Jason's Blog

Daniel was everything that a five year old can be—courageous, timid, confident, and shy. But most of all—trusting. Daniel’s mom had left him with her sister Milicia on a fateful day in 1957.

The family lived in war torn Croatia. Seeing soldiers with machine guns was an everyday occurance. Daniel was out in the street playing in a red toy wagon with these nineteen year olds. The boys were pulling the wagon in the street near his home, when the unthinkable happened. They pulled the wagon through a gate and little Daniel’s head was forced between two posts. He was dead in seconds.

Where was Milicia? She was supposed to be watching, but something had happened. She was distracted and now Daniel was dead.

Daniel’s mother faced all the anger, sorrow, and pain that goes with losing a child. But through it all, she never blamed Milicia. As Mirslov Volf tells this story, he always looked at his Aunt Milicia as his guardian angel. Mirslov’s mother never blamed her sister and never passed that blame on. This allowed her son to grow up free from anger, free from labeling and hurting Milicia.

I believe one key power tool that can help you with your anger in all its forms is the spiritual discipline of extending mercy. It is the wellspring of forgiveness and the source of love. If we are merciful, we can be slow in anger, free from rage, coercion, and depression. Our life will be full of peace.

How are you doing with developing the spiritual discipline of mercy?  Is mercy vibrant in your life?  If so, you’ll have a few scars to show for it.

Let me share two quotations that you might find helpful.  Joshua Grave’s The Feast (Leafwood, 2009) has a fine chapter on Suffering:

A deep spirituality molded in the image of Jesus takes root when we realize that God manages to use suffering to transform darkness, disillusionment, suffering, pain, and ugliness into everlasting beauty. . . The Apostle Paul proclaimed, ‘I want to know Christ  and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings,’ because he understood that suffering is a means by which God changes the world from its insistence on violence, revenge, corruption and domination” (p. 94).

Do you believe that God can take our brokenness and transform it into glory?  That is what He does through the cross. If you believe in the power of suffering, then you might be able to pray this prayer:

Let my trust be in Your mercy, not in myself. Let my hope be in Your love, not in health, or strength, or ability or human resources.

If I trust You, everything else will become, for me, strength, health, and support. Everything will bring me to heaven. If I do not trust You, everything will be my destruction. [Merton, Thomas. Thoughts in Solitude. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999. p 29-30].

Black and white. That is how the world use to be. It was easy to choose sides. But today’s world calls for deepening shades of gray. One piece of worldly wisdom is – “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” In politics, we recognize that candidates aren’t ruled by character and conviction; everything is about image and votes. What does all of this mean for the H-word: Hypocrisy?  The answer might surprise you.

Sadly most people have given up on being consistent or expecting consistency in others.  We expect politicians and leaders of all types to fail us.  We are a jaded lot – dripping with venom and cynicism.  We expect people to say one thing and do another.  It’s the norm.

This was driven home to me recently as I was reading UnChristian by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons.  They point out that while most 16-39 year olds hate hypocrisy, they expect it now.  They anticipate that people will play the game:

“Whether it’s enhancing their MySpace identity with that ‘perfect’ photo, playing mind games with their friends, shifting the way people think about them to gain an advantage, telling white lies to cover themselves, or boosting their credentials on a resume, young people have become adept at shaping their own version of reality” (UnChristian, 2007): 43.

What does this mean for you and me?  Two thoughts:

1.  Have you found yourself being inauthentic?  Are you worried about projecting a “perfect” image?  If so, keep in mind that the world already knows that you aren’t perfect.  They aren’t impressed by a pretty picture.  The would prefer if you 1) either admitted your imperfection or 2) stop trying so hard to be something that your not.

2.  God isn’t impressed by hypocrisy.  He sees everything.  There is nowhere that we can go and be hidden from his sight.  He sees us at the office on Tuesday and on Sunday and on Friday night.  He knows who your friends are, He knows when you cheat, He knows when you take that extra long look at the opposite sex,  He knows. . .

God has spent millennia around people who have tried to hide their mistakes and who have inflated their own egos and accomplishments.  Don’t play games with Him.  Confess. . .

He still loves you and wants the real you.

In my small group yesterday, a friend told me the parable of hedgehogs and foxes.  It is an old story dating back to at least 600 years before Jesus and is attributed to Archilochus (and you could read more about him from Wikipedia).   This story, though, has gained new currency as it has been reintroduced by the nationally acclaimed business author Jim Collins.  The story goes like this –

The fox is a cunning creature.  Day in and day out he tries to way to capture the hedgehog in his den.  He waits quietly by the road, and one day the hedgehog wanders out to him.

“I’ve got you now!” shouts the fox with glee.  The hedgehog simply sighs and rolls up into a spiny ball.  The fox is defeated again.  Though the fox knows many things; the hedgehog knows one great thing.

Collins goes on to comment that business can succeed if they excel at one thing and concentrate their energies.  Christians reading this story have to ask, “What is that one great thing?”

In our group we considered the one great thing to be humility.  This is the greatest thing that we can do.  The Bible really bears this out:

“God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble”  (Proverbs 3:34; James 4:6)

“Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3)

“Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:4)

Let me add a couple of quotes on humility from Christian authors through the ages:

“The gateway to salvation does not live open unless we have laid aside all pride and taken upon ourselves perfect humility. . . this humility is an unfeigned submission of our heart, struck down in earnest with an awareness of our own misery and want.”  — John Calvin, Institutes Book 3, Chapter 12.6

“Humility, the place of entire dependence on God, is, from the very nature of things, the first duty and the highest virtue of man.  It is the root of every virtue.” — Andrew Murray, Humility (Whitaker House Press): 16.

This really seems to fit well with idea of making 2010 and year of discipleship.  Let me encourage you to be a Hedgehog when it comes to humility.  Curl up tightly and be resolute in your desire to be humble before God.  It doesn’t matter if we are great at many things if we miss this first essential.

Yesterday in Bible class as were studying James I mentioned a book that I have found rather helpful called There’s is the Kingdom by Robert Lupton ( Harperone, 1989). The chapters are short and to the point. Below is chapter 1. Enjoy!

There’s is the Kingdom- Chapter 1