It occurs to me…

Today is one of those lessons in Oswald Chambers’ My Utmost for His Highest that I’d love to just rip out of the book.  But I haven’t, which is, I suppose, a good first step related to the lesson.

“I will follow you Lord, but first let me….”  Luke 9:61

I’ll get right to the punchline in Chambers’ commentary – “We act like pagans in a crisis, only one out of a crowd is daring enough to bank his faith on the character of God.”  Earlier, above that, he writes: “Again and again you will get up to what Jesus Christ wants, and every time you will turn back when it comes to the point, and you abandon resolutely.”

In the past, when thinking and writing on this passage I have referred to it as a practice in which I, like the man in the passage, “but” God.  That it, some option or opportunity reveals itself to me with clarity, I feel led to respond (that #!$& still, small voice) in this way or another, but talk myself out of it.  At times my refusal has some logic behind it, at other times it is more flippant, but of course the logic is of no interest to Chambers.  In his binary world, there is abandonment to God and rejection of God.

I have no solution here other than to note that at times I listen to that voice, and others I do not.  I’d like to think that the instances of listening are increasing, and the rejections decreasing, but as I think that it sounds a lot like rationalization, and a whole lot like keeping score.  Then it occurs to me that in both acceptance and rejection, I am listening – which at least sounds like a good start.

“He’d always assumed that people were good, that they worked hard for any number of things that required self-interest but that certain boundaries prevailed: decency, respect for others, truth.”  Ethan Canin – For Kings and Planets,

Sometimes, when I am reading something, a line jumps out of the page at me, as if it were there just for me.  When that occurs, the meaning may become immediately clear, or it may elude me as I repeatedly return back to it and the dog-eared page that text is on.  This falls into both categories.  I am still thinking on it, but am particularly drawn to the thought that no matter the uncertainties in life, certain boundaries prevail – and if I had to pick three, “decency, respect for others, truth” would be good choices.

It occurs to me that my angst arises when my assumption that people are good is eroded, when the prevalence of “decency, respect for others, truth” are somehow put in question.  And that explains a lot about my current angst.

Life has many ways of testing a person’s will, either by having nothing happen at all or by everything happening at once.”  Paulo Coelho

I’ve been living with this quote for a while, not sure that to do with it.  Thinking on it today, it occurs to me that much of life, my life at least, is spent in the “too much” or “not enough” lanes, so much so that it has become easy to see life as a two-lane road that has only those two options – and I spend my time swerving from one to the other.  Recently, mainly based on discussions with a friend who is focusing on “sufficiency,” I have been contemplating a different construction.  What if the road of life were viewed as a single lane road of “sufficiency,” and I relegated those “too much” and “not enough” thoughts to the shoulders on either side, or even (on a good day) to the borrow ditch on either side.

While I enjoy the song all year, I make it a point on Memorial Day weekend to listen at least a few times to David Wilcox sing John Gorka’s song, Let Them In to help me remember that this holiday weekend is about more than beaches and barbecue.  The words are set out below, or you can listen to it here.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCX1cULwal8

Let Them In

Let them in Peter, they are very tired.  Give them couches where the angles sleep.  Light those fires.

Let them wake whole again, a brand new dawn, fired by the sun, not wartime’s bloody guns.

May their peace be deep, remember where the broken bodies lie.  God knows how young they were to have to die.  God knows how young they were to have to die.

Give them things they like.  Let them make some noise.  Give dance hall bands, not golden harps, to these our boys.

Let them love Peter, for they’ve had no time.  They should have trees, and birdsongs, and hills to climb.  The taste of summer, in a ripened pear.  And girls as sweet as summer winds, with flowing hair.

And tell them how they are missed, but say not to fear.  Its gonna be all right, with us down here.

Let then in Peter.  Let them in Peter.  Let them in Peter.

“There is no such thing as absolute certainty, but there is assurance sufficient for the purposes of human life.”  John Stuart Mill

I like that phrase – “assurance sufficient for the purposes of human life.”  But still, I spend a lot of time searching for “absolute certainty,” and oddly, thinking I’ll find it.

The Coleman Banks translation of The Guest House  by Rumi – to comment on it would only lessen its power:

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

As an unexpected visitor

Welcome and entertain them all

Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be brageful for whoever comes,

Because each has been sent

As a guide from beyond.

Today from Oswald Chambers: “We have to take ourselves by the scruff of the neck and shake ourselves and we will find that we can do what we said we could not.  The curse with most of us is that we won’t.  The Christian live is one of incarnate spiritual pluck.”

No sugar coating or sympathy here from Chambers.  In three sentences Chambers conveys a lot.  It occurs to me that Chambers was about 100 year ahead of Nike’s “Just Do It” and about 70 ahead of Yoda’s “Do or do not.  There is no try.”  Still, the message is generally the same.

“Every tomorrow has two handles.  We can take hold of it with the handle of anxiety or the handle of faith.”  Henry Ward Beecher

Thinking about my two-handled tomorrow bucket, I don’t know if I have quite worn out the “handle of anxiety” yet, but I am confident it is the more worn and polished of the two.  It occurs to me that the other handle, while different, will still allow me to carry the bucket, and ought to be used more often.

“More suffering comes into the world by people taking offense than by people intending to give offense.”  Ken Keyes

I ran across this quote recently and it supports the thought I have been having (those are the quotes I like best, the ones that validate my own thoughts!).  My thought is that people, and I am a people, seem to be predisposed to being offended.  That is, our skin seems to be thinning.   I won’t pretend to understand this, but have some thought that it has to do with the fact that our “soapboxes” are both anonymous and so readily available, and our egos are fed by joining in on a landslide of public opinon.  Had a bad meal at a restaurant, a bug in your hotel room, felt cheated by a mechanic – just post something about it anonymously on any one of many sites that provide review opportunities.  Read a ten-word headline about some recent action by some egotistical, bombastic guy elected to public office – form an opinion without knowing the facts.  The exchange of information is not necessarily a bad thing, but taking offense, particularly as the speed of a cell phone grab and type, at the speed of a knee-jerk reaction, may say less about the offender than it does about the offended.  Perhaps all might be better served if I attempted to gather more information before jumping to a conclusion, or noted my disappointment to someone in a position to address the concern and possibly rectify the situation.

I had to change my computer password at work recently, which is always a hassle.  I find myself typing in the old one out of habit, though I know I have a new one.  In fact, it seems like just about the time the “new” password becomes automatic, it is time to change to a different new one.

It occurs to me that this is a good life lesson here.  Change is almost always difficult.  Even when I know intellectually it is good (thwarting hackers), change is still difficult to embrace.  Yet, at some point, and generally without realizing it, the change I had such difficulty embracing becomes the change I have difficulty letting go of.   I am reminded of one of George Carlin’s comedy routines where he makes this astute observation – “Have you ever noticed that after you have a hat on for a while you forget it is there, and then, after you take it off, you still think it is there?”

All that to say – Change, hard to accept, hard to let go of.  Go figure.