Not So Secret Identity

"You're intelligent..." I smiled, glad of the complement and that a good friend recognises my genius, "...compassionate..." again I smiled, nodding this time in acknowledgement of their insight "...and you have an anger problem, which is why you're like the Hulk from the Avengers."

I laughed. It's true.  One of the the lines from the film that made me laugh out loud, "That's my secret, I'm always angry." It resonated with me, a lot.

Anger isn't far beneath the surface for me, for all sorts of reasons.

I get angry at injustices - small and big, raging full on anger.  The news of the weekend - another massacre in Syria, another aquittal for a rich man in the face of huge evidence against him, another politician misusing power, another unveiling of child porn... It is enough to drive me into raging despair.  Anger like this is good because it motivates me to be clear sighted and clear headed: demands that I do not accept the unacceptable.

I get angry at foolishness - poor decisions that impact lots of people, thoughtless action that leaves others disenfranchised and marginalised, selfishness that leaves others on the edge of relationships stunned and hurt, the waste of money and resources that disregards the lack of resources of others.  Anger like this leaves me vulnerable to judgementalism and self-righteousness.

I get angry when I'm challenged - both just and unjust challenges provoke me and leave me with a choice.  How must I respond?

I get angry when tired, pushed too hard, inconvenienced and overlooked.

The New Testament is clear - anger is no virtue and is dangerous ground on which to make decisions, base relationships and live life.  There is room made for it but not much:

"Be angry but do not sin" Eph 4:26

So how do I 'deal' with my anger:

1. Vent not, want not.  Venting anger doesn't often help - it feeds the flames rage with fresh oxygen and intensifies the feelings.  I look to express rather than to vent: examining and exploring what has got me angry.

2. Wait and ponder.  In not venting, neither do I stew - but I do give time to think and reflect on why I'm angry: is it good, bad or ugly (or most often - just complex).  Why am I angry? Is a great question to ask myself and I try not to let it begin with 'because they...' but with 'because I...'

3. Repent in haste, respond at leisure.  I have to be quick to apologise - not at a surface level (a 'sorry' that is not sorrowful is worse than the initial injury) - if I've spoken out of turn, I try not to justify it but to acknowledge it, see the injury and learn from the moment.  Sin is part of the pattern of the human heart that the grace of God is working on in me: I learn much about the greatness of my saviour in the confronting of my sin.

4. Look back in humour - again, not to belittle the moment, but if I were to hold on to sorrow for every time I stepped out of line in this area: let's just say a lifetime would not be long enough to dig me out of that particular hole.  I need to learn to laugh at the ridiculousness of my own studpidity and sin - that way, I'll probably learn to see the lighter side of other's darkness too.

5. Pursue honesty in friendship - confronting other people well is an investment into better relationships.  Not the faux honesty of 'assertiveness training' which is all about getting what our selfish hearts want but being honest in ways that invite people into deeper friendship - being honest about being angry can open doors into vulnerability in me as well as others.  It's a little bit like learning to swim at the deep end of the swimming pool - it might not be ideal, but it is pretty effective.

What are the big issues for you?  How do you deal with them?

Dirty Growth

I've just returned from a week in Vanuatu. I'm thinking about growth and vulnerability, dirty hands and hard work.

Some of my time was spent with a team from the church we attend here in Auckland. As we visited friends in Vanuatu the guys gave time and energy in doing odd jobs around a camp site. They came to snorkel, sightsee and serve. They got their hands dirty and reopened a shower block that had been closed, waterproofed a container so it could be used to store books and resources again, built and painted a wee tuck shop that opens the possibility of raising some revenue for the camp, repaired leaky pipes, installed a water tank, shared life with one another and those on site and enjoyed the beauty of Vanuatu.

Some time was spent with local preachers; church pastors and elders.  We shared meals, talks, dreams for Vanuatu, hopes for God's church and encouraged one another in how to train the next generation of men and women who will share God's work.  One of the leaders said of the women she works with - "they said they would no longer come to my 'preachers club' because they never 'preach'. So I changed the name of the club to 'better ways of handling God's Word' and now they come and use the Bible in their family devotions, also many of their husbands are now coming along too." From the pulpit to the dinner table God's Word is making an impact.

A little time was spent with the students studying in Port Vila; over dinner before the Friday night gathering and in the meeting itself.  Their joy and enthusiasm, their sense of fun and their hopes for the future are clear as they chat - as is their diversity, vulnerability and the work of God among them.  One of the students said over dinner "Before I studied the Bible with CF it was like a book with a random collection of moralistic stories, but now I see that it is very powerful as God speaks" another student responded "yes, we look for the answers and solutions to problems but they are all there in the Bible, people now face the same kinds of questions they people did from 2000 years ago".  In the meeting there was lots of laughter and a real earnest longing to know God better.

None of the above realities are 'neat and tidy' all of them presented real vulnerabilities, difficult circumstances and, in different ways, require men and women to get their hands dirty.  Growth does not come in prepackaged. convenience focussed, bundles.  Growth comes in hard work, faithful and creative labouring and the willingness to plunge our hands deep into the work of God.

This is not rocket science, in our western obsession with safety, strategic goals, measurable progress and defined areas of work focus we are too often concerned for self above a passion for growth: therefore we limit the scope and depth of growth.

I heard someone today say that the future belongs to those who are willing to get their hands dirty.  The future belongs to Jesus, however, His word is full of metaphors that demand dirty hands: farming, labouring, building, sowing, shepherding, harvesting...

If my Saviours hands are scarred and dirty - should mine be any different, no matter what he calls me to?

The silent killer – a virus for our times

I’m infected.  There have been signs for a while that should have aided a self diagnosis but it was only yesterday as I heard a fellow sufferer speak about her own symptoms that it all became painfully clear.

“a sense of entitlement is a virus that eats away at us.” She said it plainly and all of a sudden everything fell into place.

 

I’m infected.

I think I should have more, be more – that at 42 I deserve more than I have. I feel entitled, owed: those around me are indebted to me and need to cut me more more slack, afford me more respect and show deference to my opinions, wants and needs. 

I feel like God owes me: comfort, time, better housing, more generous holidays, sunshine on days off, money for my wants as well as my needs, children who are unquestioningly obedient, a spouse who is unfalteringly patient, cars that sail through traffic, health that doesn’t deteriorate, coffee that’s always good, people to serve me without error or inconvenience, days without loneliness, cake without calories, success without effort… the list goes on and on and on.

I’ve harboured and cultured this virus – I’ve warmed it with self-pity, fed it the pure proteins of consumerism and sheltered it in the dark humidity of self-interest.  The infection is bad and has a real grip.

As I listened to the speaker at church yesterday, an ordinary woman who has served for many years in a war torn country, talking about the infection of the entitlement virus – the diagnosis and the treatment were clear.

• I am owed nothing – everything I have is an amazing gift. Gratitude, not grumbling, is the first line of attack: gratitude for life and the honour of knowing God in Jesus Christ – each day is a gift. 
• Humility paralyses the virus – God is God, I am not: this is His world not mine, I serve Him not Him me, and this world does not function as He designed it; inconvenience and hard work are just part of life, remembering this keeps the symptoms of the virus in check.
• Changing the intellectual and spiritual environment starves the virus and renders it ineffectual. Feeding myself with the truth of God’s Word, choosing to serve among His people and both love and be loved in the great imperfections of life are the antibodies which course through a system and prevent the virus from thriving: the light of the gospel prevents it feeding and spreading.
• Being loved in Christ Jesus, kills the virus off. God has given us His Son and now, nothing good is withheld when it is good for us. I am owed nothing but, owned in Christ, I have laid hold of an inheritance which means I am rich beyond the wildest and truest hopes of humanity.

Today I feel a little freer of the symptoms of the virus which could prove deadly.  I’ll keep taking the medicine and antiviral therapies until the end of my days – then, I shall be truly free.

What about you? How infected are you?

Frail Flesh

 

My song is love unknown,
My Saviour’s love to me;
Love to the loveless shown,
That they might lovely be.
O who am I, that for my sake
My Lord should take, frail flesh and die?

Samuel Crossman

Jesus was born into a time of economic, political, social and religious tension.  The Roman census which displaced Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem is about tax revenue and may well have been the spark that ignited civil unrest (taxation and protest have long been closely aligned).  Herod ‘the Great’ responded viciously to any hint of rivalry, dispatching forces to murder infants and toddlers who could be the prophesied Davidic King/Messiah.  Religious authorities were revelling in the rebuild of the Jerusalem Temple, funded by the half-Jewish Roman puppet king that Herod was.  The world was in upheaval.

Jesus was born into this messed up, volatile, tense and fractious context.  On a night of banal regularity, a young woman gave birth to her first child. She was remarkable only in that her story echoed those of so many others.  Poverty, risk, desperation and isolation accompanied the birth of her son, her husband the only help at hand that we know about.  His hands, so used to carving wood, put to the unfamiliar tasks of birthing.

This child born without a halo, lacking the symphonic soundtrack, at risk of infection, starvation, hypothermia… the normal risks of birth in a non-medicalised environment. This child is so ordinary: mucus wiped away, his body dried, his umbilical cord cut, fed at the breast, placenta delivered.  He would be placed out of harms way – to sleep off the rigours of birth as mother and father cope with the clear up.

Off in the hills above the town shepherds are visited by angelic beings and are told what no one would know, if it were not for Heaven being unable to hold its secret silent.  Off in the distance pagan magicians follow a star they have divined heralds the coming of a Jewish King who would see to the rise and fall of many nations.  In the northern hills of Galillee, Elizabeth, an elderly woman cradles her own miracle 9 month old son, and wonders when the news of her kinswoman’s delivery would come; when the news of the Deliverer would reach their village.

This frail child, lain in an animal feeding trough, is the Bread of Heaven come down to bring eternal life, the Light of the World come to reveal the way, truth and life, the One and Only Son of God.  His frail flesh will grow and is headed for the cross, the grave and then to reign as the Lord of Life defeating Death for all eternity.  There in that child, God has not simply come to be among us – but has come to be one of us, to be with us, that we might come to know Him.

Two thousand years on, we gather in malls and spend money we do not have, eat food we do not need, buy clothes that will not wear out before we weary of them, celebrate an old man dressed in red, lie to our children, lie to each other and talk of the spirit of Christmas. All the time Christ is reduced to a plastic figure at the base of trees: ignored, marginalised and paid scant regard as we march on into selfish consumption.

How fitting a reminder of our need for Him still.

O holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin, and enter in, be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels the great glad tidings tell;
O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!

Have a great Christmas:

don’t allow the celebration

to hide Christ from your heart.