This time of year, folks of a more conservative persuasion in the Evangelical end of the American christian church have problems with the celebration of Christmas.
To be clear, this is not the usual disgruntled complaints about how "our" holiday has been spoiled via rampant commercialization, nor the even more recent complaint that it has lost its significance because the politically correct crowd insists on greeting everyone with "Happy Holidays" to avoid offending Jews, Muslims and others who, for a variety of reasons, don't celebrate the birth of our Lord with the same enthusiasm that we do.
And it is not the variety of arguments against the holiday couched in religious terms: Christmas, they complain, is variously a "made up" holiday (not biblical), it's based on a pagan holiday (December 25 is not the actual date of our Lord's birth) and uses a pagan symbol (the evergreen tree). And then there's the whole Santa Claus business ... a subject that could consume a blog post all on its own! The following Web sites illustrate some of the common complaints lodged against Christmas and also outline some of the common arguments against rejecting Christmas for these reasons:
https://www.ucg.org/the-good-news/christians-who-dont-celebrate-christmas-heres-why
https://www.equip.org/article/should-christians-celebrate-christmas/
http://www.eaec.org/bibleanswers/christmas/christians_and_christmas.htm
The reticence I speak of, however, is that of the deeply conservative evangelical who objects to the fact that Christmas today seems to takes precedence over, and in many ways, it's celebration overshadows, that of Easter. Easter, they contend, is the single most important day in human history. It should take precedence. Some think Easter alone should be celebrated. One argument is put subtly, but so well, here, by R.C. Sproul: https://www.ligonier.org/blog/it-sin-celebrate-christmas/.
Now, for a Christian, what Jesus did on the cross really is the pivotal moment in history. It makes the eradication or at least the significant de-emphasis of Christmas a rather tempting argument. But I've been around long enough to see many such arguments arise, gain strong followings, create movements that result in frequently vocal action groups, but then peak and fade, or worse, cause some sort of split in a denomination or local fellowship. I'd like to suggest that most such movements, including the dismissal of Christmas, are little more than tempting distractions from our mission — the irritating horse flies we keep trying to swat, causing us to miss sighting that massive catfish teasing at our hook. How often we forget that Jesus called us to be fishers of men (and women), not fly swatters.
I'd like to suggest we evangelical types stop worrying about what folks we can't control do about Christmas. In fact, I'd like to see us celebrate both Christmas and Easter, and make as big a deal about each as we're able, and to do so without the need to make one more important than the other.
Before anyone throws a stone, let me appeal to no less than the theological proposition that Jesus is both "fully God and fully man." This notion is absolutely central to Trinitarian belief and to call oneself an Evangelical Christian, I believe one still must cleave to the Trinity.
There is little doubt what Easter celebrates, and I won't long belabor the point. Suffice it to say that Jesus substitutionary death on the cross and subsequent resurrection as the "first fruit" of many to come merits celebration and fully justifies its position as the focal point of Jesus ministry and the focal point of our worship in the sharing of the Bread and Wine. And there's little argument about that.
That said, ask a Christian what we celebrate at Christmas, you can get a variety of answers, some amusing, others embarrassing. That's probably why were confused about the holiday. Only a few will mention the Incarnation. And some of the who can manage that much can't tell you the significance of that word. What, after all, does "Incarnation" actually mean that has an impact on me? That sounds like a bit of a selfish question, but it's an honest one. And it can be fairly asked of the Easter story. And easily answered. What does Easter mean for me? that's an easy one: Jesus suffered for my sin. Implication? I don't have to suffer. That is GOOD NEWS. Jesus also rose again from the dead, and word is, he has the power to raise the dead. Even me. that is even BETTER NEWS. See what I mean?
So can we do the same with the Incarnation? Well .... Uh .....
Okay, try this on. Why did Jesus have to come as a baby? And why to poor parents in Bethlehem? In what is now known as the 1st century? Why not put him on the earth as a full-grown man, on his shiny white horse. Born to the royal house? Or better yet, on a tank? Or at the head of an army? How about in 2018, with the power of the Internet at his disposal?
I think Jesus came as a baby because we come that way. He came with nothing because most of us do as well. I don't go for any children's story/song nonsense about "the little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes." I'm sorry. Jesus was an actual baby. He cried when he was hungry or hurt. Just like us. Jesus pooped his pants until he was potty trained. He was as helpless as a baby when he was a baby. He went to the synagogue school, learned to read, memorized scriptures. He grew up and experienced life and relationships and disappointments just like us. He experienced puberty and, yes, he was tempted sexually. If you deny that one, then you are a heretic. Further, Jesus called twelve disciples, under the direction of the Hoy Spirit, but he also made three special friends, not connected with his ministry, whom he visited when he happened to be near Bethany: Lazarus, Martha and Mary. They did not follow him around, or go out on missions like his disciples. They were his dear close friends who offered him their home. They were those special people whose company he preferred to that of others. To cry when You are hurt or disappointed, to poop your pants, to experience hunger, to form treasured friendships, even to be tempted sexually — these are normal human experiences. Not sins. Jesus was fully human yet did not sin. That is why he could go to the cross in your place. In mine.
And he came in his time, not in ours, because the Gospel is passed on person to person, face to face, in the context of close relationships. You can't do real relationships on the Internet. Although, Heaven knows, those online chat sites sure do try.
The point of Christmas is that He was just like you and me, but was so successfully. If he was not fully human, only without sin (what we celebrate at Christmas), then Easter is a sham.
Truth is, Easter was impossible without Christmas. You cannot have the one without the other. So celebrate both we should. In fact, we must. For history is replete with illustrations of how easily we have forgotten that without what he has been (perfectly human) and what he's done (suffered for our humanity) we would have nothing whatsoever to celebrate.
Monday, December 31, 2018
A New Year's Resolution for Irresolute Times
The American president has shut down his government until he gets from Congress the money to build The Wall he promised those who voted for him. You know, that Wall that Mexico would pay for? The one that would keep out that army of drug dealers and terrorists that keeps trying to invade our southern border, with their children and small packets of shabby belongings. (And apparently without their guns. We can only assume they'll buy guns when they get here with all that money they've swallowed and will presumably, well, you know ....) At year's end, he had alienated and fired or driven away several West Wing's worth of operatives, and fired many of his key government appointees. He has undermined whatever support he might have had in the Pentagon in one fell swoop with his decision to remove troops from Syria and turn his back on the Kurds, who have risked all by joining with the U.S. against ISIS an Iran. By Dec. 31, 2018 he will have managed to tell multiple thousands of proven lies, and misrepresented hundreds of events and situations to make himself look better and his enemies (who are now legion) look bad.
The president's first official opponent for the 2020 presidential race announced yesterday. She's clearly a kinder, and probably less unbalanced alternative to our current top guy, and as a woman, she'd be in a position to write a much delayed and much welcome new chapter in history. But ... she's also the one who maintained for years in her position as a graduate level instructor, and against vicious opposition from detractors (led, of course, by the current President) that she is of Native American lineage. Yes, she released her official DNA test findings recently, which concluded, at least reasonably certainly, that she does have Native American heritage. She waved the result triumphantly, noting that this, finally, should silence her critics (particularly the one in the White House) and settle the dispute once and for all. Problem is, that heritage turns out to be about a 1/1000th or so share in the gene pool. If that's the standard, I might be Native American as well. And it did not silence the critics. They had a field day with that one. This has got to give us pause. She got the teaching position, she says, entirely without reference to her heritage, but the position actually did depend on her heritage, or she wouldn't have gotten it. This sort of double talk is just the sort of thing we're being asked to put up with in the current administration. So how do I justify doing for her what I will not do for the current King of Double Talk? America can never be great when this is the standard for a leader's personal character.
The Democratic Party is preparing to field a host of alternatives to the GOP's current rascal. (One has to wonder if the GOP is yet regretful they helped put the current farce in motion. I suspect they are, but like their Guy, they'd rather die than admit it.) But if they think for one minute that they can send a rascal of their own — someone who cannot simply admit they've been wrong, bent a rule, miscalculated, or just made a simple mistake, for God's sake ... and get my vote, they need to think again. Not happening.
I'm truly weary of hearing folks who support the president excuse his "excesses" — or what they variously describe as his "temper," "unusual methods" (how's that for a weak euphemism), or glowingly refer to as his "tough-guy attitude" — by pointing to one or two positive items that have occurred. They delight, for example, in showing you the Stock Market performance, which is largely the result of economic rebuilding efforts led over two terms by his predecessor, by the way. But ... whoops! Last two weeks, it's registered its worst performance since 2008 (remember the Great Recession, anyone?). And how about better relations between North and South Korea? Yep, nice thing, what happened in the Olympics. The president "fell in love." But not one actual thing of substance has taken place in terms of dismantling the North Korean nuclear program. Not. One. All smoke and mirrors. The Art of the Deal, anyone?
My New Year's resolution is to withhold support from any candidate, anywhere, who cannot answer a simple question from a reporter with a straight-up, honest answer. That may mean I don't vote in 2020. But that's the way it's going to be. I have a bit of hope around Beto O'Rourke. But a lot of that might be because I don't yet know enough about him to have heard the downside. (Trying to be a realist, here.) The rest of the field just doesn't excite me. Biden is a good fellow, but he's Old School. We need New School. Hillary? I'd like to hear her own up to the lie she told about the gunfire when she got off that plane. Self aggrandizement. She was busted, and yet she played games. It's just got to stop.
In the year 2019, I will have to see a big turnaround in the character of those who wish to represent me if I'm to have any confidence that things will improve in the U.S. political landscape. And while we're at it, let's try to find candidates who know something about the issues that our country faces. It would be great to elect someone, again, who can actually write his/her own books and speeches. (Present guy can't, but Obama could and did do both. Hell, and someone who can read. Word is, the current guy can't get through a couple of pages without getting distracted. And don't you believe for one moment that he personally wrote the answers to those questions by submitted to Mueller. Didn't happen. Did not happen.) Oh, and please, someone who isn't a game show host, or a casino owner or some other kind of flashy, shallow showboat, whose wife's main deal seems to be clothes, who gets written up every week for some outrageous new outfit and has more shoes than Imelda Marcos. And how about someone who is smart enough to know they need to listen to the experts in the DOJ, the Pentagon and elsewhere, and make decisions as the head of a knowledgeable team. Make America Great Again? First, you need great people.
Waiting ....
The president's first official opponent for the 2020 presidential race announced yesterday. She's clearly a kinder, and probably less unbalanced alternative to our current top guy, and as a woman, she'd be in a position to write a much delayed and much welcome new chapter in history. But ... she's also the one who maintained for years in her position as a graduate level instructor, and against vicious opposition from detractors (led, of course, by the current President) that she is of Native American lineage. Yes, she released her official DNA test findings recently, which concluded, at least reasonably certainly, that she does have Native American heritage. She waved the result triumphantly, noting that this, finally, should silence her critics (particularly the one in the White House) and settle the dispute once and for all. Problem is, that heritage turns out to be about a 1/1000th or so share in the gene pool. If that's the standard, I might be Native American as well. And it did not silence the critics. They had a field day with that one. This has got to give us pause. She got the teaching position, she says, entirely without reference to her heritage, but the position actually did depend on her heritage, or she wouldn't have gotten it. This sort of double talk is just the sort of thing we're being asked to put up with in the current administration. So how do I justify doing for her what I will not do for the current King of Double Talk? America can never be great when this is the standard for a leader's personal character.
The Democratic Party is preparing to field a host of alternatives to the GOP's current rascal. (One has to wonder if the GOP is yet regretful they helped put the current farce in motion. I suspect they are, but like their Guy, they'd rather die than admit it.) But if they think for one minute that they can send a rascal of their own — someone who cannot simply admit they've been wrong, bent a rule, miscalculated, or just made a simple mistake, for God's sake ... and get my vote, they need to think again. Not happening.
I'm truly weary of hearing folks who support the president excuse his "excesses" — or what they variously describe as his "temper," "unusual methods" (how's that for a weak euphemism), or glowingly refer to as his "tough-guy attitude" — by pointing to one or two positive items that have occurred. They delight, for example, in showing you the Stock Market performance, which is largely the result of economic rebuilding efforts led over two terms by his predecessor, by the way. But ... whoops! Last two weeks, it's registered its worst performance since 2008 (remember the Great Recession, anyone?). And how about better relations between North and South Korea? Yep, nice thing, what happened in the Olympics. The president "fell in love." But not one actual thing of substance has taken place in terms of dismantling the North Korean nuclear program. Not. One. All smoke and mirrors. The Art of the Deal, anyone?
My New Year's resolution is to withhold support from any candidate, anywhere, who cannot answer a simple question from a reporter with a straight-up, honest answer. That may mean I don't vote in 2020. But that's the way it's going to be. I have a bit of hope around Beto O'Rourke. But a lot of that might be because I don't yet know enough about him to have heard the downside. (Trying to be a realist, here.) The rest of the field just doesn't excite me. Biden is a good fellow, but he's Old School. We need New School. Hillary? I'd like to hear her own up to the lie she told about the gunfire when she got off that plane. Self aggrandizement. She was busted, and yet she played games. It's just got to stop.
In the year 2019, I will have to see a big turnaround in the character of those who wish to represent me if I'm to have any confidence that things will improve in the U.S. political landscape. And while we're at it, let's try to find candidates who know something about the issues that our country faces. It would be great to elect someone, again, who can actually write his/her own books and speeches. (Present guy can't, but Obama could and did do both. Hell, and someone who can read. Word is, the current guy can't get through a couple of pages without getting distracted. And don't you believe for one moment that he personally wrote the answers to those questions by submitted to Mueller. Didn't happen. Did not happen.) Oh, and please, someone who isn't a game show host, or a casino owner or some other kind of flashy, shallow showboat, whose wife's main deal seems to be clothes, who gets written up every week for some outrageous new outfit and has more shoes than Imelda Marcos. And how about someone who is smart enough to know they need to listen to the experts in the DOJ, the Pentagon and elsewhere, and make decisions as the head of a knowledgeable team. Make America Great Again? First, you need great people.
Waiting ....
Saturday, December 22, 2018
Seeing Past the pre-Christmas Chaos
It's Saturday. Christmas Day is Tuesday. I'm not ready. Of course I'm not. I was barely able to handle the run-up to that special day of celebrating the Christ child, family time and gifting when I only had two kids. But now I've got four more to think about — six total — ranging in age from seven to thirty-three!
Just keeping track of everything is a challenge. Gift giving alone is a major challenge. Some are easy to buy for. But there are several who are mysteries. In one case, I generally know what he might want, but he typically already has it by the time I find out he's interested! In the case of the other, I have no blessed idea what on earth to get him. But when I inquire directly, "What would you like for Christmas?" I get the monosyllabic mumble of the Millennial. He looks up from his computer screen, with something that roughly approximates "I don't know." Okaaayyyy ....
So I awoke this morning, trying hard to remember just who I had something for and whose gift was still sitting on a shelf in a store somewhere. I've got gifts in bags in my car, on the end of my bed, and at my girlfriend's house. Yeah, I know, I could have made a list. In the flurry of all the activity, I could have called a halt and insisted I be allowed to sit and be rational for a few minutes and organize myself and write things down. But Christmas Chaos prevailed.
Then there's scheduling. There are three family units who expect to see me at some time on or near the Big Day. The chances of those three family units scheduling things at different times — no conflicts? The odds makers in Las Vegas wouldn't give you much there. So the very best you can hope for is putting in appearances as you can, handing out hugs and gifts, and setting priorities, hoping you don't step on too many toes in the process.
It is my great, good fortune that Someone Else, whose brain tends more to a motherly sort of natural organization, has assured me that I'm not nearly in as big a fix as I've imagined. Yes, there's still much to do. Still don't know what to get my Millennial, for example. Clueless, in fact. But I've been told it will (somehow) all work out. I'm just going to believe that. I see with the eyes of faith. I know I've made it through the chaos in years past. So ... onward!
Just keeping track of everything is a challenge. Gift giving alone is a major challenge. Some are easy to buy for. But there are several who are mysteries. In one case, I generally know what he might want, but he typically already has it by the time I find out he's interested! In the case of the other, I have no blessed idea what on earth to get him. But when I inquire directly, "What would you like for Christmas?" I get the monosyllabic mumble of the Millennial. He looks up from his computer screen, with something that roughly approximates "I don't know." Okaaayyyy ....
So I awoke this morning, trying hard to remember just who I had something for and whose gift was still sitting on a shelf in a store somewhere. I've got gifts in bags in my car, on the end of my bed, and at my girlfriend's house. Yeah, I know, I could have made a list. In the flurry of all the activity, I could have called a halt and insisted I be allowed to sit and be rational for a few minutes and organize myself and write things down. But Christmas Chaos prevailed.
Then there's scheduling. There are three family units who expect to see me at some time on or near the Big Day. The chances of those three family units scheduling things at different times — no conflicts? The odds makers in Las Vegas wouldn't give you much there. So the very best you can hope for is putting in appearances as you can, handing out hugs and gifts, and setting priorities, hoping you don't step on too many toes in the process.
It is my great, good fortune that Someone Else, whose brain tends more to a motherly sort of natural organization, has assured me that I'm not nearly in as big a fix as I've imagined. Yes, there's still much to do. Still don't know what to get my Millennial, for example. Clueless, in fact. But I've been told it will (somehow) all work out. I'm just going to believe that. I see with the eyes of faith. I know I've made it through the chaos in years past. So ... onward!
Friday, December 21, 2018
Has it been that long? Too long!
So, my most recent previous post was in 2017. Really? Okay, I guess I've had a rather eventful life since then. Here's the short list:
1) Started writing a novel. No, that's not quite right. Began a three-book series. (Why do anything in a small way?) So that's occupied a bit of my fairly limited spare time. The spare time is limited because of point #2.
2) The wonderful lady mentioned in my About Me (Doctor of Philosophy and mother of four) has become a very LARGE part of my life. And she is writing the first of a fiction series as well. She's an overachiever. Hers is five books ... so far. Book one is in the agent-search stage. It's a zinger. My book is somewhere in the earlier formative stages. I have large pieces of it put together, but the whole is yet to come together. And it's an historical novel, so it's required a lot of research. (That's my excuse for being so slow. So much to do, so little time).
3) In August, I was laid off (as were several others) from my full-time position with a magazine (owned successively by two publishing companies) after helping to build it into the premier publication in its market over eighteen years. Magazines aren't the coming thing. They are looking to cut costs Still looking for a position. Seems I'm too old or over-qualified for most.
So, what with writing a book, helping to raise young ones and looking for work and an editor, blogging has, once again, taken a soccer-mom mini-van, third-row back seat.
The problem? Writing —blogging in particular — isn't just something I'd like to do. It's a significant piece of who I am. For me, words aren't just a means of communication. Words are food. Life. I can't wait for years for my book to come out. I've got to know that at least someone, somewhere is reading what I write. Now.
Wasn't always so. When I was in kindergarten and first grade, I thought reading and writing were the most boring thing on the planet. "See Jane run. Run Jane, run. Run, run, run." I couldn't imagine anything more boring. But then, a miracle happened. I was moved to a new school in a different neighborhood. One that had a library. It was full of books. All shapes and sizes. Books with sentences that didn't repeat words over and over. Books that told stories. Interesting ones. About fascinating people, places. Where had they been hiding this? I read voraciously. My eyes would pass over the lines of words like a starved man who had not eaten in days. I would actually salivate at a well-turned phrase.
I had a medical condition at age eight that kept me indoors. While other kids expanded their worlds on their bikes in the three-dimensional world beyond their home street and local neighborhoods, my world expanded in the magical realms fiction writers created in though the mythic power of words. I did not miss that outside time. The inside time, with writers in their inner worlds was extraordinary.
The real world, of course, impinged. My medical condition was resolved. I re-entered the realities of my street, neighborhood and the wider 3D physical reality in which I actually live. But my heart still pines to play in those places where words shape worlds and magically shine insightful light into the hearts and minds of those who live in them. In the best of those word worlds, I have found the wisdom that has guided me, comforted me, led me, cautioned me, supported me — saved me — in this sometimes harsh, painful and lonely walk through real life.
In college, I was given encouragement to write by two instructors who took me under their wings, as it were. They told me I could fly. But I quickly determined that I had little to say of lasting import. Young, foolish, a child of the 1960s, I intuitively knew I needed to grow up. I spent years, instead, writing for hire. Writing and editing other people's ideas. Developing others' verbal voices.
It is only recently that I've found my mission as a writer. I've found something I really want to say, a word world I wish to create, a time in history I need to recreate to share a timeless message.
Yet real life is actively conspiring to keep me from my word world. Its demands shout, while the kingdom of the Word calls softly. I've struggled mightly with that. The urgency of Today in Reality so often takes precedence. Can I now, despite all the loud shouts from the "musts" and "shoulds" of daily life, give ear to the quiet call to write what's in my heart of hearts, here?
Time will tell if this missive is the first of many — evidence that I will write because I must to live — or just another one-off, a meager effort that gives way to the tyranny of the urgent.
1) Started writing a novel. No, that's not quite right. Began a three-book series. (Why do anything in a small way?) So that's occupied a bit of my fairly limited spare time. The spare time is limited because of point #2.
2) The wonderful lady mentioned in my About Me (Doctor of Philosophy and mother of four) has become a very LARGE part of my life. And she is writing the first of a fiction series as well. She's an overachiever. Hers is five books ... so far. Book one is in the agent-search stage. It's a zinger. My book is somewhere in the earlier formative stages. I have large pieces of it put together, but the whole is yet to come together. And it's an historical novel, so it's required a lot of research. (That's my excuse for being so slow. So much to do, so little time).
3) In August, I was laid off (as were several others) from my full-time position with a magazine (owned successively by two publishing companies) after helping to build it into the premier publication in its market over eighteen years. Magazines aren't the coming thing. They are looking to cut costs Still looking for a position. Seems I'm too old or over-qualified for most.
So, what with writing a book, helping to raise young ones and looking for work and an editor, blogging has, once again, taken a soccer-mom mini-van, third-row back seat.
The problem? Writing —blogging in particular — isn't just something I'd like to do. It's a significant piece of who I am. For me, words aren't just a means of communication. Words are food. Life. I can't wait for years for my book to come out. I've got to know that at least someone, somewhere is reading what I write. Now.
Wasn't always so. When I was in kindergarten and first grade, I thought reading and writing were the most boring thing on the planet. "See Jane run. Run Jane, run. Run, run, run." I couldn't imagine anything more boring. But then, a miracle happened. I was moved to a new school in a different neighborhood. One that had a library. It was full of books. All shapes and sizes. Books with sentences that didn't repeat words over and over. Books that told stories. Interesting ones. About fascinating people, places. Where had they been hiding this? I read voraciously. My eyes would pass over the lines of words like a starved man who had not eaten in days. I would actually salivate at a well-turned phrase.
I had a medical condition at age eight that kept me indoors. While other kids expanded their worlds on their bikes in the three-dimensional world beyond their home street and local neighborhoods, my world expanded in the magical realms fiction writers created in though the mythic power of words. I did not miss that outside time. The inside time, with writers in their inner worlds was extraordinary.
The real world, of course, impinged. My medical condition was resolved. I re-entered the realities of my street, neighborhood and the wider 3D physical reality in which I actually live. But my heart still pines to play in those places where words shape worlds and magically shine insightful light into the hearts and minds of those who live in them. In the best of those word worlds, I have found the wisdom that has guided me, comforted me, led me, cautioned me, supported me — saved me — in this sometimes harsh, painful and lonely walk through real life.
In college, I was given encouragement to write by two instructors who took me under their wings, as it were. They told me I could fly. But I quickly determined that I had little to say of lasting import. Young, foolish, a child of the 1960s, I intuitively knew I needed to grow up. I spent years, instead, writing for hire. Writing and editing other people's ideas. Developing others' verbal voices.
It is only recently that I've found my mission as a writer. I've found something I really want to say, a word world I wish to create, a time in history I need to recreate to share a timeless message.
Yet real life is actively conspiring to keep me from my word world. Its demands shout, while the kingdom of the Word calls softly. I've struggled mightly with that. The urgency of Today in Reality so often takes precedence. Can I now, despite all the loud shouts from the "musts" and "shoulds" of daily life, give ear to the quiet call to write what's in my heart of hearts, here?
Time will tell if this missive is the first of many — evidence that I will write because I must to live — or just another one-off, a meager effort that gives way to the tyranny of the urgent.
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