montero, Salt Lake Tribune, go to, “Petra’s story: Aurora victim survives thanks to a ‘miracle’”).

The family surrounds Petra with love, and the prayers of thousands carry her along. Some day soon she might even get to go home to her own room, her own bed, her own refrigerator.  What a day that will be. Thank you for traveling this journey with her. As well, at Petra’s and the family’s urging, Kim is now out of state for a few days, receiving chemo therapy in hopes of extending her life with her family. It is a difficult, trying, process. She deeply appreciates your prayers.

August 18, 2012: Petra was released from the rehab hospital this week, and has moved back home. After two brain surgeries, her quick recovery has been beyond belief!  Thank you for your prayers! Petra was even at church Sunday, a joyous occasion! Her dear  mother, Kim, has been in Houston for several weeks, trying to beat or delay the cancer. It has been an extremely difficult battle. She can use your prayers. We are very thankful to the special friends and churches in Houston that have come alongside her. You rock! She is excited to come home to see Petra and her family. We hope and pray it is soon.

August 21, 2012: Petra and her family flew last night down to Houston. Petra is healing well, but Kim, Petra’s mom, has taken a turn for the worse. The flight back to Denver may be replaced by a quicker flight over a greater distance: the journey from Earth to Heaven. Kim’s cancer-filled body is about to die.

We trust God in all of this, and we are thankful that God gave Kim a chance to help care for and heal her little girl. Throughout Petra’s ordeal, Kim has been the kind of loving parent we all desire to have and to be. We gather with sadness but unshaken faith. Death is no one’s friend, but it has no power over the spirit set free by Christ. Death becomes simply a doorway to a new place where intimacy with God and others is as natural as breathing.  Soon, Kim will be released to be as she was designed to be. We ask you to pray for the family, and ask the Father that the short time they have together will be rich and joyous.

August 28, 2012: Sunday night, Kim Anderson, Petra’s mom, went to be with the Lord. Her passing was gentle, and she was surrounded by family and friends. Her family will return home tonight from Houston, and a service is planned at her church, Cherry Creek Presbyterian Church, in Englewood, Colorado, at 11 am on September 8th. Kim expended the last weeks of her life supporting her daughter Petra, and the rest of her family. It has been a time of reflection, perseverance, and surprised blessing. Kim told me it has been like walking along a road after running out of gas in the mountains, and then noticing a silvery lake just off the road, reflecting the sunset. While you might wish you had never run out of gas, you are actually thankful, for you know you would have driven by so quickly that you would have missed the beauty. Thank you for praying for and loving this special family.

Sometimes the journey is filled with surprises…

Remember dances in the gym?

Today, I am afraid of my blog.

Blogging is, by its nature, both a mirror and a temptation. Why? Because in almost every instance, blogging is primarily self-focused. We write about what we see, and feel, and like. While we include interplay about God and children and puppies and the Grand Canyon, it is of our experience about our own world that we write. Blogging subtly centers on me. It is the design of the brute. Think about it. If no one reads our blog, we feel saddened that more people don’t know us. If many people read our posts, we begin to feel like we have significant wisdom and influence. Our value is tethered to the wispy balloon of stats and notifications. If the comments are good, we smile. If they disagree, we want to craft such a witty or wise response that the whole world stills for a moment and looks on admiringly. We write and rewrite. Read and reread. Blogging is a seductress.

Under a cheap mirror-ball, Blogging dresses in clingy spandex and approaches, beguiling me with long eyelashes over a sweet smile. The Most-Popular-One sweeps in to summon me for a dance. My pimpled soul swells with pride as it stares, teenager-like, at the gym floor. Me? Ah, sure. My date, Humility, is in the washroom right now, it seems. I am led away by the hand, trailing undone laces from my both my tennis shoes and my brain.

The Breakfast Club

Perhaps because I am such a wall-flower, God has been teaching me about humility recently. In Hebrew, humility is anawa. In Greek, it is tapeinos. Both mean, “low to the ground.” In my life, I think about it as “to be brought low,”as in “planting your face,” or “crashing and burning.” I am, most reluctantly, being trained to dance by Humility. Like I’m trapped in a clip of The Breakfast Club,one example from a few months ago is caught in the DVR play cycle of my mind. I remember it clearly.

I am walking down the main hall of my church with one of my pastoral teammates. We are coming from a tortuous afternoon meeting, and my low blood sugar is intersecting my mental fatigue. I am stoically mentioning (read, ‘whining about’) how I wish I could sneak a short nap. At that moment, I notice a young family sitting at the other end of the hallway. A father is guarding his toddler’s exploring circle-stagger. And a mother, too, sitting and holding a sleeping infant in her arms. Very picturesque. Currier and Ives stuff, featuring the Madonna and child. I insert myself in the postcard, of course, as the Christmas carols cue. From down the hall, I cry out to the family in a stage whisper, clearly but gently, so as to not wake the sleeping baby. I enunciate every word: “That’s—what—I—need!”

A few steps closer and I can now see the parents’ faces, vividly painted crimson in embarrassment or horror. Only then do I notice that the baby isn’t really napping. Cradled in a large blanket, he is quietly nursing.

Echo: “That’s what I need.” Humility. The feeling of being brought low. Reminiscent of the dark days following the crash of a prehistoric asteroid, my dignity becomes extinct. Picture me for the next few minutes, waist deep in the tar pits, explaining, apologizing, groveling, and dying. An Ice Age dawns. The toddler, now somehow steady and stalking, circles me like a saber-tooth tiger on a dodo bird. And the baby keeps on, well, eating, but to my ears there is now an accusing sound. As if to say, “Mine!” I remember thinking, “So sad. I really loved being a Pastor here.” Finally, the young father speaks, thankfully with a grin and a twinkle, “We’re fine, Pastor Brad. We think it’s funny. Now just walk away. Please.” Humility.

“Back off! Mine!”

Life is not really about me. God has a perfect sense of humor and a dedicated command of his purposes for me. Humility is your date, Brad. Are you counting blog hits again? God presses the mic button. Run the nursing baby clip again, Gabriel.

Shooting Victim Petra Anderson

(Updates follow article)

At Columbine, I have seen this before. But not up close.  As a church pastor in Denver, I have worked as a chaplain alongside several police and fire departments. I was privileged to counsel parents just hours after the Littleton Columbine shootings. However, in this new tragedy at the Aurora Theater Dark Night shooting, one of the victims was a 22-year-old woman from my church, Petra Anderson (pronounced Pay-tra). Petra went to the movies with two young friends who are biking across America.  You and I have been inundated with news about what happened next. A joyful movie turned into bloody, unbelievable chaos. Petra was hit four times with a shot-gun blast, three shots into her arm and one bullet which entered her brain. This a bit of Petra’s miracle story.

With awesome people from our caring and pastoral team, I spent all day Friday in the ICU with Petra and her family. Her injuries were severe, and her condition was critical. A bullet had entered Petra’s face through her nose, and then traveled up through her brain until stopping at the back of her skull. The doctors prior to surgery were concerned, because so much of the brain had been traversed by the bullet. Many areas of brain function were involved. They were hoping to keep her alive long enough to get her into surgery. The prognosis was uncertain—if she lived, Petra might struggle with speech, movement, and thinking due to considerable brain damage. With Kim, Petra’s mother (who is in the final stages of terminal cancer), we simply cried, hugged, and prayed.

It is pressed into my memory now. Motion and emotion…

Other families come and go into the ICU waiting room. Some sit with us, and we talk. Others are visited by doctors with “Family Advocates” in tow. The families listen, sob, and then are moved like stunned cattle to a more private space to grieve. We pray. Petra is finally taken into surgery, using two different surgical teams. One team of neurosurgeons will open up the back of her skull to remove the bullet and clean up brain damage as best they can. Another ENT-specialty surgical team will then work through Petra’s nose by scope to follow the bullet’s path up into her brain.  Their hope is to remove bone fragments, clean up damaged brain tissue, and reseal her brain to reduce infection.

If you have lived any of your days in a hospital waiting room, you know how long the enduring process is. It has a woeful pattern to it. Sit. Walk. Grab a drink. Sit. Walk. Answer a phone call. Sit. Walk. Hug someone. Sit. Talk to the FBI. Sit. Pick at the food. Sit. Walk. Go down the hall, but not too far because you’re afraid to miss something. Back. Hug. Pray. Sit. Sit. A picture of a five-year old waiting for next Christmas from January 1^st comes to my mind. FOREVER. Only this feels worse: a heavy forever, with no promise of presents, Santa, or good news at the end.

Petra Anderson and her world class violin.

After the waiting drags for over five hours, tired doctors and nurses spill back into the room, one or two at a time. I look for “Family Advocates” but can find none. I exhale. The doctors update us: “It went well, and she’s recovering now. We found very little damage to the brain, and got the bullet out cleanly. It went better than we hoped for.” Each brings a warrior’s smile, and a bit of information—information that we turn into hope as we regurgitate it over the next hours.  Still, the medical team remains professional and reserved, “Something might still go wrong. We just need to wait and see if she makes it for the next 48 hours.”

Tears and thank you’s abound. We are so thankful for these men and women. We hug. Everyone hugs. Then, round two. Sit. Wait. Pray. Fully dressed people cuddle into small snails and try to sleep on the floor. Some are shuttled to a room donated by the Holiday Inn across the street. Thank you, Lord, for every little thing. We sit. We pray. “We’ll understand better tomorrow.”

Petra is moved back to ICU. She looks, surprisingly, wonderful. With a small hole in her nose, and her arm wrapped, she almost looks uninjured. She is medicated and sleeping when I come to visit her on Saturday. I sit, talk, and pray quietly with Kim amid the darkened room, lit by glowing medical screens and power switches. Nurses, like quiet soldiers posted on guard, come in, march attentively through the machines, and go out.  These men and women really care. Finally, one of the surgeons comes in to check on Petra. He has had some sleep, and looks more like a movie star this time. As Petra sleeps, he retells the story of the surgery, and we ask questions.  The doctor reads the perfect script, as if he is on Hallmark Hall of Fame. He fills us in on the miracle. Honestly, he doesn’t call it that, he just uses words like “happily” and “wonderfully” and “in a very fortunate way” and “luckily” and “we were really surprised by that.”  Kim and I know a miracle when we see it.

It seems as if the bullet traveled through Petra’s brain without hitting any significant brain areas. The doctor explains that Petra’s brain has a small “fluid pocket” in it. In our non-medical minds, it is a tiny route of fluid running through her skull, like a tiny vein through marble, winding from front to rear.  Only a CAT scan would catch it, and Petra would have never noticed it. It seems many people have these places in their brains, in random places.

But what is significant is that in Petra’s case, the shotgun buck shot, maybe even the size used for deer hunting, enters her brain from the exact point of this channel. The bullet is channeled  from Petra’s nose through her brain. It turns slightly, and comes to rest at the rear of her brain. And in the process, the bullet misses all the vital areas of the brain. In many ways, it almost misses the brain itself, doing very little damage.  Not exactly, but like a giant BB though a straw created in Petra’s brain before she was born, it follows the perfect route. The bullet moves in the least harmful way. A millimeter in any direction and the the brain is destroyed. Evil wins a round. (Medical update at the end, below)

As he shares, the doctor seems taken aback. It is an odd thing to have a surgeon show a bit of wonder. Professionally, these guys own the universe, it seems, and take everything in stride. He is obviously gifted as a surgeon, and is kind in his manner. “It couldn’t have gone better. If it were my daughter,” he says quietly, glancing around to see if any of his colleagues might be watching him, “I’d be ecstatic. I’d be dancing a jig.” He smiles. I can’t keep my smile back, or the tears of joy. In Christianity we call it prevenient grace: God working ahead of time for a particular event in the future. It’s just like the God I follow to plan the route of a bullet through a brain long before Batman ever rises. Twenty-two years before.

While we’re talking, Petra awakes. She opens her eyes, and sits up, “Mom.” Movie-star doctor spins to grab her, to protect her from falling. The nurse assures him she’s been doing this for a while. He talks to her, and she talks back. He asks questions, and Petra has the right answers. “Where do you hurt, Petra?” “All over.” Amazed, but professional, he smiles and leaves the set shaking his head. I am so thankful for this man.

Petra is groggy and beat up, but she is herself. Honestly, I look worse before my morning coffee. “I’m thirsty,” she proclaims.

“You want an ice cube, honey?” Kim replies.

“Please.”  Wow. She lays down, back to sleep, a living miracle who doesn’t even know it yet. Good flowering out of the refuse pile of a truly dark night. “Thank you, Jesus,” I whisper.

Petra, you are amazing. Kim, you, too, are amazing. I am so proud of you both. But God, you are in a league of your own. (Duh.)

There is much ahead. More surgery. Facial reconstruction, perhaps. And for Kim, chemo therapy to stretch every moment out of life. But life remains.The ending is yet to be written for this family. One final note: I am told Petra will take her first steps today. Time for the miracle to go for a walk.

Kim and Petra need our help. For more on the Andersons, or to help with their medical costs, please visit here. This is a great site.

Author’s Update #6 (8/21/12, 14:22: Petra and her family flew last night down to Houston. Petra is healing well, but Kim, Petra’s mom, has taken a turn for the worse. The flight back to Denver may be replace by a quicker flight over a greater distance: the journey from Earth to Heaven. Kim’s cancer-filled body is about to die.

We trust God in all of this, and we are thankful that God gave Kim a chance to help care for and heal her little girl. Throughout Petra’s ordeal, Kim has been the kind of loving parent we all desire to have and to be. We gather with sadness but unshaken faith. Death is no one’s friend, but it has no power over the spirit set free by Christ. Death becomes simply a doorway to a new place where intimacy with God and others is as natural as breathing.  Soon, Kim will be released to be as she was designed to be. We ask you to pray for the family, and ask the Father that the short time they have together will be rich and joyous.

Author’s Update #5 (8/18/12, 9:47): Petra was released from the rehab hospital this week, and has moved back home. After two brain surgeries, her quick recovery has been beyond belief!  Thank you for your prayers! Petra was even at church Sunday, a joyous occasion! Her dear  mother, Kim, has been in Houston for several weeks, trying to beat or delay the cancer. It has been an extremely difficult battle. She can use your prayers. We are very thankful to the special friends and churches in Houston that have come alongside her. You rock! She is excited to come home to see Petra and her family. We hope and pray it is soon.

Author’s Update #4 (8/1/12, 16:34):Petra has been doing very well in the rehab hospital. She is learning to move and think again. Her memory still responds slowly. We are proud of her dedication, and her desire to get on with her life. She listens to her music, and has even been surprised by her boyfriend playing his clarinet for her. One newspaper reporter wrote:

“Each morning for the past few days, Austin Hogan has carefully pulled out his clarinet, put in a reed and played music in the hospital room. His audience, lying on her back, is quiet and lets it wash over her. The first day he did it, Hogan played something from Mozart. The next day, she asked for something faster. For Petra Anderson — whose survival is nothing short of a miracle, says her doctor — the music delivers something the tubes snaking into her arm from the IV drip simply can’t. It feeds her soul.”

(For the full story from David Montero, Salt Lake Tribune, go to, “Petra’s story: Aurora victim survives thanks to a ‘miracle’”).

The family surrounds Petra with love, and the prayers of thousands carry her along. Some day soon she might even get to go home to her own room, her own bed, her own refrigerator.  What a day that will be. Thank you for traveling this journey with her. As well, at Petra’s and the family’s urging, Kim is now out of state for a few days, receiving chemo therapy in hopes of extending her life with her family. We pray that it is powerful and effective. This medical process is a difficult and trying ascent for Kim, who is already weary. She deeply appreciates your prayers.

Author’s update #3 (7/28/12, 9:30): Petra update: It is hard for us to believe it was only eight days ago that Petra had two brain surgeries after being shot in the head. For the family, it has been a blur, like trying to see faces in the windows of a train passing by at high speed. Or trying to stand in the center of a playground merry-go-round, with people spinning it faster and faster. In the blur, one thing remains clear: we have been blessed. We have been taken care of by wonderful medical personnel at the Hospital. We have found friends all over the world interceding for us. Yesterday afternoon, a week after being admitted, Petra was released from the hospital to go to a rehab hospital. Unbelievable. We are rejoicing. Still, Petra is weak, and has much healing ahead. But she is anxious to get her life back on track, and to move ahead. Please keep her in your prayers.

Author’s Update#2 (7/26/12, 13:40): Petra is recovering well today, although she is still very weak and unsettled. She is talking with us, moving about a bit, and even eating some. Thank you for your prayers and support.

Medical update. As well, the neurosurgeons involved have reviewed post-surgery MRI brain scans, and clarified Petra’s injury to the family. The channel was not a “defect,” as we originally understood it to be. As the family understands it now, it is more of a fluid-filled pocket which starts right where the bullet entered Petra’s brain.  Everyone has these channels, it seems, in random places. According to her doctors, the miracle is not that Petra’s brain was different than others, or deformed. The miracle is that the bullet hit Petra exactly where this fluid pocket occurred in her brain, and then traveled a journey through her brain missing all the vital areas. With the family’s permission, one of Petra’s doctors, Dr. Michael Rauzzino, was interviewed for NBC News today:

“If the pellet had wavered a millimeter, really in any direction from what it actually took, then she would have likely either died or been severely injured. I would say this is definitely a miracle…It would be hard to create a path similar to this where it goes all the way from the front to the back and misses every single blood vessel, doesn’t bother any of the major structures, and leaves her able to talk and move everything and not be paralyzed or dead. Never in my entire career have I seen a case where a bullet has traversed the entire brain like this and not caused severe damage or death.”

For the full story by Amanda Leitsinger, you can go to “Shotgun pellet’s ‘miracle’ path spared Aurora victim’s life” at  NBCNews.com.

With each new day, the learning continues for us. As we find out more, we will continue these updates.

Author’s Update #1 (7/24/12, 13:26):  Petra was moved from ICU yesterday. She continues to improve. Please keep praying. Far less importantly, the Comment section has been closed. Why? Since this web site went up Sunday afternoon, the amount of traffic has gone viral, averaging about 71,000 hits per hour. This means that the comments traffic has been overwhelming, and beyond our ability to keep up with.  By far, most comments have been wonderful and supportive. God bless you all. All kinds of ideas and thoughts have been posted: thankful, angry, sad, questioning, amazed, rude, kind, and insightful. The world is filled with people who see this tragic event from different perspectives. I am thankful for all of you who commented, whether you agreed with my world view and faith perspective or not. We have been forced to think and reflect–a very good thing.  I hope the dialogue continues in other venues.- Brad

More information about supporting Petra Anderson and other shooting victims is also available at Hope Rises:

The Early Discovery of Hawaii by Captain James Cook.
Image courtesy of the Hawaiian State Historical Society, found on http://www.jamesandeverett.com/whatscooking/.

I’m on vacation right now in Maui, Hawaii, a beautiful collision of green and blue, mist and breeze. This morning, I’ve been reading about Hawaii’s history and back-ground. In this paradise of the Pacific on a bright sunny morning with sailboats dancing in the distance, I find I am wistful and heartsick.

When I feel this way, I write. Today I write about the Fall of mankind in Hawaii, remembering a Bible passage about wanting more, but getting less:

The serpent told the Woman, “You won’t die. God knows that the moment you eat from that tree, you’ll see what’s really going on. You’ll be just like God, knowing everything, ranging all the way from good to evil.”

When the Woman saw that the tree looked like good eating and realized what she would get out of it — she’d know everything! — she took and ate the fruit and then gave some to her husband, and he ate. Immediately the two of them did “see what’s really going on” — they saw themselves naked! Ashamed, they sewed fig leaves together as makeshift clothes for themselves.

When they heard the sound of God strolling in the garden in the evening breeze, the Man and his Wife hid in the trees of the garden, hid from God.  (Book of Genesis 3:4-8)

In 1777, Hawai’i’s people lived in the most sophisticated society in Polynesia. They were seafarers, and had explored the entire Pacific Ocean to Alaska with simply their knowledge of the sea and stars. On land, they were excellent farmers, developing 200 varieties of sweet potatoes and taro in well watered, engineered-irrigation fields. Hunger was unknown. They were well dressed, and known for the fine woven bark cloth they produced. They excelled in music, art, and dance. There was virtually no sickness or disease, and had been none for almost 600 years. Imagine–no one ever getting sick or dying of an illness! Hawaiians were a strong, healthy people, about 500,000 to 800,000 in number, living in a Garden-of-Eden-like land.

One year later, in 1778, Captain James Cook arrived with his British sailors. He brought with him western ideas, western lifestyles, and many new things. Reports say that the Hawaiians welcomed the tall ships, with their gold, exotic foods, and fancy cloth. A party began, full of love and hope. The British were respectful of the Hawaiians at first, desiring to find new trade partners and a way-station to other ports. And for the natives, how easy it must have been to be swayed: Look at this unknown wealth! We have so much to gain, a larger world, a broader way of life! Now we shall really live! Everything lies ahead!

Sadly, Cook’s party and the whaling ships which followed brought more than western treasures. They also brought western diseases. In less than 50 years, most of the Hawaiian population would die of disease, and those remaining would become impoverished. In one generation, the skills of Polynesian culture were gone, the understanding of farming lost, and the simple ways extinct. No one could make Hawaiian cloth, so most natives could be found clothed in tattered, cast off clothes from sailors. Eventually, the Hawaiians revolted and killed Captain Cook, but without removing the flotsam and jetsam of “more.” The damage of the Fall cannot be rewound.

In this real life parable, honestly, I’m not sure who the villains are, exactly. Most of the players were simply well-meaning “explorers.” Both the English and the Hawaiians were looking for new places, new options, new ideas, new opportunities, new power, and new thinking. New becomes heroin sometimes. It precludes sound thinking, wisdom and foresight. Boredom has become the enemy. Progress beckons. While change can be great, our hunger presses us too much. A Joni Mitchell song echoes: “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til its gone. They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.”   I was born in Hawaii, and love these islands, but the lesson seems deeper for me. There seems to be a heart-tug about contentment here. About thankfulness. NEW, BETTER, MORE–all can cost a lot more than we know.

Hawaii has more endangered species of plant and animal life than any other place on earth. Workers had to be imported from Japan and South America to work the land. Many Hawaiians gained a deep Christian faith, but without any sense of real history or daily hope. By 1840, there were less than 80,000 Hawaiian left on the islands. By 1920, less than 24,000 native Hawaiian could be found. Foreign companies own over 90 percent of the land.  Today Hawaiians have the shortest life expectancy of any group, the highest rates of cancer, heart disease, stroke, and diabetes, the lowest median family income, the highest incarceration rate, highest infant mortality rate, the highest high school drop-out rate in the United States. Progress has come. Wanting more, they have gained, and lost. [1]

“So God expelled them from the Garden of Eden and sent them to work the ground, the same dirt out of which they’d been made. He threw them out of the garden and stationed angel-cherubim and a revolving sword of fire east of it, guarding the path to the Tree-of-Life.” (Book of Genesis 3:23-24)

Finding the Garden of Eden on the road to Hana, Maui.
Photo from http://www.travelbugster.com by Dave Morgan.

 

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[1] From M.J. Harden, Voices of Wisdom: Hawaiian Elders Speak (Aka Press, 1999).

Eagle separation from Columbia

At 2:12 PM (ET) on July 20, 1969, astronaut Mike Collins triggered the springs that pushed two spacecraft apart. “Beautiful,” he exclaimed as he peered through the window of the Command Module, Columbia. Apollo 11 Mission Commander Neil Armstrong rotated the Eagle, giving Collins a good look at the lunar module.

“You’re looking good,” Collins confirmed.

“Roger,” Armstrong responded. “The Eagle has wings.”

With lunar module pilot Buzz Aldrin aboard as well, Armstrong said simply, “See you later,” and headed for the moon’s surface. After aeons of humanity staring into the night sky and dreaming, today was to be the first time human beings would set foot on the moon.

The Eagle’s sixty-two mile journey toward the moon’s surface was to take about two hours. On the decent, emergency alarms began to ring. An emergency code appeared on all their screens: “1201. 1201.1201.” Searching the nearby notebooks, Mission Control discovered the problem. The guidance computer was overloaded, and struggling to keep up. The Eagle was approaching the moon for a landing, but it was not decelerating as it should, and was traveling too fast.  But should they abort? How serious was a 1201?

After some discussion, the CapCom in Houston, Charlie Duke, radioed, “Still a go for landing.” Eleven times the alarm bells rang.  Eleven times the Eagle was given a go. But Houston was growing nervous. Something was going wrong with the Eagle’s guidance computer system at the most critical point in the mission. “1201. 1201. 1201.”

The astronauts aboard the lunar module showed no panic. But they were distracted. Armstrong was searching the lunar landscape for a suitable place to land the Eagle, and his concentration was interrupted repeatedly by the shrill alarms. “1201. 1201. 1201.” Now, as they approached five hundred feet over the moon, he didn’t like what he saw. The over-loaded guidance and navigation system was flying the Eagle toward a crater filled by immense boulders. He thought if he could stop the module just short of the crater, they would be all right. But it soon became obvious that they wouldn’t be able to stop in time to avoid a potentially disastrous impact with one of the threatening boulders.”1201.” A decision had to be made.

In opposition to protocol, Armstrong reverted to being a test pilot. He took control of the Eagle and flew it manually, as if he were flying a helicopter, looking to “land long,” in a pilot’s vocabulary. At that point, the module was pitched slightly forward. Armstrong brought it fully upright to slow its rate of descent. As Aldrin called out various readings of their altitude and velocity, Armstrong—standing, peering out of a small triangular window, gripping the hand controllers—scanned the surface for a safe place to land. For agonizing minutes, he could not find one. But the experience and steady calm of the pilot and his hours of training made him well suited to the challenge.

Apollo 11 Launch Control

In Houston, they didn’t know what was happening. Their computers told them that Armstrong had assumed manual command from the guidance computer. But they didn’t know about the crater. And they didn’t know why the Eagle hadn’t landed. All they could hear was Buzz Aldrin reading out numbers of altitude.There was a calmness in his voice. From the sensors attached to the astronauts’ bodies, they could see that Armstrong’s heart was racing at 156 beats per minute, twice its normal rate. And there was that persistent, “1201. 1201. 1201.”

Houston also knew that the Eagle was nearly out of fuel. At 260 feet, Aldrin glimpsed the Eagle’s shadow. Between 200 and 160 feet, Armstrong saw where he wanted to land, just past another smaller crater. A little below 100 feet, however, their engine blast began to kick up clouds of lunar dust that obscured surface visibility. At 75 feet, Duke told the astronauts they had sixty seconds of fuel remaining. Fully occupied with flying the module, the astronauts did not radio any response, and everyone in Houston was becoming seriously worried.

With still no idea what Armstrong and Aldrin were doing, Flight Director Gene Kranz told Duke to remind them that “there ain’t no gas stations on the moon.” Duke informed them that they had thirty seconds before their fuel was exhausted. Again, no response, just Aldrin continuing to report the numbers: “Forty feet, down two and a half. Picking up some dust. Thirty feet, two and a half down. . . . Four forward, four forward. Drifting to the right a little.”

“1201. 1201. 1201.”

You could hear a feather drop,” Kranz said. He and everyone else at Mission Control knew that, for the time being, they were no longer part of the decision making for Apollo 11. Neil Armstrong had assumed sole authority for landing the Eagle. Houston, in a state of unbearable anxiety, waited to learn if he had made the right decisions, mission critical decisions made on the spot  in the middle of a crisis. Life or death teeters at the fulcrum.

At fifty feet from the moon’s surface, it was too late to abort. Still, Armstrong hadn’t reached a safe place to land. But at this point, Armstrong believed the Eagle was close enough to survive even a crash landing intact. “I knew we were getting short. I knew we had to get it on the ground. . . . But I wasn’t panic-stricken about the fuel. I had faith.”

As he slowed the module’s descent, the swirling dust confused his perception of depth and speed. The Eagle began to drift first backward and then sideways, as a frustrated Armstrong pumped the hand controllers to correct it. The poor visibility, as well as the worry over the nearly exhausted fuel, made it as stressful a landing as most pilots could bear.

Armstrong was so intent on his job, he didn’t hear Aldrin report that the light signaling contact with the surface had flashed on, with fifteen seconds of fuel left. And he had settled the Eagle down so gently that he hadn’t felt it make contact with the moon. He intended to kill the engine at contact to prevent pressure from its exhaust from damaging the module. As soon as he realized a moment later that he had managed to land the Eagle safely, he shut off the engine. In Houston, the controllers, to their intense relief, had heard Aldrin affirm contact and state “engines stop.” Almost as if he were querying the astronauts, Charlie Duke radioed, “We copy you down, Eagle?”

Tranquility Base

A second later, Armstrong announced, “Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.”

“Tranquility Base.” Never before had the term been used, even in training.  “Roger, Tranquility,” a surprised and delighted Duke responded. “You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We’re breathing again. Thanks a lot.”

A wonderful true story, with a quick application. Many times in our lives, we are forced to make tough decisions. Sometimes these decisions are so key that they affect our  lives and futures deeply.  At these times, when we wish we could pause and think, we are often overloaded and under stress. Time presses. Blood pressure rises. Normal guidance feels like its failing. “1201.1201.1201!” The alarm bleats in our souls and minds. Dust kicks up, and the smooth places seem obscured.

At that moment, how do you handle the mission critical decisions?What do you do with your 1201?

Armstrong fell back on four things, which allowed the mission and the lives of the astronauts to be saved:

• focus (learning to put first things first)
• training (disciplined preparing beforehand for future events or crises)
• team-work (utilizing and trusting others to help you succeed)
• faith (a deep sense that all of this will work out, with God’s help)

So, let me ask:  What do you need to focus on right now? How are you training? How is your team? How is your faith?

Few know that on the morning of July 20, Aldrin radioed, “Houston, this is Eagle. This is the LM pilot speaking. I would like to invite each person listening in, whoever or wherever he may be, to contemplate for a moment the events of the last few hours, and give thanks in his own individual way.” Privately, he took Communion and read from Scripture, “I am the vine, and you are the branches. Whosoever abides in me will bring forth much fruit.” Reflecting on this event sometime later, he said, “It was interesting for me to think: the very first liquid ever poured on the Moon, and the very first food eaten there, were the Communion elements.”

“1201.” It seems a part of modern life. For many of us, the hours of our days seem pressed by emergency codes.  We’re searching for our own Tranquility Base. Mission critical decisions need to be made, and soon.  Normal guidance systems seemed to have failed. For me, trust is the answer.

Trust your preparation.  Trust others.  Trust God.

Aldrin, Eagle, and Earthrise

Edited and sourced from Salter, Mark (2007). “Hard Call: Great Decisions and the Extraordinary People Who Made Them”

One thing I really like is that Gibbs lives by a set of “rules” developed over time in the classroom of life. Gibbs’ rules originated from his first wife, Shannon, who told him on their first date, “Everyone needs a code they can live by.” Years later, Gibbs began writing his rules down, keeping them in a small tin inside his home.  A long list, he numbers them, and often refers to them only by number. Some of my favorites:

• Rule #5: “You don’t waste good beer.”
• Rule # 15: “Always work as a team.”
• Rule #39: “There is no such thing as coincidence.”
• And Rule #51: “Sometimes you’re wrong.”

OK, so I’m not Leroy Jethro Gibbs.  Not even close. But I honor the character, and the character of the character.  I, too, have a set of rules to govern my life.  Forged bit-by-bit over many years, and coalescing from wise mentors, amazing joys, difficult struggles, bad choices, and travels around the world, these are my compass for humbly answering, “How does one live a worthy, happy life?” These are my Code for living well.

STRAIT’S RULES FOR LIVING WELL

• Rule 1: God is good, and in charge.

• Rule 2: Everything in life is subject to change  but rule one. 

• Rule 3: When rule 2 is in operation, God is glorified when we remember rule 1. 

I am seeking to be joyful, mystical, and Jesus-centered.  God does all things well. Mystical is a word which speaks to my openness for God to surprise me, even when it doesn’t seem at first as if he is doing all things well. ”Jesus-centered” speaks to my deep desire to follow my Lord, who has good things planned for those who seek him. – BRS

• Rule 4: Always tell the truth, especially to yourself.

Jesus believed that the truth was what set people free. But truth can be hard to swallow. We all want to be better than we are, and sometimes we even pretend to be what we are not. “Fake it ’til you make it,” is the mantra of our culture.  In contrast, I am sold out to authenticity, transparency, candor, and vulnerability. These forms of honesty always reveal the pathway to freedom and blessing.  A starting place for all of us should be: “As best I know, what’s the truth?” -BRS

• Rule 5: Growing and dying are the only options. Choose.

I am a gardener, both with people and plants. I like to tend, nourish, and just hang around growing things. I want to grow myself. And I want to help others grow. -BRS

• Rule 6: Live in the now.

• Corollary A to Rule 6: Now is all we have, but tomorrow may joyfully surprise you when it arrives and becomes now.

My heartbeat is to be “incarnational” and fully present in every moment of life, as Jesus was. He was often interrupted on his journey, and yet seemed to always have time for people. I believe that Jesus is alive and available to “become flesh” in each of us now.  I don’t want to be trapped in the past or impatient for the future. Now is what we have. -BRS

• Rule 7: Invest in people.

People were designed to last forever. Friends were designed to last even longer.  I believe that our primary purpose on earth is to love those we meet on the journey, and to help others grow in love. Everything else is details.  I have a passion for all the people of the world, and have taught in Africa, Central America, Mexico, Turkey, Israel, Thailand, India, and even Iowa. And everywhere I go, I seek to learn about each culture, faith, and person. And about myself. -BRS

• Rule 8: Exegete everything.

• Corollary A to Rule 8: Rule 8 is most effective when it is applied before making a decision or reaching a conclusion.

• Corollary B to Rule 8:  Pain often increases in inverse proportion to applying Rule 8.

Exegete is Greek word: “to draw out meaning.”  So, I want to learn from everything and from everyone. I want to take time to observe, ponder, think, reflect, pray, and draw out meaning from every breath.  Everyone has something to teach, and everyone has something to learn. The world is one gigantic classroom!  -BRS

• Rule 9: You can only live your own life. No exceptions. 

So often, we expend great amounts of energy to change others. I have never seen lasting change–for good or bad–without a person’s own, willful choice to change. We cannot change anyone. Period. We can barely change ourselves. Change is a job relegated to the Spirit and to the classroom of pain. -BRS

• Rule 10: Be humble.

Pride is the single most destructive force on Earth. It blinds us, isolates us, and calcifies us. Jesus died for messed up, broken, selfish, incomplete people. Me, you, everybody. No exceptions. I have failed often, and I have grown through suffering. I don’t take myself too seriously. We all are broken and need each other! -BRS

• Rule 11: The way up is usually down.

I want to walk the low road.  I have seen great poverty and heart-rending tragedy, and so have listened, hugged, and cried with many people

Learning in a poor village in Ghana

around the world (for example, I was a Crisis Counselor to parents immediately after the Littleton Columbine shootings, I have worked with refugees in camps in Central America, and I traveled to India to work as a Grief Counselor in Tsunami-struck villages.) In low places, we learn high truths. -BRS

• Rule 12: Laugh. Authentic joy is the antidote to every struggle.

I find most life on this planet wonderfully intriguing and entertaining. I love to laugh, although I can find humor in odd places or at “strange” times. Sometimes, laughter seems to pursue me, sneaking up from my gut and jumping into my mouth, with unbidden joy. -BRS

You’ve seen it in others’ eyes.  “E.” You’ve felt it in your own heart.  That moment when you have no gas left. No gray cells working.  No passion in the tank. Emptiness. People seem to be running on fumes.

I’ve been asking people a key question lately: “What fuels your life?”   This includes what things recharge a person, fill a person up, give an individual new energy or passion. What do you fill up your life-body-soul-mind with?   I’ve jotted the answers down, and put them alphabetically. From all people of all ages and stages, I think this list will make you smile. Which of these make your list or touch you? Hmmm. Perhaps its time to pull off at the next filling station…

What fuels you?

• amazing grace
• art
• ball park hotdogs
• the beach
• being appreciated
• being generous
• being a good example
• being part of a team
• being significant
• being understood
• Bible study
• big band music
• board games
• the bread and the wine
• brushed teeth
• candlelight
• cathedral bells
• celebrating
• children
• a child’s laughter
• chillin’ outdoors
• Christmas
• classic cars
• a clean car
• a clean house
• clean sheets
• clouds in motion
• coming home
• community
• confessing
• conversation
• cooking
• cozy blankets
• creating
• a crisp apple
• a cup of tea
• a dance
• a date night
• declaring God’s goodness
• a deep laugh
• discovering a passion
• discovering the answer
• doing the hard thing
• doing the right thing
• doing the will of God
• the empty Cross
• the empty belly
• exercise
• expectation
• an extra free hour
• faith
• family
• family car trips
• feeling cherished
• fellowship
• finding that which is lost
• fireplaces
• fishing
• flowers in bloom
• “For me?”
• forgiveness
• Fourth of July
• four-wheeling
• fresh bread
• fresh lemonade
• fresh paint
• a full belly
• a full night’s sleep
• a full tank of gas
• gardening
• good coffee
• a good friend
• a good meal
• a good movie
• a good TV show
• a good workout
• “Half-off!”
• hanging with friends
• helping others
• heroes
• hiking
• home-grown tomatoes
• home-made ice cream
• an honest complement
• an honest day’s work
• a hot bath
• hot french fries
• hot showers
• hugs
• hummingbirds
• “I love it!”
• my iPod
• Jesus
• kids on a slide
• kilts
• a life experience
• live music
• listening to God
• listening to someone
• looking into someone’s eyes
• love offered freely
• loving on people
• lyrics with meaning
• making a difference
• making a new friend
• making a sacrifice
• making dinner together
• making others feel good
• making something with your hands
• a massage
• a meaningful relationship
• a mission trip
• moonlight
• Mozart
• music
• my small group
• a nap
• a new bar of soap
• a new battery
• a new box of crayons
• obedience
• the oboe
• oiled wood
• old photo albums
• overcoming
• “Paid in full.”
• painting
• peanut butter and jelly
• performing well
• pets
• a picnic
• “Play ball!”
• porch swings
• prayer
• a promise kept
• puppies
• quality time
• quiet
• rain
• reading
• riding my bike
• safe darkness
• sailing
• salvation
• a scenic drive
• Scripture
• self-control
• a sense of purpose
• shade
• sharing
• shopping
• showing patience
• siestas
• silence
• simplicity
• singing
• sizzling on the grill
• skydiving
• the smell of cinnamon and apple pie
• the smell of wood smoke
• the smell of the woods
• a smile
• a snow day
• a snowflake
• soaking in a hot tub
• soaring architecture
• soaring birds
• soaring mountains
• soft leather
• solitude
• the sound of the ocean
• spiritual biographies
• sports
• stained glass
• sunsets
• surprises
• surrendering to God
• sweet dreams
• sweet tea
• sweet kisses
• swimming
• a task completed well
• teaching Sunday school
• telling the truth
• tenderness
• thankfulness
• time alone
• time to think
• time to travel
• umbrellas
• untracked powder
• unwavering faith
• visiting others
• walking in the park
• a warm breeze
• a warm chocolate-chip cookie
• waterskiing
• weddings and funerals
• a wise word
• worshipping together
• writing
• the zoo

Postcards from a wonderful site called avagabonde.blogspot.com

I am a mutt, it seems, of mixed-spiritual heritage. I was raised a Methodist in a integrated inner-city church. I became committed to Jesus in a high school Young Life club. I find my theological home in historic Reformed theology, and I am an ordained Presbyterian minister (EPC).  I teach leadership and spiritual formation at an Evangelical seminary.  I love to read the ancient writings of the Church Fathers, most of them Catholics or Orthodox priests. I am a spiritual Neapolitan, a blended-fruit smoothy, a potluck. Hawaiians call it aloha mixed plate.  A tradition from the shared lunch of workers in the pineapple plantations: “Welcome. Share. But you get what you get, Brah.”

A mixed plate. It is a difficult concept, because I do not believe that all roads lead to God, any more than all roads lead to Denver. You can move toward or away from any destination. But God has used truth from different Christian persuasions and teachers to draw me to a narrow path. Perhaps this is why I find so much ‘mystery’ in my faith.  Perhaps it is the explorer, the wayfarer, in me. Celtic Christians often called themselves, “Peregrinari Pro Christo,” (exiles for Christ.) This illumines one of the core understandings of these Irish and Scottish followers of Jesus: “Life is a journey, a spiritual and actual pilgrimage.”

To this point, when asked about my faith, sometimes I simply call myself a “Christian Mystic.” I got the term first  from C. S. Lewis.  His definition of Christian Mysticism is simple: “the direct experience of God, immediate as a taste or color.” Lewis  writes,

“Discovering spirituality is like discovering you are in a boat. Mysticism is like pushing off from the dock. Since many leave safe mooring and perish in the waves, this is not to be done in a cavalier fashion – even though it can be exciting to push off into the deep. The issue is not of whether we should push off, for Christians must do so as well if they intend to get anywhere (and that is what boats are for), but rather of where you are going…The Christian casts off from this world as well, but with clear intent to where he is headed, with the best of maps, circumspectly, deliberately.  The Christian Mystic arrives, against all dangers and odds. Thus we launch out with fear and trembling, but trust that He who commanded us to do so can calm the waves, and see us through to His real, safe port.”

Christian Mystic. I know this is a title which can be greatly misunderstood.  I have learned that there are people who feel the very term “Christian Mystic” to be highly improper, an oxymoron of sorts. For these people, the word “mystic” summons up a wide range of images, touching on individualism, monastic cells, heathenism, eastern religions, and otherworldly spiritual attitudes such as those found in “New Age” philosophies.  Mystics seem untethered to them, helium-filled airheads drifting in and out of one experience or another. For me, nothing could be further from the truth.

“Mystic” is related to the New Testament Word, mysterion, which means “secret” or “mystery.”  Christianity, while built on rational faith and life in the real world, is supra-rational. Bruce Demarest, Professor of Theology at Denver Seminary, says, “Great Christian realities, such as intimacy with God, spiritual passion, and prayer, must be framed in the mind and experienced in the heart. Christian mysticism, simply put, is the believers direct experience of God in the heart.” (Satisfy Your Soul, 1999). As a Christian Mystic, or Mystical Christian, I want to experience Christ, as if I were living with Him in the pages of the Bible. Chuck Colson notes, “So I no longer distrust the mystical. No, I’ve had plenty of experiences with it.”(Jubilee, 1998).

Richard F. Lovelace, Professor of Church History at Gordon-Conwell Seminary, defines mysticism as “a non-technical term denoting movements stressing Christian experience and encounter with God.” (Dynamics of the Spiritual Life, 1979). For me, in essence, being a Christian Mystic means seeking the Center, Christ, more than the boundaries (who is in or out). It means living each moment expectantly focused on Jesus, open and broken, and waiting for him to guide and direct. It means concretely walking the journey toward Him, with Him, and in Him, too. It means I am resigned to not knowing all of the answers about God and faith. It recognizes that much of God’s work in our lives is a mystery.

The Bible declares: “His ways are not our ways, nor his thoughts our thoughts. His ways are above our ways, and his thoughts are above our thoughts.” It has the sense that God is real and present around us, at work and available. This is practical theology for me–for it sets as my goal the knowledge and experience of the real and living God. It is concerned about spiritual formation, and so bids me to  seeks to develop a deep spiritual intimacy with Him. It touches down firmly on God’s amazing love, and his care for the sinner, the poor, and the brokenhearted. Spiritual Mysticism teaches me ways of growing our hearts and lives, and developing an authentic love for all people. I want to find Jesus in everyday life. Christian author and pastor A. W. Tozer notes, “A mystic is a believer who practices the presence of God.” (Pursuit of God, 1948).

Evangelical theologian and President of the American Theological Society Donald Bloesch wrote, “Those who stand in the Reformation tradition will acknowledge that a Christian can at the same time be a mystic, but they will insist that this means a radically qualified mysticism, qualified by faith in the self-revelation of a divine Mediator in human history.” (The Struggle of Prayer, 1988). I am a person with a Master’s degree in theology, and I love to read the Bible. It answers my questions, reorients my life, and scratches deep itches in my soul. Everything for me must be weighed in biblical truth and example. I walk with others on this journey; I must subject myself to many godly Christian men and women who will hold me accountable and keep me grounded. In all of my life, Jesus must remain the Core, the Cornerstone, the Source, and the King of my life. Still, Christian Mysticism asks that I  be concerned with more than knowing the letter of the Scriptures, or reciting religious dogmas. I seek to know the Spirit of the Word, which is to say to live from within the experience of God’s Word at the very core of being. Jesus says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” A mystic, quite simply, is a lover of God who pursues the Lord from a deep realization that life as a Christian grows as the soul moves toward its fullness and destiny in relationship to God.  I want to see God. I seek to be with Him, grafted into Him, listening to His voice, doing what He asks me to do. I want to push away from the entanglements of the world. I want to explore Jesus-focused spiritual life.

To travel into the world of the Christian mystic with me, one must discard concepts such as ego, pride and spiritual materialism in favor of adopting a sense of humility and hopeful expectation. It is to begin a great and stirring adventure that moves the soul from the kingdom of darkness to the Kingdom of God. While orthodox and historic in theology and passionate about personal holiness, for me a Christian mystic is concerned more about pleasing God each day than figuring out perfectly all the rules of faith. I live with a sense of Narnian wonder, “Aslan is on the move!”

Maybe ‘mystic’ is too loaded a term. Perhaps it has been misused, or confused. I may be wrong. Still, it is the best nomenclature I know so far.  Indeed, as one begins to experience the Bible as the living Word of God, we pray to be guided from an ego-centric point of view to a mature and deeper sense of God’s presence. Jesus’ message is that the kingdom of God is not out there somewhere, but rather here, within, available to the humble person through faith. It is a personal realization that reaches across time, an imperfect yet shining beacon to every human soul willing to follow. I have so far to go, it seems. I may take wrong turns, or miss some important way-signs. But, none-the-less, I am on the road, one foot in front of the next. All who wish to travel with me, I welcome with open arms.  We walk this journey together as exiles for Christ.

As the applause grows at the Willow Creek Leadership Summit, her head falls. Eventually, it lies on the podium. People stand, and the applause increases. It is for Mama Maggie Gobran, a Coptic nun from Cairo. She is the Mother Teresa of Egypt. She has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize several times for her work among the poor. She had fed thousands of people across the middle-east. As violence has errupted in Egypt, she has stood again and again for peace. As we applaud, she hides her old, yet smooth-skinned face. She becomes smaller, almost folds into the podium. As the applause finally ends, she has backed a bit away from the podium, her right hand now clutching the simple cross on the breast of her white Coptic habit. The room settles, is hushed to stillness. Quietly, she returns to the podium. A small, peaceful voice prays in broken English, “Jesus, I love you. Jesus, I serve you. Jesus, I praise you. You are all. You are all to me.” She is small, but a presence hangs over her, as if she is larger than anyone I have ever seen on the Willow Creek stage. “I am the least,” she says. “I am the one who has been forgiven much, but loved little. Jesus is all. I am the least of anyone here.”

She speaks and no one moves. It is as if we have been bused from a huge auditorium, beyond screens and speakers, and are in a small chapel, a handful of disciples sitting at her feet, hanging on every syllable. Only it is not about her, but about her devotion to Jesus. She moves in and out of prayer as she speaks. Teaching, praying, teaching, praying. Her lesson is simple. “God wants to use you to do great things. You.” Oddly, we know she cannot–would not–willingly lie to us. We believe her. God wants to use us. Me.  She continues, “But there are some things you need to do for him to use you. First, you need to call on Jesus. Call out to him. Seek him! Second, you must give up all, and follow Jesus. You must go where he goes. Finally, the hardest: have a pure heart and to get to know the Almighty, the Holy One.”

It is a simple message of whole-hearted dedication. “If you want to be a hero, to make a difference, to change the world, do what God wants you to do. Only that.” Her peace and affection are tangible, like a gentle rub on knotted shoulders. As she speaks, I find myself falling into her words like a serene, warm pool, drawn by her character and countenance. I feel deeply loved by her. I want to serve alongside her. I want to love like she loves. I want to trust Jesus like she does. And love him like she does. Lord, may I, please?

As she ends, she gently asks permission of the audience. “May I bless you? May I bless this place, and all who are connected to this place? May I bless your country? May I bless you, please?” Oh yes! Our hearts cry out, but we cannot make a sound. The room remains frozen. As a sign of this blessing, she kneels in the silence, and kisses the stage. Her face again is lost in the white of her Coptic shawl for a minute. If someone else did this, it would seem theatrical. But this is right, and we are hungry for her silent blessings. Her kiss carries her prayers, and the Bible promises that, ” the prayers of a righteous person have much power.” She remains on her knees longer than is comfortable for us, but we do not want it to end. It is a holy moment. For a long moment, eternity pours out on us.

She rises smoothly, as one who moves to and from her knees often. Applause rises, out of place, but we do not know what else to do. I feel like someone who has tasted what heaven will be like. My nose is running, and my cheeks are wet. I pray. Thank you, Jesus. I feel spiritually full, and painfully hungry.

“The rich world of his ancestors set the standard for Dietrich Bonheoffer’s own life. It gave him a certainty of judgment and manner that cannot be acquired in a single generation. He grew up in a family that believed the essence of learning lay not in a formal education but in the deeply rooted obligation to be guardians of a great historical heritage and intellectual tradition.”

A standard set from ancestors. This reflects a difficult and odd truth found in the Ten Commandments:

 “You shall not bow down to them or worship them (other Gods); for I, the Lord  your God, am a jealous God, visiting (in Hebrew, paqad: to deposit or set in motion) the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.” (Exodus 20:5-6)

As the Word teaches, the character of one generation—through sin nature or blessing—flows down into another. Honestly, doesn’t this appall you a bit? Punishing one person for the acts of another? Let alone children? But there is a greater truth here—God is not speaking to a single person, but to a people. The pronoun, “You” is in the plural, as is “fathers,” “children,” and “generations.” This is magnified by the addition of “a thousand generations.”  God is not saying that I will punish each child for the behavior of each respective father. Instead he is saying that if one generation falls away and worships other “gods,” that the sins will be deposited in the future upon the next generation. It is a corporate commandment, not an individual one. Somewhat like the U.S. National debt, pushed into the future to be dealt with someday. God, working for their good, knows that the overall behavior of the Jewish culture will taint, infect, or train the generations which follow. Said a different way, God clearly understands that, as he established it, the collective behavior of fathers and mothers of a society will create a motion, a future debt or balance, for their children.

I see today that we are so infected with individualism that we have come to believe that “we alone” can raise our own children into righteousness and wisdom. Or that we alone, as pastors and leaders, can create a church which is holy and effective. But scripture attests that the motion of a sound orthodox faith is designed to build from generation to generation. Watching waves roll into the Hawaiian coast, I recognize that each wave is not really alone. It moves as a part of a flow, pressed forward by a thousand- thousand-thousand tons of water behind it, all parts heaving and moving to the ordered pull of extremely distant celestial bodies and far away gusting winds. As each wave rolls to crash in white-frothed confusion on the beach, it is not only obeying the law of gravity, but also the law of generations. The law of generations in Exodus 20 says simply that we are influenced by the collective motion of our societal environment, and of our society’s history. My dad and his dad, and his dad before him, have generationally created a pull which has an influence over me. Their good pulls me up, and their evil pulls me down. The truth has been given proverbial status: the apple does not fall far from the tree. Let alone the apple falling far from the apple orchard, at least without some tangible touch of God’s intervention. In Hawai’i, the grandmothers and grandfathers have a saying, “Nana i ke kuma” (look to the source.)

I am shaped by my source. But it is not only my direct spiritual linage which pulls at me. A generational pressure is then cumulatively added to or subtracted from by the wills and actions of those others around them to influence me. The overall motion of a people is determined by the overall direction of its movement from generation to generation. The effects of bad parents in a good community are mitigated, but so are the benefits of good parents raising kids in a bad society.

We have lost the law of generations, I think, to another, more man-friendly law: the law of perceived control.  This law, far from Biblical standards, acts like this—when faced with a situation one cannot control, one simply chooses to believe and act as if one can control it.  This law creates the seawalls of the human mind, pretending that a few rows of piled papermache stone will hold against the largest ocean wave. For example, with our children, we desire an abundant, safe, healthy future, but we cannot guaranty it to them. So, although we cannot control their future path, we act as if we can, believing that if we, as good parents, do all the right things, they will be “fine.” Enter Sunday schools and charter schools and Ivy League schools. But there are so many factors acting upon them, so many celestial bodies of ideas pulling at them, so many generational sins weighing on them, that I fear we are fooling ourselves. King Solomon might add parenthetically here, “A chasing after the wind?” We cannot alone make them safe.  We cannot alone make them good. We are fooling ourselves. We can influence, but we are a small part of the equation which shapes them.

What is needed then is not another parenting class, but a generational leadership class. If the law of generations remains true (and the Bible says it does), then we must work to create a legacy of good for our whole “schoolhouse” of children. We must work to create a tidal pull toward righteousness in more than just our own families, but also in the families of all those in the church. “You raise your child and I’ll raise mine,” isn’t Biblical and it doesn’t work. We must work to get grandfathers and grandmothers to parent again, only this time as elders who take responsibility for a whole generation. It is an individual effort, to be sure, but it is a corporate movement of change. The church needs to be a family, “deeply rooted obligation to be guardians of a great historical heritage and intellectual tradition.” We need to find a difficult balance: a faith both deeply rooted and vibrantly alive. This is a real seawall against the evil of our world, and I am willing to haul stones for this legacy.

But wait. Can I be gloomy for a second? Christmas is also corrupted with the oil slick of humanity’s rubbish. “I bring you great tidings of joy” is not so angelic these days. Co-opted by Macy’s, it is now joyful tidings of, “last minute savings on thousands of gifts and free shipping!” To arrive today, the Christ-child must wander through over-stuffed mall parking lots, push past angry shoppers, and skirt a national heart fueled by spiritual barrenness. The city’s Manger scene has been replaced by a blow-up Santa decreeing “Happy Holidays.” There is still no room at the inn. While families gather to share the season, others assemble to rip the scabs from the old relational wounds they carry. Charitable giving rises around Christmas, as people remember how blessed they are. But so do stress, depression, abuse, and suicides. My counseling load becomes bludgeoning. Joy and hope and love seem bagged by the Grinch and carried away.

No wonder we feel torn at Christmas. In reality, Christmas is a time of great blessings and also of great emptiness.  As I write, my heart feels a little more vacuous tonight, as if something drained away a bit this year. Time is a mixed blessing. It is a muddy river. Such is the tale of our lives. Life is good and difficult, both full and empty. For example: as a teenage boy, I was a mess. (Most of you are not surprised.) Pony-tailed and barefooted in all seasons, I came from a divorced, muddled family. Unsure of myself, I looked for attention at every turn. While successful in academics and sports, deep inside I felt lost and broken, as if I had misplaced some essential part of life and couldn’t remember where I had left it. I hungered for some place to feel at home. God’s answer in part came through the father of my high-school sweetheart, Sue Mears. Dr. William Mears was a graduate of the Virginia Military Academy. In contrast to my long shagginess, his hair was cut high and tight. He seemed all Army—he had been the first Army flight surgeon to be sent to Viet Nam during the war, and had excelled in his military and medical career. When I met him, Colonel Mears was Chief of Ophthalmology at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital. I called him, simply, “Sir.” But it was the softer side of Dr. Mears that changed me. He accepted me as I was—even allowing this untamed boy to date his daughter. He saw past the outward Brad, and welcomed me into his home without judgment. He even invited me to come to church with them. This invitation began a time of my life when Christmas became more than lights and presents. Sitting next to them in church one Christmas season, I met the Person of Christmas, the living Jesus. The reality of Christmas began to fill the emptiness in my heart. Dr. Mears’ generosity and love were an essential part of this faith growth in me. Sadly, Dr. William Mears, 76, went to be with his Lord on October 10th of this year. All I can say of him is, “Thank you, Sir. You were willing to set aside yourself to change my course for eternity. May I be more like you.” I will miss him; I feel full, and empty.

Another example: on an especially trying day, I had preached a failed sermon in Seminary chapel. Within a few hours, a Seminary leader sent me a note: “You have no business as a pastor. I am embarrassed you are even a student here. You should leave.” Seeing the agony on my face as I walked in the rain past his window, a grey-haired gentleman responded. He called out to me, and then, with a gentle linking of his arm in mine, he led me to his office. I remember his words as if they were yesterday. “This is not really about you, Brad. There are other issues going on here. Don’t be discouraged. I believe in you. We will work together to make you the best preacher and pastor around.” Then with a twinkle he added, “You may not know it, but I have some limited credibility around this place.” Thus began my mentoring relationship with Dr. Vernon Grounds, President Emeritus and Chancellor of Denver Seminary. For 18 eighteen years, Dr. Grounds coached and cajoled me into a bit of the pastor he was. He made time for me, and I grew. He became my friend. Dr. Grounds went home to heaven this September, at the age of ninety six. To him I say, “Thank you, Vernon. You emptied your schedule to find time to mentor a young man into a Christian leader. May I be more like you.” I miss him. I feel both full and empty.

As I write this, a young woman in my church, Tricia, is trying to understand Christmas. Her husband, Robb (34), died unexpectedly a few hours ago. His flu bug of yesterday became her sobbing of today. As I hugged her, I looked at their Christmas tree and my heart tore—two small boys will have to limp through this Christmas, and others, missing their daddy. The church and family have rallied around her. Still, I feel the emptiness now. And yet, somehow, I am also thankful and full.

This Christmas, we must remember that this Season is—at the source—a time of emptiness. In Philippians 2, we are reminded that Jesus voluntarily left heaven, emptying himself to become one of us. The Unchanging and Omnipresent Son of God became limited to one place in space and time: a little town of Bethlehem, Palestine, in the first century. The Greatest, most Powerful required feeding and changing. The One who created everything in the heavens and on the Earth—warm tides, rain forests, and every manner of life—immersed himself in the decaying scents of a barn-yard stable, in the chill of a winter’s wind, in the struggles of a world full of turmoil and war. The Eternal came to live and die. For Christ, the Christmas process involved an unimagined emptying. Followed by the hope of great fullness. His purity mixing with our dirt, to sanctify it. His emptying becoming a path to our fullness.
The emptiness of the Baby Jesus has stripped from death the final victory. Eternity is now laid out like a Christmas dinner, waiting for all who believe to gather. Tricia and boys: Robb is still alive, finding his seat at the table. Dr. Mears, Dr. Grounds, and others find their chairs. Empty and full; it is a Christmas mystery. The birth of Jesus changes everything! I sing with Whoville, “Welcome Christmas!” Welcome, Lord. May we be more like you!

If emptiness, or muddiness, or depression pursue you this Christmas, take hope. Filling is always preceded with a tipping of the cup to emptiness. God has not forgotten. He seeks. He loves. He comes. Wait for it. Feel the emptiness, but seek the pouring in of Christmas!

• Relationships 101
• How to Make Anyone Fall in Love With You
• How to Start a Conversation and Make Friends
• Love, Sex, and Lasting Relationships
• The Relationship Cure
• A Practical Guide for Improving Communications and Getting What You Want in Your Relationship
• Relationship Rescue

Publishers are churning out books and articles on relationships for one reason–they sell. They sell because people yearn to understand and experience healthy relationships.

One might ask, “Why are these relationships so important to us?” One obvious answer, at an admittedly symptomatic rather than root plane, is that people feel disconnected. Psychologist John Townsend offers this simple conclusion: “Disconnectedness…is the deepest and most fundamental problem we can experience…The problem: our need for attachment.  The solution: find intimate relationships.”[1]

C. S. Lewis writes about this longing to find the deepest level of connection:

The books or the music in which we thought ‘the beauty’ was located will betray us if we trust in them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing…For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited…Do what they will, then, we remain conscious of a desire which no natural happiness will satisfy.[2]

Lewis obviously knows that there is something more than our desire for interpersonal love. Our spiritual relationships reflect a sense of disconnection and the resultant hunger, too. A recent Google search found over 223,700 websites which offer strategies or contentions leading toward “intimacy with God or a “deeper relationship with God.” Amazon.com has almost 3,700 book titles under the heading “Intimacy with God.”  In these web sites and books, a wide variety of spiritual orientations and methodologies promise help on one’s search for supernatural connection. Like flamboyant boxes of breakfast cereals lining row upon row of shelves, they seek to catch one’s eye. Some examples: “Have the abundant life that Jesus promised!” “How to have a powerful and effective prayer life!” “Taste heaven now!” Researcher Robert Wuthnow observes, “One thing is clear: the search for community and the sacred will continue to characterize the American people. These quests will animate our values and the ways we relate to our friends and neighbors.”[3]

Admit it. We are consumed with intimacy, especially a deep intimacy with a God who transcends us. This struggle for a connectional intimacy with God is not a modern one. Throughout history, many Christians have wrestled with the same issues. The list of petitioners is august and broad of tradition, including many champions of the faith: Ignatius of Loyola, Teresa of Avila, Francois Fenelon, Ulrich Zwingli, John Newton, John Owen, C. S. Lewis, Henry Nouwen, John Calvin, Thomas Merton, Dallas Willard, A.W. Tozer, Mother Teresa, R. C. Sproul, and Henry Blackaby. In almost one voice, these Christians seem to agree that what is needed, holistically, is a deeper experience with the very person of God.[4] Might I offer some examples to give our own hunger for intimacy perspective?

What does the historic Christian voice have to say about our hunger for spiritual connection? In the 1950’s, A. W. Tozer looked over this historical pursuit of intimacy with God and wrote:

To have found God and still to pursue Him is the soul’s paradox of love, scorned indeed by the too-easily-satisfied religionist, but justified in happy experience by the children of the burning heart….Come near to the holy men and women of the past and you will soon feel the heat of their desire after God. They mourned for Him, they prayed and wrestled and sought for Him day and night, in season and out…[5]

Christians desire a relationship with God because it is the only thing which can really fill our hearts. Augustine understands, writing the famous phrase, “You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until the rest in you.”[6] Some other examples from across the ages are helpful in sensing this common passion for spiritual intimacy. For example, in the eleventh century, Anselm of Canterbury writes:

Lord, you are my Lord and my God, and I have never seen you. You have made me and nurtured me, given me every good thing I have ever received, and I still do not know you. I was created for the purpose of seeing you, and I still have not done the thing I was made to do. Come on then, my Lord God, teach my heart where and how to seek you, where and how to find you. Lord, if you are not here, where shall I find you?[7]

John of Ruysbroeck (1293-1381) agrees:

Each morning I awake, and pray that the Lord will come.  He will come in the breaking of my fast, and in my walk.  He will come in the sounds of nature.  He will come in the voices of those I know.  He will come in the needs of a stranger, or an opportunity to be empty.  This is the other coming of Christ our Bridegroom, which is present with us every day. We should consider it with a desiring heart, lest it should not take place within us; for it is needful, if we are to remain steadfast and to go forward in eternal life…Come, Lord Jesus, come. I am in desperate need of you.[8]

Blaise Pascal (d. 1662) writes in Pensees,

The Christian’s God is a God who makes the soul aware that He is its sole good: that in Him alone it can find peace; that only in loving Him can it find joy…[9]

Puritan pastor John Owen (d. 1683 ), in the language of his day, writes:

Communion consists of giving and receiving. Until the love of the Father be received, we have no communion with him therein…But this is that I say—When by and through Christ we have an access unto the Father, we then behold his glory also, and see his love that he peculiarly bears unto us, and act faith thereon. We are then, I say, to eye it, to believe it, to receive it! This is that [goal] which is aimed at![10]

John Stott, in 1958, writes simply,

“Father” and “Son” are the distinctive titles which Jesus gave to God and to himself. By union with him we are permitted to share something of his own intimate relation to the Father…The great privilege of the child of God is relationship; his great responsibility is growth.[11]

Brenning Manning, in Abba’s Child, writes,

The deepest desire of our hearts is for union with God.  From the first moment of our existence our most powerful yearning is to fulfill the original purpose of our lives – ‘to see Him more clearly, love Him more dearly, follow Him more nearly.’  We are made for God, and nothing less will satisfy.[12]

Reflecting on his own spiritual life and those of other Christians, Charles Swindoll writes,

Lonely, hollow, shallow, and enslaved to a schedule…those words have haunted me for months.  I wonder how many who read these pages feel the same.  Perhaps you have not expressed your world in those words, but they describe why you feel so frustrated, so frayed…Thankfully, I have had the time to let those thoughts linger and spawn other thoughts until I arrived at the heart of the issue – a lack of intimacy.  Pure and simple, that best defines the problem: an absence of intimacy with the Almighty.  Involvements, yes, but not intimacy.  Activities and programs aplenty, but not intimacy.[13]

John Piper speaks of the persistent “ homesickness” for God which is in the human heart:

The only weapon that will triumph is a deeper hunger for God…What is at stake here is not just the good of our souls, but also the glory of God. God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. The fight of faith is a fight to feast on all that God is for us in Christ. What we hunger for most, we worship.[14]

Joseph Stowell adds with hope,

While we have life and breath, God will not cease to pursue a rewarding, deepening intimacy with us. He is not content to leave us alone. His unconditional love for each of us compels Him. He wants to meet us at the intersection of every dream, every desire, every choice, every thought, and He urges us to turn toward Him and actualize the finished work of His Son, the gift of the Spirit, and the resource of His Word. He welcomes us to begin a pilgrimage that puts our back toward the aloneness of our souls and turns our faces toward the spectacular glow of intimacy with Him—toward life the way it was meant to be.[15]

It seems clear that Christians since the earliest times have experienced a spiritual awareness of an emptiness, perhaps one that is birthed in divine influence. Christianity seeks a God who has created in us a desire to connect with himself; a deep thirst which, “can only be quenched in one way—in a more intimate relationship with God…”[16] C. S. Lewis writes, “God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.”[17]

[1] John Townsend, Hiding from Love (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1991) 173.

[2] C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, Theology (1941) 3-4.

[3] Robert Wuthnow, Sharing the Journey: Support Groups and America’s New Quest for Community (New York: The Free Press, 1994) 21.

[4] Sharon Daloz Parks, Big Questions, Worthy Dreams: Mentoring Young Adults in Their Search for Meaning, Purpose, and Faith (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 2000).

[5] A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications Inc, 1948)

[6] Saint Augustine, The Confessions of St. Augustine, trans. Frank Sheed (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1943) 1.

[7] Saint Anselm of Canterbury, Proslogion, trans. M. J. Charlesworth, 2 ed. (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1979)??

[8] Saint John of Ruysbroeck, The Adornment of the Spiritual Marriage: The Sparking Stone, the Book of Supreme Truth, trans. C. A. Wynschenck (London: J. M. Kent Publishers, 1916).

[9] Blaise Pascal, Pensées, trans. A. J. Krailsheimer (New York: Peguin Books, 1966) 544.[6] Richard Foster, The Great Omission (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2006) 18.

[10] John Owen, Communion with God (Grand Rapids: Associated Publishers and Authors, Inc., 1970 ) 23.

[11] John Stott, Basic Christianity (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1958) 166.

[12] Brenning Manning, Abba’s Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 1994) 271.

[13] Swindoll, Charles R. Intimacy with the Almighty: Encountering Christ in the Secret Places of Your Lives. Dallas: Word, 1996.   8-9.

[14] John Piper, A Hunger for God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1997) 10.

[15] Joseph M. Stowell, Coming Home: The Soul’s Search for Intimacy with God (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1998) 24.

[16] Merton, Faith and Violence: Christian Teaching and Christian Practice 222.

[17] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity.

“I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires.” – Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906), U.S. reformer, suffragist

“Every man thinks God is on his side. The rich and powerful know he is.”
- Jean Anouilh, French dramatist, playwright

“You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out he hates all the same people you do.” -Anne Lamott, Author

Someone forwarded me a recent blog on readersupportednews.org, an overtly liberal political site. In the blog, an unknown author writes a “humorous” piece in the form of a news article about Jesus being selected as a Supreme Court nominee. In the article, the GOP is rallying in the press to reject the nominee (or should I capitalize it, “Nominee”?) The vitriolic, tongue-in-cheek point of the post is that the political right will distrust and oppose anyone whom Obama selects. From my perspective, this is true, although none of the conservatives I know are as hateful and blind as pictured. Still, there is a clear undercurrent in the article which raised my concerns far more than this. To the unknown author, and to those who commented on the blog, Jesus would clearly be a progressive Democrat based on his stands on abortion, immigration, free enterprise, and community organizing. He fits with their platforms, it seems, and is on their side. Is this true? An interesting question: Who would Jesus align with in 2010 political America? Might I offer a speculative option? Jesus wouldn’t. Instead, he would make everyone hopping mad. My creative, push-the-envelope, politically incorrect “what if” take is offered below. – Brad

An Interview with Jesus

Editor’s Note: Some have said that Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the recent Obama nomination for Supreme Court Justice, is hard to pin down. Since his nomination, he has taken a low profile, and has turned down countless interview offers from many renowned programs: FOX News, CNN, ABC, NBC, Rush Limbaugh, Jay Leno, and Larry King. This has, as to be expected, raised questions about Mr. Christ, his personal beliefs and political stands. Last week, however, Mr. Christ contacted NPR’s Morning Edition. He personally asked to sit down with Cokie Roberts for an NPR interview. The discussion which followed was both ground-breaking and controversial. The transcript follows. (At least in my mind. BRS).

NPR: Thank you, Mr. Christ, for talking with me today.

Jesus: Thank you, Cokie, for making room in your busy schedule. And I’m more comfortable on a first name basis. Please call me Jesus.

NPR: Certainly. Jesus—it seems a bit odd for me to call you that, but thank you for the privilege—I wonder if you are aware of all the questions that are spiraling around your nomination to the Supreme Court?

Jesus: (Laughs) Of course I am aware, Cokie. Growing up, I was taught to be a good listener. I care a lot about what people say. And about what they don’t say out loud. I work hard to understand what people are really thinking and feeling, too.

NPR: Your reputation is certainly one of care and concern for the common person. Let me ask you, how do you feel about being nominated to the highest Court in the land?

Jesus: (Pause) Well, Cokie, I am honestly divided. I am thankful that President Obama would consider me, and I humbly believe I could add some wisdom and clarity to the Supreme Court. (Laugh) It may sound silly for a carpenter to say, but I think I would feel right at home as a judge. But at the same time, I have grave concerns about the nomination. I sense it might be used by some people to advance their own agenda. Its too easy to both “label me” and to try to make me just another political poker chip in America.

NPR: I think I understand your concerns. Both parties, Democrats and Republicans, have been stating for a long time that, quietly and behind the scenes, you are on their side. That you believe what they believe, and support their policies.

Jesus: In a way, Cokie, I am on their side. Both sides, actually. You see, I really pay attention to them—Democrats and Republicans, as well as Independents, the unregistered, and the skeptics alike. I listen to their words and their hearts. I desire many of the things they desire to come true. Cokie, beyond the rhetoric, both parties want healthy families, and so do I. They want love and intimacy in their lives. I want this for them. They want economic security and a world which is completely at peace. I so desire this. Like both parties, I want what is best for the American people. Peace and purpose and happiness, for the long term. For the long, long term.

NPR: (Laugh) You sound all-American, Jesus.

Jesus: Actually, I am Israeli, a Palestinian-Jew. And I feel connected to the people of the whole world, not just America. But I feel a burden for America, too. So much has been accomplished here. And so much more is possible. America can again be a change agent for good in this world.

NPR: I hope you are right, sir. But I do have a few concerns, too. How can you align yourself with two opposing parties?

Jesus: Cokie, I did not say I am aligned with both parties. I said, “I am on their side.” As people, not as organizations. (Sigh) I know this can be confusing, Cokie. I care about people, rich and poor, of all backgrounds and skin colors, in every city and town and farm of this land. It is the people that I love, every beating heart and every dreaming hope. From the youngest to the oldest, I feel a burning guardianship to protect and help every human being, regardless of citizenship, faith, or political party. It sounds strange, but I see us as one family. Different, yes, but closely related. We need some more community builders. To your listeners, I say: Republicans are worthy of civility and love. Democrats are worthy of civility and love. Non-voters are worthy of civility and love. All people are worthy of genuine respect and love. But—let me really clear here—I do not love or “buy into” any one party or political strategy, no matter how hard they try to make it seem as if I am on their side.

NPR: Does that make you an independent?

Jesus: (Laugh) I have been called that before. “Too independent,” was the phrase. I have often stood against the political mainstream and its leaders. But I am not behind any political ideology. None. More strongly even, I am seriously concerned with the political landscape of America. I am deeply frustrated with both the left and the right.

NPR: How so?

Jesus: (Pause) Do you really want to know, Cokie? Honestly?

NPR: I believe we deserve to know the truth about what you think, sir.

Jesus: So be it, then. Since I’m not really interested in pleasing people to get some job or office, I can be really frank, can’t I? The truth. Where do I begin? Well, with pride, the odious arrogance I see in the hearts of women and men, of all political persuasions. Politics is so swollen with pride. As if, even with your limited perspectives and own wounds, you can determine what is right for all people. I say to you, wipe the smugness from you face, Republicans, and humble yourselves! I say to you Democrats, face your conceit and self-importance, and humble yourselves! To all of you, truly I say, stop delighting in your shallow sound bites or precocious talk shows, and seek deeper wisdom! Don’t you know that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble? Make your humility practical. Clean your own houses. Stop finding fault with your sister, exposing her poor vision, and look in the mirror for your own blindness! Stop trying to whip the waves of fear and anger against each other in the name of being right and gaining votes. You bend the truth, spin it, or ignore it to look good. “Whatever it takes to gain or maintain power.” This is the sign which hangs, unbidden, over American politics. (Pause.) You sow the wind, not realizing that the tornado will grow until it destroys you. Become learners, not set-in-concrete political bigots. You all think too highly of yourselves! You claim I am one of you. Truly, truly, I am embarrassed at the cesspool of Washington. It stinks to high heaven. I love you just like a mother loves her wayward children, but is time to change your ways. All of you.

NPR: (long silence) Hard words, sir. Many in Washington are squirming right about now. I’m not sure you are gaining many friends. But can you give us more specifics on what you believe? What, exactly, are you for, Jesus?

Jesus: Cokie, I am for loving people, even when that is costly or unpopular. For example, I am for the alien, the one who has no papers and who must sneak across your border to gain a new tomorrow. I say to each of you: Don’t mistreat or take advantage of an alien or migrant, for your forefathers came to America as aliens, too. Find a place for them, and integrate them into your land. Give them hope. Once you cried to the world: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretches refuse of your teeming shore.” And so you became a shining place for the oppressed. Graciousness and generosity have been a part of your short history, and you have been richly blessed because of it. Look deep within you, and find this graciousness again. God will honor you if you take care of the alien among you.

Cokie, let me say it again–I am for loving people. Especially people who are weak or struggling. I am for the poor, and the powerless, the widow and the orphan. So many of you work hard so that you can build wonderful homes, take vacations, and educate your families. But your abundance has become greed, and you are never satisfied anymore. Capitalism has moved from a wonderful means of opportunity toward an excuse for gluttony and consumerism. And all the while, there are others in the world who are hungry and crying for justice. I say to you, truly, do not be tight-fisted or hard-hearted toward those who are poor and have little. Feed others, and God will bless you. Seek justice for the poor and oppressed, for God is watching. Work hard for your families, but share with those in need, even if it means you yourselves must have a little less. In Washington, high government workers treat themselves like kings. I wonder what would happen if politicians not only spoke about the poor, but gave from their own pockets and pensions to feed them?

One more example, Cokie, of what I am for. I am for all human beings. I am for the elderly, and the college student. But, honestly, my whole life I have had a special place in my heart for kids. I love children, and this includes the unborn. Each human life and each heartbeat brings me joy. Politics has made children, whether in the room or in the womb, a political volleyball. It is time to be honest with yourselves: real life grows inside a mother. A heart beats. Any child does not need to be defined in the courts to be human. Inside, you know this is true. Much evil has been done in our history when one human defines another as less than fully human. In selfishness, many of you have condoned the erasure of much of a generation so as to have more freedom for yourselves. You want to control your future and yet you seek to avoid the consequences when you lack sexual control. Driven by your bodies and bravado, you shout, “freedom of choice, freedom of choice!” And yet you give no choice to the heart inside the womb. This, too, is selfishness and pride run rampant. I say to you, truly, God cannot bless the fruit of your factories if you will not let him bless the fruit of your wombs. Be generous in all areas of your life, and become lovers of life, more than just a plank in someone’s political platform. Cokie, the bottom line: I am for the value of all people and all life. Perhaps that makes me a poor fit for American government service.

NPR: Wow. You speak more like a prophet than a politician, Jesus. Time will tell about your nomination, and I expect much discussion and conflict ahead for you in the confirmation process. But I am honored you have spoken to Morning Edition today. Perhaps you would be willing to come back and speak to us in the future?

Jesus: Of course. I have some similar thoughts to offer to the religious leaders of the world, too. And these might be even harder for them to hear.

NPR: I can’t wait, sir.

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Author’s Note: Jesus’ positions here come directly from Bible passages in modern language. For example, see Exodus 22:21, Leviticus 19:33-34 & 23:22, Numbers 15:15-16, Deuteronomy 10:18 & 24:17, Psalm 59:12, 73:1-12, 101:5, 106:38, 137:13, 146:7-9, Proverbs 31:9, Ecclesiastes 11:5, Jeremiah 7:6, 20:17 & 22:3, Ezekiel 22:29 & 47:23, Isaiah 10:1-4, 26:5, 44:24 & 57:5, Matthew 18:4 & 19:21, Luke 1:41-44, 12:33, 14:11, Romans 12:16, Galatians 2:10, James 2:3-6, and 1 Peter 5:6.

The plot of Avatar also pulls at us. It is a lost-then-found immersion epic like The Last Samurai, Dances With Wolves, or Disney’s  Pocahontas. A broken hero, Avatar’s Jake Sully, has lost the use of his legs and his purpose as a Marine. Still, his genes allow him to replace his brother in a large science experiment, wherein he becomes a Na’vi through mind linking to the virile  body of an “Avatar.”   Jake, in Avatar Na’vi form, has been hired by a pseudo-military mining corporation to help bring technological renewal and modern life into the world of the natives, so that the planet can be mined. An ambassador for modernism of sorts, the problems arise when Jake discovers that the natives have what really matters without any modern additions. In their native purity, they have the “real” and better life. Even more so, it is the way of the modern world which threatens the pristine purity and spiritual “rightness” of the native culture. Like gentry firing long guns from trains to decimate the buffalo herds of the Native American plains, on Pandora in 2154 a confluence of  military and corporate power seek to strip mine the forests of this sci-fi planet for a precious substance, unobtainium. Jake, immersed in the Na’vi culture as an intermediary, grows wise. He overcomes evil,  falls in love, finds full over-the-top health, and discovers the real meaning of life.  His spirituality blossoms, and he becomes–through faith–one of the Na’vi forever. Purpose, meaning, love and super powers. Oh, and a dragon of sorts to ride into the two-mooned sky. Not bad.  This is a powerful draw for anyone who has a heart bigger than a Grinch. Avatar is both well made and powerful. As a sci-fi junky, I really enjoyed it.

So heres where the rub comes. Too often, we go to a movie to escape or “just enjoy ourselves.” In so doing, we unintentionally turn off our minds. We absorb the plot and the effects, we feel the character’s struggles and redemption, but we don’t really THINK about what we are watching. We don’t ask hard questions of the film. We just experience it.

Stop. Lest we forget, science and religion both affirm that our thoughts and beliefs about life are critically shaped by what we experience. Our childhood, our friends, our loves all come in the package of experiences. We unconsciously ask over and over again, what do my experiences teach me is right and safe and good? The more real the experience, the more powerful the touch, the more we are influenced. When we turn our minds off and just experience things, we allow ourselves to be shaped deep within, without really getting it.  The bottom line: Avitar is a good movie but it is also the most expensive political-religious commercial ever made. Miss this? Let me help illuminate with some simple questions we should ask every time we immerse ourselves in the experience of a movie:

From the point of the movie, who is the hero? For Avatar, it is the Na’vi people and the re-born-as-breech-cloth native Jake. While one must admit that much unjust violence has been perpetrated on natives from many countries, does this mean that indigenous groups are always good?  Who are the bad guys?  In Avatar it is clear: big corporations and the military are completely out of control, and full of violence. They must be stopped.  Is this true in our world? Or is it a political perspective? What is the highest good shown? In this movie, good equals saving the planet Pandora, and its collective, all-life-containing spirit,the ancient spirit called by the Na’vi, “Eywa.” Whatever one must do to save the planet is allowed.  What is the perspective of God, redemption, or eternality in this movie? Eywa is the Source on Pandora, connecting all life-forms together. Per Cameron, Eywa gives life and blessing. It is Eywa, flowing in the weeping branches of a tree, who contains all the spirits of the ancestors and all other life. This is God on Pandora, and the ecstatic worship scenes are unhidden. Wrapped in shapely blue skin, the Na’vi sway before the One Tree. Sadly, this is not a future place of peace, but a vividly repainted picture of paganism, where God is in all things and is all things. This, to me, is more than a bit of nature worship. As pantheism, it is a well-made kaleidoscope journey away from the Christian Truth as I know it.

I liked the movie, on the surface. I really liked the creative thinking, the moving story line, the character development, and the 3D effects.  But with my brain on and my spirit engaged,  Avatar is so much more than a cool sci-fi movie. It is a glorious, half-billion dollar presentation for a political-religious way of thinking. It redefines a world view, from one seeking a Creator, to one worshiping that which is created.   Sadly, I’m not allowed to just turn off my mind and coast anymore. No matter how spectacular the special effects, or in part because of them, this movie makes my soul uneasy.