Good, Old Fashioned Fun

Our age of cynicism and snark has rendered the concept of innocent fun almost painfully out of date. When we’re constantly suspicious of everything and everyone, when we’ve learned that technology is better at deceiving us than enlightening us, and when the media seems to compete at informing us of the failings of anyone of any note, how do you relax and just be silly and have fun? How do you appreciate cleanness in a culture that assumes any real enjoyment has to be at least moderately dirty?

I remember my shock and disappointment the first time I ever went to a comedy club. Before the Internet age where everyone can know what’s happening anywhere, comedy clubs held a kind of special mystery for me. What a fantastic concept – a place dedicated to making people laugh? That was before I learned firsthand about overpriced drink minimums and the apparent understanding that profanity equaled creativity or comedy. I’ve never been back since.

But the reality is that our culture and the ever-connectedness of the Internet affects most people to some degree. We can’t avoid it. It’s literally the definition of culture, something we’re immersed in and have a hard time separating ourselves from it because we’re conditioned by it. A good measure of this is to watch things from a long time ago – and your age will determine what that length of time means specifically to you, but I’d suggest at least 35 years ago, as a good starter. If you have kids, then sharing with them things you enjoyed as a younger person is a particularly effective – and often painful! – exploration of changes in culture.

So it is I’ve introduced my kids (and wife, really) to an some old friends from my younger years – Bill S. Preston, Esquire and Ted Theodore Logan. Together they have a most Excellent Adventure, only to subsequently endure a most Bogus Journey. But, now it’s finally time for them to Face the Music.

These are unlikely characters for me to have a fondness for. They’re nothing like me now nor were they anything like me back in the day. Although I fancied myself for a brief period of time a laid-back sorta California guy, it was less than a half-hearted persona. And I could never very convincingly pull off the energetic, good-hearted idiocy these guys are endowed with.

But I realize in retrospect how amazingly clean these movies are compared to much of comedy today that relies on technology or sarcasm or profanity and explicitness to grab the audience. My family has watched the first two films with me. I only really remembered the first one as I found the sequel to pale in comparison. And it does still. But it maintains much of the fresh-scrubbed earnestness of the original. It also utilizes some slightly rougher language than the first one, but nothing compared to what you find today in even PG-13 films.

Equally impressive is the commitment the actors have to their characters and the concepts as a whole some 30+ years later. As the third installment of the series opens in theaters, I’ve appreciated the way the actors protect and cherish the two good-hearted but dim-witted characters they played as much younger guys.

For instance Keanu Reeves – who I would never have guessed would be the one to go on to superstardom – has recently clarified the two characters are not stoners. They aren’t slow-witted because of drugs. They aren’t the sharpest knives in the block but they know who they are, they are committed to their friendship, and they are committed to their dream of achieving fame through their rock group, Wyld Stallyns.

Two good friends who want to make music together. Their naivete is painful at times. They’re misunderstood by those around them who are more worldly-wise (Ted’s dad, most notably) and who assume their simple natures will end in failure. But if you’re happy with who you are and you have a good friend and you enjoy being together, can your life really be called a failure, even if you aren’t rich?

I haven’t seen the latest installment but I look forward to it, in no small part because it’s rather a miracle this film has been made and neither of the lead actors really needed to do it, so hopefully early reviews are accurate and they’ve held out for a story that stays true to the characters and the style already established. But at the very least, it’s been nice to reminisce a little bit about a time when you didn’t need to be rude or drunk or stoned or naked in order to have fun. I trust that’s still true today for many, many people. I just wish we had more movies about them.

Reading Ramblings – September 6, 2020

Date: Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost – September 6, 2020

Texts: Ezekiel 33:7-9; Psalm 32:1-7; Romans 13:1-10; Matthew 18:1-20

Context: Sin. One of the central realities of Biblical Christianity, the reality and severity of sin have been greatly obliterated by modern psychological theory. It is not uncommon to meet people with absolutely no concept of any moral guilt on their part towards other people, let alone towards a Creator God. Yet sin is fundamental to the Biblical Christian worldview and anthropology – our understanding of ourselves. If sin is not a fundamental, existential issue, there is no need for a savior, no eternal consequence to our thoughts, words and deeds. Certainly this is a convenient corollary to evolutionary theory, but it is completely foreign to a Biblical Christian understanding. Yet many churches are unwilling to address the real and pressing matter of personal moral guilt, afraid that in a culture which prizes self-esteem at all costs, it will drive people away. Whether it drives them away or not is, unfortunately, not the responsibility of the Church. The Church is responsible for declaring the reality of sin and the severity of it, both in temporal effects and eternal conclusions, as well as the divine remedy centered alone in the Incarnate person and work of the Son of God, Jesus the Christ.

Ezekiel 33:7-9 – The opening half of this chapter is God’s renewed call on Ezekiel to warn the people of God of the danger they stand in because of their lack of repentance. This call was first issued in Chapter 2 and further explained in Chapter 3. Ezekiel is in exile with the aristocratic remnant of Jerusalem in Babylon. Much of his 20-year span of prophecies has to do with warnings against the people who remain in Judah after capitulating to the Babylonian siege about 10 years before the final Judean revolt against Babylon and the subsequent destruction of Jerusalem. Ezekiel continues to warn both the people in Judah as well as those already in exile of the continued dangers of unrepentant disobedience to the calls of God. God’s warnings are real and true. It is Ezekiel’s job to faithfully convey them. He is not responsible for the response (or lack thereof) of God’s people, but will be held responsible if he fails his calling to warn them. This is part of the continued work of the Church today – calling people to repentance and the assurance of forgiveness in Jesus Christ.

Psalm 32:1-7 – Where do we go with the guilt of sin? When we are convicted of guilt because of our thoughts, words or deeds, regardless of whether anyone else knows about it or not? How burdensome that weight can be, as we try to convince ourselves it’s no big deal, or that no sin was actually perpetrated! The conscience is a powerful thing, if an imprecise one at times. The reality of moral guilt also requires a means of relief from that guilt or we quickly become overwhelmed by it and unable to function. I’m sure modern psychologists would have a field day with the side effects described by David here, even if they refused to acknowledge the reality of a God before whom David is ultimately held morally accountable. Only from our Creator can true forgiveness and healing come. To pretend otherwise is foolish and dangerous. It is our joy to know our God does indeed provide healing and forgiveness. Hiding from him is only detrimental to ourselves and those around us. Honesty with God, repentance and faithful trust in his forgiveness through his Incarnate Son are the true and lasting source of healing and relief and joy that all other methods of meditation or positive-thinking can only aspire to.

Romans 13:1-10 – Had we remained in Eden, I doubt we would have need for government in the sense we know it. Adam and Eve enjoyed perfect union with and obedience to God the Father, so that there would be no need for any hierarchy or system of human administration. At least I like to think this. Even if there were, eventually, such a need, it would be perfect. However, we are not in Eden. Our connection both to God and one another is now broken and flawed even in our best intentions. Reason itself is marred. Government becomes a necessity, but also a flawed necessity. God in his goodness ordains that broken humanity organize itself and protect the vulnerable through systems of government. The Bible does not advocate one system over another, yet historically nearly every human governmental institution has at one level or another claimed for itself divine legitimacy. Some governments are better than others. Some officials are better than others. Christians are strongly warned against presuming to take government into their own hands, but rather to trust in God’s work. Good leaders exist for the good of their people. And while bad leaders certainly exist they will answer to God for their abuses, and Christians are not to assume it to be their job to rebel against power structures. We are, however, called to love. Everyone. At all times. Not just theoretically but tangibly as we have opportunity. And we are called to give thanks to God for providing means of protection through human governance. Serving God does not automatically exempt us from our responsibilities as citizens of a given political entity, even as we cling to God’s Law even should temporal law set itself up in opposition to God’s will.

Matthew 18:1-20 – How serious is sin? Far more serious than we are inclined to take it, most likely. Pervasive. Devastating. Dangerous to ourselves and to others. Jesus’ language here should leave no doubt as to the insidious nature of sin and our proclivity to turn a blind eye to it. Entering the kingdom of heaven consists of the simple awareness we cannot accomplish this on our own but, like little children, must be dependent on a loving God to give us what we could never procure on our own. It is God’s good intention to give generously, but sin interferes. Not just the innate sinfulness in each one of us, but the cruel reality that we are able to lead others into sin, endangering their eternal gift from God the Father by potentially directing them away from his love and grace and forgiveness.

All of this stems from the question posed by the disciples initially of who is greatest? We are prone to measure greatness by standards we create and control and therefore are to some degree achievable. But this is not greatness in the kingdom of heaven. There are standards there for us to manipulate, and the one who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven is none other than God himself, who continues to extend grace and mercy and forgiveness to even the least of these that we are likely to consider of little value and not worthy of such extravagant love and care.

Jesus reiterates the directive Matthew recorded in the previous chapter about the work of the Church in proclaiming the forgiveness of sins or announcing the danger of unforgiveness to the unrepentant. Here the words are linked to how matters of sin are to be handled among the people of God, where there should be at least nominal agreement on both the nature of sin and the need for repentance prior to forgiveness. So serious is the issue of sin that when it is discovered, it needs to be confronted and repentance called for. This should be done lovingly and privately, but if such means are not sufficient, things must be escalated. Always this is with the goal of bringing about true repentance – not simply acknowledgement of the sin but an earnestness to turn away from that sin. If someone who claims to be a follower of Christ will not respond to the clear teaching of God’s Word, then they are to be treated as one who has not yet learned of God and Christ. They are no longer participants of the members of the body of Christ but become those to be reached out to with the good news of grace and forgiveness made possible through repentance. Only in this way can the integrity of the Church be maintained and the seriousness of the situation communicated to the offending person, so they would repent and receive God’s forgiveness. The goal is the celebration appropriate when someone receives Jesus Christ and the promise of eternal life!

Writing Help

For all you aspiring writers out there, a little bit of help here. Or maybe a big disappointment here. Either way, worth giving some thought to. Definitely a new way to consider the old maxim that there is nothing new under the sun!

Copaganda and History

In light of yesterday’s post and the issues swirling in our country at the moment around police, this article detailing copaganda in the United States was very interesting. For those unaware (like myself, about an hour ago), copaganda is a term used to describe a perceived whitewashing of police and their work in our communities. It is a derogatory term, presuming that bucolic and benign depictions of police through programs such as Officer Friendly are patently false, deliberate efforts to brainwash the population (children in particular) into trusting police officers who, in reality, are an implied danger and threat to the population.

Copaganda of course belies a particular point of view. Whether it’s a full on distrust or disavowal of any form of authority or something more particular to the police force is a matter of degree. The underlying assumption is that the police are not there to benefit the population but rather to control and, by extension, fleece it in some way, although the article above doesn’t make clear at all what such whitewashing efforts actually accomplish and how they are dishonest. The fact that sometimes police officers do their jobs poorly – either because they are sinful humans who are prone to error or because they are sinful humans who sometimes deliberately do bad things – is taken as evidence that any positive understanding of police officers in general is false.

While I can’t remember any specific Officer Friendly presentations in school I no doubt had them. The name Officer Friendly is familiar even if the specifics of who might have talked to us and when are lost in the haze of aging memory.

What this and other articles fail to take into account is the rising level of violence in our society over the last century and particularly over the last 60-some years. I can understand why police officers and other law enforcement officials are a bit more reserved and cautious these days, especially in certain areas of town. They face threats that were likely impossible to even conceive of 60 years ago. While perhaps law enforcement has always been described as a field of service where you put your life on the line, it would appear in our country that has only grown more and more true over the passing decades.

But I’ll point out that depictions of police officers as friendly and well-intentioned is not simply a public relations move from the 60’s to 80’s, but rather how our culture as a whole viewed the police and, I would argue, everyone.

I’m philosophically opposed to the practice of binge-watching that seems all the rage these days. But the one series I am working my way through systematically (though slowly) is the original The Twilight Zone series. As a kid I loved when I could find this on Saturday afternoon reruns, and my fondness for the slightly tilted surreal reality hasn’t faded with time or with subsequent, disappointing efforts to revive the series. Combined with this is my sheer amazement at the output of Rod Serling and others associated with the show. Truly impressive from a creative standpoint!

The show is also a fascinating time capsule. It captures the sort of Everyman nuances from mid-century America, nuances that ideas like copaganda directly contradict and claim were false. What I see in those shows is a culture vastly different from today. It doesn’t shirk from portraying bad people, but it’s well-understood that they are bad and wrong and also atypical. The underlying assumption is that most people are honest and well-intentioned, trying to get through life. The trouble-makers and problems invariably end up being those who see themselves as somehow above such mundane matters, as exceptions to the rule, as smarter or better than everyone else. Their assumptions are invariably proven to be wrong, and not just wrong but dangerously wrong. Usually for themselves but also sometimes for many other people or all other people. If there’s a myth that needs dispelling, it might well be the myths of copaganda and exceptionalism that is so prevalent today rather than the boring assumptions of averageness 60 years ago.

In shows like The Twilight Zone, or Andy Griffith or any number of other successful mid-century shows, police are invariably depicted as basically good. Not perfect. Sometimes bumbling. Sometimes bad but in that case it’s clear the badness is their personal issue rather than a systemic problem with police as a concept. These might be futuristic, interstellar police such as in the first season episode The Lonely. They might be more ‘typical’ figures such as in the episode The Night of the Meek, where the policeman functions both as an Everyman kind of figure, a person just like you and I rather than a dark and sinister agent of nefarious groups and ideologies, but also as a protector, as the one charged with being objective when having to determine the truth in a given situation. We’re reminded that left to our own devices we are very capable of misreading others and accusing them of false things based on our preconceptions, and the local police officer who knows his beat and the people on it can serve as a protection for the marginalized. This is a theme also prevalent in Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?

It’s not that the series ignores the dangers of abused authority, as in The Obsolete Man. But perhaps closer to the horrors of Hitler and Mussolini, there’s an awareness of a profound difference between human frailty and flawed judgment in a moment of crisis, and a deliberate misuse of power to systematically oppress people. The series as a whole is far more prone to prowl and probe the dark corners of our souls and hearts as common citizens rather than to seek to pin blame on an external person or authority. After all, the abuses (perceived or otherwise) of a group in power are only possible because of the sinfulness and brokenness (as well as the ignorance) in our individual hearts and minds.

Just as telling in these shows is the relatively rare presence of police and other officials. People more often than not have to figure things out for themselves rather than rely on the opinions of anonymous experts or authority figures, whether that involves an interdimensional rescue or a group of neighbors coming to grips with imminent atomic holocaust. If the implication of copaganda is that we are victims of a police state, there’s very little presence of police in these shows. That overall absence also belies the fundamental assumptions that people are essentially trying to be decent and can often, if imperfectly, deal with situations on their own.

It will no doubt be claimed that shows such as The Twilight Zone represent only one slice of human experience, and that however accurate they might be in that one slice they don’t cover every possible experience. That’s true. As it’s true of everything, including copaganda. The fact that some people have negative experiences with the police does not in and of itself prove that all police or the concept of a police force is evil and wrong. Recent events in Seattle where the police were forced out in favor of a presumably better and more benevolent self-rule are good reminders this is true, and that without the restraint provided by an authority presence, we quickly revert, Lord of the Flies style, to a basic system of rule by force and the abuse of the weak and marginalized (even if that category now becomes made up of those who were formerly not marginalized).

It might also be argued that shows like these are less depictions of what is and more wishful thinking about what could or should be, or even of what once was. But I’d argue the depiction of law enforcement in such shows is not attempting to be exceptional or in any way mythic or imaginative. What makes the shows work is that police officers – whether supporting characters or the main character – are believable. The law enforcement characters are not the fantastical ones, and that even if Andy Griffith is a bit stylized, it’s not a character beyond the realm of reality for the viewers. He doesn’t completely contradict reality and experience, even if his even-keeled temperament never gets ruffled in the course of a typical 20-minute episode.

We’re sinful and broken. For some that sinfulness and brokenness is going to be more severe and pose a greater risk to others. In an industrialized and urban society (another factor copaganda doesn’t deal with) where most often neighbors don’t know each other very well and extended family bonds are often non-existent we apparently require a group of people to help maintain order and provide assistance in emergencies. Recent events have shown that though police officers are not perfect (as nobody is!) their presence is far better, ultimately, than an absence of their presence.

This doesn’t mean there isn’t room for improvement. This doesn’t mean there isn’t reason to question certain aspects of law enforcement. And it certainly doesn’t mean than when bad apples are discovered we don’t deal with them. It just means that the presence of bad apples doesn’t necessarily prove a theory of an entire system and everyone in it being corrupt and a threat to the people they claim to serve. And if some police officers have to deal with inner city violence and drug and human trafficking, it doesn’t mean that some others have far more docile beats where they are indeed able to assist in visiting schools and being a proactive positive influence in young people’s lives.

The Talk

This article questioning the value of The Talk caught my eye. The column is primarily politically motivated and I’m not going to deal with the political rhetoric that predominates the second half of the article.

I’d like to say to Ms. Brazile that I am not black or a person of color or a minority in the traditional usages of those words in our culture. But I had The Talk as well. I don’t remember the specifics but it was a very clearly communicated lesson. Police are here to protect us and as such we assist towards that end by being polite and deferential. I must be polite and deferential to use Ms. Brazile’s words. But perhaps my must is different than hers and the version of The Talk she seems to imply.

Because while I have no doubt police and other first responders were highlighted as people deserving of our respect and gratefulness, politeness and deference were something I was taught everyone deserved. My parents, my teachers, my neighbors, strangers – everyone. I learned these basic concepts in the classroom. But I also learned them at home. And at home they could explain the deeper reason and reality behind these talks. The reason why others deserved this and it was incumbent upon me (must) to give it is that I am a follower of Jesus Christ. And the command He gives me isn’t simply to grudgingly pretend to give politeness and deference but rather to actually love my neighbor, whomever that neighbor happens to be at the moment. And further still, I am commanded to love even my enemies, to pray for those who persecute me (Matthew 5, Luke 6). So it isn’t just a matter of whether I agree with the person in front of me or think they’re doing their job properly or even whether I know for a fact they are doing their job improperly, I am not released from the command to love them. And love encompasses both politeness and deference.

That was my talk, given not just once, and my talks started long before I was a teenager.

The Talk you refer to sounds different. I don’t know or presume to judge what your religious leanings are. And Lord knows in our cultural rejection of the concept of God and the authority of the Bible, lots of alternative concepts are forced into service to convince people how they should live their lives with others. Concepts like tolerance and kindness, things I’ve written about critically here over the years because they can’t possibly replace love your neighbor as yourself.

The Talk you describe sounds a lot like a talk about self-preservation and self-defense. It sounds like a talk aimed at saving someone’s life when something has gone terribly wrong, not as how you ought to be with everyone, all the time. It sounds like a talk that presumes the worst about the police and frankly, everyone else. It sounds like a talk that is ultimately not very convincing because it comes far too late, and is far too limited in scope, and it is likely being given by someone who doesn’t really believe The Talk themselves, though they undoubtedly had a similar talk at some point in their lives.

However I’m going to go out on a limb here and make an assumption and an assertion. And that is that The Talk you refer to is not the first talk or the only talk on this topic. I’m willing to wager that nearly every child in every school room in this country received a talk multiple times at a very early age. A talk aimed at teaching them how to behave with others, to show courtesy and respect to authorities and those older than themselves. A talk, even, that described police and firefighters as heroes who are here to help us.

But what also seems evident is that though nearly every single person in our country probably had those talks, there are some people who either weren’t listening or, more likely, heard other talks as well. Talks that asserted courtesy and politeness and deference weren’t default ways of interacting with other people. That the police were enemies, not friends. That you have to fake politeness and deference because they certainly aren’t warranted. Regardless of the situation.

Ms. Brazile questions the efficacy and appropriateness of The Talk if it isn’t working. But I’ve watched an alleged video of this latest shooting in Kenosha. And as near as I can tell there isn’t an ounce of politeness or deference being demonstrated anywhere in this video. I hear people screaming – which surely can’t help the situation. I hear moments of silence that I assume are blocking out profanity. I see what appears to be a young man struggling against police rather than cooperating with them and apparently ignoring their commands for some reason. It’s not a good quality video, and it might not even be authentic in this age of digital forgeries and deep fakes. But I’m assuming it’s authentic until I learn otherwise, and I’m making that assumption in good faith rather than in an intentional desire to skew things.

The Talk isn’t being followed in this video by any of the bystanders or apparently the young man at the center of it. I don’t know what happened right before this video or right after it. I’m not defending the use of lethal force in this or any other particular situation, though I readily admit lethal force is sometimes necessary and appropriate.

I’m simply observing that for a community of people you assert to have given and received The Talk, none of them are following it, as near as I can tell. Which leads me to question your conclusion – that The Talk is nothing more than wasted words. You assert this young man was innocent and was merely trying to help out a situation, but that doesn’t seem to be what’s going on in this admittedly grainy and shaky video. Regardless of what this young man thought he was doing or intended to do, it ended up with him disregarding The Talk as you described it. Which means perhaps it isn’t The Talk that’s deficient.

Perhaps it means instead we need to really look closely at the other talks this young man probably heard. Because it’s those talks he appears to be listening to, for whatever reason. And listening to those talks never is helpful to a person. In this case, he appears to have been seriously wounded. But he might have just as easily been injured to a lesser degree while struggling with the police. Or he might just as easily have ended up arrested and charged with resisting arrest or interfering in an officer’s duty or any number of other charges. All of those outcomes are bad. All are tragic. There is no outcome, no situation where ignoring The Talk you describe makes any sense.

So perhaps instead of blaming The Talk, or the police, or systemic racism, we need to examine the other talks young people are hearing. Because those talks don’t seem to be helping anything or anyone.

Sermons, Technology & Catholicism?

Since the onslaught of the Coronavirus pandemic, I’ve struggled with technology to provide sermons online for my congregation. You’d think with a background in technology this wouldn’t be so hard, but my professional technology background was never in audio/video production. It’s been an unpleasant learning curve, to say the least. In no small part made steeper by my frustration at lack of resources. Undoubtedly a change in attitude on my part my transform all of this from an irritation to an opportunity.

Or I could convert to Roman Catholicism, I suppose.

Part of my technology woes have to do with YouTube’s refusal to allow me to upload videos longer than 15 minutes, even though I’ve authenticated my account and done everything they’ve said to ostensibly allow much longer video uploads. This means I have to decide if I’m going to gauge my sermon lengths to fit inside a 15-minute format, or if I’m going to say what I feel like I have to say even if it takes longer than 15 minutes.

Now that my congregation is meeting outdoors, this takes much of the pressure off as many of my parishioners are there on Sunday mornings and don’t need it posted to YouTube.

The Roman Catholic approach (at least in the Santa Fe diocese) is a lot simpler – preach shorter sermons. In fact, priests there are being warned if their sermons consistently are longer than five minutes in length, they could have their preaching privileges revoked. This is their attempt to mitigate the risk of in-person worship, by all but eliminating the sermon.

My Protestant (Lutheran) background finds this a terrible solution. If worship is essentially God’s gifts to his people in Word and Sacrament, then to minimize the Word portion does a disservice to the people of God. While shorter services and sermons might make sense for a limited period of time, or in addition to or as alternatives to a longer preaching service, to simply not provide the Word to God’s people for months on end strikes at the very heart of what and who the Church is.

So I’ll go on struggling with technology and trying to find better solutions. And I’ll continue to find ways to bring the Word to the people of God in weekly worship. And I’ll resist the temptation to convert to Catholicism.

Reading Ramblings – August 30, 2020

Date: Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost – August 30, 2020

Texts: Jeremiah 15:15-21; Psalm 26; Romans 12:9-21; Matthew 16:21-28

Context: We are conditioned at an early age with the idea if we do things a certain way, we can reasonably expect certain outcomes. Study hard and you’ll get good grades. Work hard and you’ll be appreciated with greater opportunities and compensation. Follow a basic path towards a life that is stable and happy at home and at work. We’re in control. To some extent there is some truth and wisdom in this conditioning. But when we attempt to use similar reasoning in our relationship with God, we can quickly find ourselves on rocky ground. Does our good behavior or obedience mean God will protect us from disgrace or hardship or suffering? Does it ensure we are happy and healthy in body, mind and spirit and that our loved ones are similiarly protected? The great figures of the Bible lived their lives of faith through very trying and difficult times – should we assume we are different? If so, we run the risk of fulfilling Satan’s accusations about Job, that our faith is really only present because we’re comfortable and blessed.

Jeremiah 15:15-21 – Jeremiah’s task is not easy – proclaiming God’s judgment and displeasure and the results of that to the people of God in the city of God, Jerusalem. People who presume God’s protection could never be removed, that He would never allow his people to suffer catastrophe. But their assumptions certainly aren’t based on the history of their people. As the Israelites wandering in the wilderness for 40 years should demonstrate, God has never hesitated to chastise and discipline his people. Jeremiah’s message is not appreciated and he suffers because of it, and now cries out to God at the unfairness of it all. Why should Jeremiah be made to suffer when he is only being faithful and obedient to God’s calling (vs.15-18)? God’s response is not necessarily what we (or Jeremiah!) might like to hear! Jeremiah is chastised for complaining and called to repentance and obedience rather than self-pity (v.19). God has been, is, and will continue to be with Jeremiah. This does not mean Jeremiah will quit suffering, but it should mean Jeremiah can trust in God to defend him and sustain him in the midst of continued suffering and attempts to silence him. We too should trust in God’s presence even as we suffer from Coronavirus fears or political unpleasantries. We show ourselves to be people of God in our faithfulness and love during these challenges, rather than by presuming we are exempted from our obligations as God’s people just because things are hard.

Psalm 26 – We should admit this psalm is hard to read, initially. It makes us uncomfortable. It sounds as though the speaker is bragging, standing on his merits to demand certain things from God. We’ve read enough of St. Paul to know this would be inappropriate, Pharasaical, diminishing the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf. But if we read the psalm more closely, we see the main issue as being one of relationship. The speaker gives examples that demonstrate the trust in his heart (v.1). This is the center – his absolute trust in God, and that this trust works itself out tangibly in his life by what he chooses to do (vs. 3, 6-7) and what he chooses to avoid (vs. 4-5). In this relationship not just of external piety but internal trust and devotion, the speaker rightfully looks to God as the source of their strength and hope. He is not trying to justify his pleas for help to God, but rather knows that because of his faithfulness and trust, God will not disappoint him. We too should have this trust. Our God will vindicate us no matter what happens to us. God has and will deliver us in Jesus Christ and we can be confident about this!

Romans 12:9-21 – Paul has transitioned from his exposition about the Jewish people to encouragements to the Romans to live lives fitting their faith in Jesus Christ. Verses 3-8 focused on what this looks like within the life of faith with fellow Christians, and now starting in v.9 Paul extends this to general behavior appropriate at all times and situations. Paul summarizes his section at the start – love is not just an idea or a concept, love is expressed tangibly or it is insincere. Love actively seeks good and avoids evil. Love insists on devotion to one another in all situations not just when things go the way we prefer them to. Love honors others rather than trying to tear them down to build ourselves up. Love serves the Lord zealously. And love focuses on the big picture even when things at the moment are difficult. Love is generous and inviting to others. Love extends beyond those we like and who like us to enemies and persecutors. Love is not conceited but loves people regardless of how society defines them or treats them. It is a high calling Paul outlines, one we are not capable of on our own or based on our emotional commitment, but rather we trust God the Holy Spirit to strengthen us towards this calling even when we are tired or don’t feel up to it. That way God receives the glory rather than ourselves!

Matthew 16:21-28 – Jesus knows what God the Father is calling him to do. He is committed to doing it despite the fact it is highly unpleasant. But Peter, like us, would like there to be an easier way. A simpler way, and perhaps even a way more personally fulfilling or materially rewarding. Peter encourages Jesus to realign his understanding of God’s will with the world’s way of looking at things. Being of the world this is only natural. We presume the world’s way of honoring and giving glory is the way God works as well. What glory or honor could there be to God if Jesus suffers and dies as a common criminal? Surely Jesus can’t mean to pursue a path so contrary to how the world does things!

But Jesus does intend to because that is God the Father’s will. This understanding led Jesus to resist Satan’s temptations in the wilderness earlier (Matthew 4:1-11), but certainly Peter’s words remain tempting. Jesus truly is human and the idea of a humiliating and excruciating death are terrifying! So Jesus’ strong words here are roughly equivalent to his rejection of Satan’s more direct temptations in Chapter 4.

Jesus knows what God the Father wants and trusts God the Father to see him through it. This is the same faithfulness and trust God calls Jeremiah to in the Old Testament reading, and the same faith and trust the psalmist leans on. It is the same faith and trust you and are called to, and we don’t have a problem with this when things are going well – when we’re healthy and before Coronavirus appeared and when politics and economics are going our way. But when things are not going our way, we’re prone to wanting to take control and force things the way we think they should be. We’re prone to complain to God rather than giving him thanks and praise. We’re prone to lamenting our obedience rather than trusting in God even when things are not working out the way we desired.

We are called to take God’s Word that his love for us truly is real, even if it doesn’t look and feel the way the world decides love should look and feel. Jesus’ trust and obedience in this situation led to his victory over sin and Satan and death, to our freedom and eternal life. We can and should trust God can work even in the difficult places and times in our life to his glory and the benefit not just of ourselves but those around us as well.

Buyer Beware or Unaware?

One of those nagging little facts I retain for no particular reason is a phrase I learned in my high school economics class my senior year – caveat emptor. A Latin phrase which means let the buyer beware. The basic concept is that in any given transaction, the one handing over money for goods or services should beware to the best of their ability they are not being taken advantage of. This could be in purchasing a faulty product or not studying the terms of service carefully (a common problem these days when Terms and Conditions of products can be very lengthy and very small print!). If you aren’t careful about how you buy, you might be taken advantage of. Don’t simply trust blindly.

It’s an important concept, as it presumes the buyer is capable of being wary. That they have the requisite skills and understanding to make decisions regarding who they give their money to and in exchange for what. It was a fundamental, undergirding principle of our country for a long time, though I’m not so sure it is any longer.

Of course the buyer can’t possibly know everything. Laws have been created and passed to give buyers protections. Did that new big-screen TV not work out of the box like promised? The seller or the manufacturer or your credit card company – and likely all three – provide you with some level of protection from the reality that despite best intentions and through no deliberate attempt to defraud, goods and services don’t function the way they should.

That’s a far cry from assuming consumers are too stupid to know what they’re doing. But more and more, the assumption seems to be that consumers shouldn’t be held at all responsible for the decisions they make, and that experts should take that responsibility for them.

One example of this is in the field of health care and insurance. Since costs for health care and healthcare insurance continue to skyrocket (perhaps because the system is faulty?!?), and because more and more health insurance companies are covering procedures that are elective in nature and passing the costs on to others (gender change surgeries, abortions, etc.), it’s an important arena for consumers to be aware in. Sometimes it’s simply a matter of taking whatever your employer provides. Other times, you have options or choices, either through your employer or because you are self-employed. Even with your employer, there are usually various options and plans to select from a given provider, and so the consumer is still required to beware what they are purchasing or paying for is really what they want and need.

For seven years now my family has been a member of a health sharing ministry. This decision was made because of concerns of the changes in health insurance in terms of what they decided they would cover (and therefore what we would be helping to pay for), particularly in terms of abortions. We did our research, I talked with at least one person who had been a member for years already, and we read and reread the fine print. Samaritan Ministries did a good job then and now of clearly stating what we were and were not getting and what was and was not covered. We understood not everything was covered, and we understood that our membership and ability to submit needs for coverage was based on a shared set of Christian principles in terms of how we live our lives.

Had our health situations changed substantially (we’re all basically healthy), this might not have been a good option or an option we needed to leave behind. But we’ve so far not ever regretted the decision to move to Samaritan Ministries, and we genuinely feel good, knowing we are helping other Christians in their needs.

But, caveat emptor. And so when I saw this article pop up in a news feed the other day warning against such programs, I naturally read it. After all, regardless of how I feel about something, I want to be well informed.

Firstly, the article is primarily politically motivated, in opposition to a move by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to allow health sharing ministries to be considered a form of health insurance and therefore allowing participants to potentially claim their expenses as deductions on their taxes. The article perceived this as an attack on Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act) since it could entice more people to leave traditional health insurance plans and participate in health sharing ministries instead. This would reduce the number of healthy people paying into insurance plans and drive up insurance costs. The goal of the author is to protect the costs of those participating in health insurance plans, rather than to honestly evaluate whether there might be viable alternatives to such plans that could – using market forces – pause or reverse some of the spiraling costs of health care and health insurance. The author’s irritation that health sharing ministries are less expensive than many health insurance plans is palpable.

One particular critique is that health sharing ministries aren’t as comprehensive in their coverage. This is very true. There are many things our membership with Samaritan Ministries don’t cover. This is part of the appeal for us, in some ways, as we don’t want to be funding abortions if we can help it. In other ways, it does serve as a reinforcement to pay attention to our membership and potential needs. If we developed a health condition not covered by our membership, we’d need to evaluate whether we could remain members or not. Likewise, when I’ve been asked by others about our experience, I’ve emphasized that while it works for us, it may not work for everyone and they need to pay attention very carefully to the fine print.

Also as our needs have changed, I’ve been proactive in asking questions of Samaritan. When our oldest son left home for an internship a few weeks ago, I needed to ensure he was still considered part of our family plan, or else we’d need to help him get his own individual plan with Samaritan (or a different insurance plan if he decided to go that route). In all such communications Samaritan has been clear and forthright and prompt. Sometimes less coverage is exactly what you want, because you know you aren’t ever going to need some of the things that aren’t covered.

Yes, this means that someone with a pre-existing condition who opts for a health sharing ministry could end up with some substantial bills they need to pay on their own. That’s why they need to read the fine print very carefully. Yes, someone could simply see the lower monthly share amount and decide it was best to switch out of traditional health insurance to save some money on a monthly basis, and because they ignored the principle of caveat emptor, they could end up hurting themselves financially when things they assumed would be covered aren’t covered. This isn’t because the health sharing ministry is being dishonest or attempting to defraud people. Rather, it’s because health sharing ministries by default and design cover fewer things than traditional health insurance does. That’s not bad (at least it doesn’t have to be) but it does require paying attention to details.

Not that this keeps people from insulting health sharing ministries and, by extension, those who find them valuable.

The Los Angeles Times ran a rather bitter column on the topic of the proposed IRS changes. “Healthcare experts” are invoked nebulously as disapproving of health sharing ministries because of “substandard coverage”, ignoring the fact some such health sharing ministries are intentionally providing less coverage for certain things deemed necessary and essential by experts, such as abortions and elective surgeries for gender reassignment.

I’ll assume the columns assertions that sometimes these plans are marketed in less than honest ways might sometimes happen. Frankly, I don’t see many advertisements for these plans out there, but still, I’m sure it could conceivably happen. That doesn’t mean the plan or ministry itself is dishonest. Unless of course they’re deliberately misleading people, in which case they should be held accountable as any provider of goods or services should be – and not simply because they’re health sharing ministries.

Nineteen state attorney generals think the proposed IRS changes are illegal because of a lack of analysis of the outcomes, and because it could be damaging to existing health insurance markets. Why is it that we are guarding against potential competition in this market? Oh yeah, that’s right. Because this is a government mandated and controlled market to some extent now, and the government apparently didn’t consider the possibility of competition messing up the amazing numbers it used to convince our lawmakers to approve it. Gee. I guess we should just stick with the status quo despite there being potentially good alternatives that give the power and decision making back to the people rather than the government.

Because people apparently aren’t capable of being wary or informed in their decision making. So let’s just eliminate options for them. Much simpler. Very American. Not.

The author asserts that my health sharing ministry is offering me junk, and I’m stupid enough to buy it. While that’s always potentially true (even of insurance companies) my experience thus far is that this is not the case. To assert otherwise in such broad brushstrokes displays the very type of willful or unavoidable ignorance the author is accusing me of possessing and seeks to protect me from.

Unfortunate.

The New York Times weighed in as well with an emotional piece about a young boy with a tragic illness. The implication in the article is that this poor family is going to be ruined because they are members of a health sharing ministry instead of an insurance company. The article has multiple compelling photos of the young boy in various stages of health, and essentially paints the picture this family is being left out to dry by their health sharing ministry – Samaritan Ministries, the same one we use.

But nowhere is that specified in the article.

Instead, the severity of the boy’s situation and treatment and the likely costs of such treatment will likely exceed the cap on per incident issues. Ignoring the fact that Samaritan negotiates with healthcare providers for reduced charges because they will be paid via cash rather than having to jump through insurance hoops hoping for reimbursement. And despite the specific fact – mentioned but lost in the shuffle in the article – that Samaritan has a program specifically to help in such extreme situations. The boy’s family hasn’t been cheated or misled or anything, and there’s no certainty yet the bills will exceed the incident cap, or that Samaritan won’t cover up to the cap, and that there may not be additional funds to help them.

But just the possibility that there could be a problem is enough to justify the attack article. Despite the fact the father defends Samaritan in terms of previous issues they’ve submitted for coverage. Still not good enough.

So, after reading these various articles, I come back to to what my high school economics teacher, Mr. Conway, taught me. Caveat emptor. Know what you’re doing to the best of your ability. But also recognize you can’t know everything, and nothing is guaranteed. The authors of these various articles all give the common impression that health insurance coverage is guaranteed, yet I’m sure we all know someone who was told their coverage wouldn’t be as extensive as they were led to believe, or who were denied coverage for a particular issue.

The New York Times article mocks the company’s exhortation for members to trust in God. But that’s just what it’s members do. Not simply a claim of Christian faith is required for membership but also reasonably verifiable evidence of regular church attendance. Members do trust God, and that’s part of the point of Samaritan Ministries – is faith not simply as a pleasant sounding mantra but something that guides the decisions we make and the money we spend and how we spend it.

I pray these authors never run up against the unpleasant truth that health insurance is not a guarantee of financial safety and security. And I pray they might reconsider whether deliberately opting for programs that don’t cover everything is the same thing as receiving “substandard” care, and whether the potential for misunderstanding is the same as duplicity.

Kindness Replaces Tolerance

I warned about the dangers of the tolerance movement over a decade ago. This was a cultural buzzword aimed at disarming anyone critical over the massive changes being pushed onto our society and culture by a very small minority of people with powerful, well-placed allies in media, education and government. Don’t like the idea of marriage being redefined arbitrarily by the State – or by the individual? You’re not being tolerant.

The danger of the movement was that tolerance flowed only in one direction. Everyone was to be tolerant of the minority opinions of marginalized groups, no matter how small or how outrageous their demands. But nobody needed to be tolerant of long-standing institutions, practices, or beliefs. These were inherently excluded from the mandate to tolerance because they were deemed to be intolerant themselves. A convenient argument that served it’s purposes. Massive changes to our culture were forced through as critics from any quarter were silenced by the demand to be tolerant.

Tolerance hasn’t been heard much in recent years. But a new, related buzzword is rising to prominence – kindness. I was sitting at LAX a few weeks ago and saw a woman and her young children sitting nearby – two of the three of them had shirts touting or demanding or encouraging kindness. Later on landing from various flights, the flight attendants invariably reminded everyone to be kind as they went on their way. An Internet meme showed a letter ending with the exhortation that, if you had to choose between being right and being kind, you should choose being kind.

Kindness is a tricky thing. It sounds good. Who doesn’t want to be kind, after all? Kind, nice, these are words in our cultural that hold appeal. They’re often wrapped up in the explanations we give about how we want people to be. Don’t we want our kids to be nice?

I guess it depends on how you’re defining the term, and that’s the slippery part. Ultimately, as a follower of Jesus Christ and an adherent of the Bible as the sole infallible repository of instructions and examples of what that means, I want my children to be loving. Kind as a variation of loving might work, but kind in substitution for loving will never work. Not for very long. This was my critique of the tolerance mantra as well – it’s a lousy substitute for love. So is kindness.

Biblically, kindness isn’t a major theme. More often than not in the Old Testament when a translation (such as the English Standard Version) employs the word kindness in translation, it’s referring to God’s disposition to us, the Hebrew term chesed. Otherwise, kindness is sometimes the Hebrew word shalom, which more commonly is associated with peace. But peace isn’t necessarily a word we use as much today and so kindness is used instead (Genesis 37:4, for example). Kindness is not a common Old Testament term (if you do a word search for kind, be aware that more often than not the results refer to the translators use of the word kind as a synonym for type).

In the New Testament when translators employ the word kind, they are translating a variety of Greek words with a fair variance of meaning, such as epiekeia (also meaning gentleness), philanthropos (courteously or, more literally, humanely), chrestos (good) (Luke 6:35 – the only place in the Gospels where the ESV makes use of the word kind in translation). This Greek term word chrestos in various forms is the primary word translated as kind by the ESV.

The Bible is far more apt to talk about love, and specifically exhorting followers of Jesus Christ to love rather than to be kind.

Kindness as a metaphor or synonym for love would then be an appropriate goal for my children or for myself. But kindness as a replacement for love doesn’t work. Not for long. Kindness has too many problematic connotations. It’s possible to be kind without love. Kindness is more perfunctory, more a matter of how things are done rather than why things are done. I could imagine someone to be kind who was merely very good at superficial displays. Someone who aspires to be kind has no problem with saying whatever wants to be heard, pretending to agree with whatever is requested. In fact any number of things we consider to be quite bad in general could be justified under the banner of kindness. The goal is to spare hard feelings or difficult conversations or unpleasant disagreements. The goal is not necessarily what is best, or true, or right.

Love recognizes that there must be a best and a true and a right and sometimes, unfortunately, in the name of love we must confront people with this reality who would rather believe otherwise. I could be kind to someone and not point out the dangers of a course of action or an ideology. But I wouldn’t be loving them. I’d be more accurately loving myself but excusing myself from a difficult conversation or their disapproval or rejection of me for not simply supporting them in their erroneous ideas. Love must be tough sometimes, because love presumes some hard truths and realities, and recognizes that our feelings are very fickle and fragile. If my goal is only to spare someone’s feelings I will inevitably fail at this, and in the meantime I will likely have also failed at being honest or any number of other things as I go to greater and greater lengths to try and spare their feelings.

And of course, like tolerance, this kindness movement is only in one direction. We must be kind to very small minorities of people who insist on changing everything in our culture to suit their personal preferences for how things ought to be. Anyone who would disagree with them is being unkind and is therefore to be denounced and if necessary destroyed.

Examples? How about the evolutionary biologist having his career shredded because he insists on the science that shows that male and female are not simply cultural and social constructs that can be arbitrarily redefined or done away with completely. Science in no way supports the demands of radical LGBT supporters who insist that gender is a spectrum to be defined by the individual rather than a binary reality to be dealt with. Apparent exceptions may arise to this, but it doesn’t change the fact that in the overwhelming majority of situations, men are men and women are women and this is biologically not sociologically dictated and should be supported as such.

Or how about the sanctions enacted by more liberal democracies on more conservative democracies who refuse to embrace LGBT demands for redefinition and reconstruction of society around their ideas?

How about people losing their jobs for having the audacity to state the obvious – that not all protests and protestors are equal, and that there are some very awful things being done right now and hidden behind the masquerade of protesting racial injustice?

How about people being vilified and criticized for not simply doing what everyone else is doing, or what some people demand that they do? Being criticized for their rightful recognition that body language matters and therefore we should be very careful in what we demand from others?

The overly simplistic attack that someone who refuses to do what others arbitrarily demand them to do is evidence of racism or some other inappropriate motivation is unkind, but it is sanctioned under the kindness banner because not providing the demanded response is itself deemed unkind and therefore not entitled to the protections the kindness banner would otherwise extend.

If my goal is not kindness but love, then I am forced out of my own head and my own ideas and my own hopes to engage with another person as another person, not just an extension of myself. I am driven to listen to them, to seek to understand them. I may in the end still not agree with them, but love also prohibits me from discarding them or attempting to destroy them simply because they disagree with me. It also prohibits me from accusing them of being unkind or unloving simply because they don’t look at things the same way I do.

Kindness dispenses with all of that effort.

So beware of this latest Trojan Horse called kindness. It isn’t necessarily what you think it is, isn’t necessarily what Sesame Street claims it is, and you aren’t required to live and act and believe by it’s precepts and demands. Especially if you claim to have a Lord and a Savior who has given you far greater and deeper and richer commands to love, even if it isn’t always perceived as kind.

History Puzzles Solved

I love history. I don’t credit most of this to history teachers in primary and secondary school, though. I only recall two of my high school history teachers, who were both outstanding. But overall it seems difficult to make history interesting to kids.

So interesting historical puzzles tend to stand out in the muddle of dates and names and places. For me, the story of the disappearing colony of Roanoke is one such mystery. And now, somebody claims to have solved it.

The solution is that the missing settlers simply moved in with the friendly local Indian tribe, the Croatoans. They intermarried, and both archaeological finds and some historical statements seem to lend credence to this idea. It’s a plausible theory, so plausible it seems strange it wasn’t really discussed more prior to this.