Worshipping the god of busy

I live in a small town, and I’ll often work from a local Starbucks coffee shop. Lately I’ve noticed an incredibly fascinating trend when someone sees someone else they know in the shop…the scenario plays out like this:

Person 1 (P1) sees Person 2 (P2).

P1: Hey there! I haven’t seen you in forever! How the heck are ya?!

P2: Well hey! Shew…busy! I hardly have time to breathe.

P1: I hear ya, I hear ya. What’s happening these days?

P2: Oh you know, same ol’, same ol’. You?

P1: Yep, me too. Crazy, right?

P2: Guess that’s life, huh? Well, I hate to rush off, but duty calls! It’s been great catching up!

P1: Absolutely! We should all get together sometime!

P2: That’d be great! See ya!

I watch conversations like this happen all the time. (I’ve even been a willing participant a few times). But it’s not even a conversation…it’s just a bunch of programmed responses we’ve learned so we don’t actually have to engage. Notice there are no specifics, no details, no information, just carefully chosen words that protect the conversation from any sort of meaning.

Hiding behind the lie of busyness, dancing around the cauldron of same ol’, same ol’, then scampering back to the dark forest of monotony before someone blows our cover.

One of the most awkward moments in church is when one of the leaders on stage says, “Why don’t you turn and greet the people around you…”. Crap. What follows is a series of “Hey good to see yas” and “Hey how are yas”…then a mutual awkwardness as we try to figure out who to leap into a conversational vacuum with next.

Heaven forbid we linger. 

It seems we as society are always offended, never satisfied, constantly rushing, rarely engaged, and left wondering why.

So, today, I’d like to make a proposal: change things up.

When was the last time you called someone just to chat? Took a friend (or your spouse) out for a meal without any agenda other than to spend time? Have you ever paid for the random stranger in line behind you? Ever bought someone else’s gas? (With current prices, you may have to budget for this one.) Secretly covered someone’s groceries…electric bill…just even wrote a note to someone who could use some encouragement…babysat for a couple who need a night out…

There are limitless ways for us to be generous. If we don’t have time to be generous, we’re wasting our time. When we can rush our kids around to 47 different extra curricular activities, but can’t write three sentences in a note, there’s something wrong.

I don’t ever want to have conversations like the one I shared above…I want my interactions to be meaningful. From listening to my oldest son tell me about the largest hailstone in history for the millionth time to cashier in Target who’s having an off day.

As Thomas Merton says, “If our life is poured out in useless words, we will never hear anything, never become anything, and in the end, because we have said everything before we had anything to say, we shall be left speechless at the moment of our greatest decision.”

Let us not give air time to meaningless words, actions, and pursuits. Their temptations are powerful, but the end results are stunningly inconsequential.

Generosity is a sign of life…a sign that we are paying attention…

When it comes to the needs of people around us, whether we know them or not, I pray our attention is rapt.

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“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” // Jesus Christ

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What are your ideas for ways we can invest in, show generosity to, and care for the people around us? Please share!

Pay Attention

“Can I put those items at the front counter while you finish shopping, sir?”

I never made eye-contact, but the retail worker stretched her hands toward the pile of glass bowls I was balancing in my arms.

“Thanks, that would be great,” I said, still concentrating on her hands.

Her hands.

They were gentle and middle-aged, slightly weathered but well cared for.

As I transferred the bowls from my arms to her hands, I noticed there was an untanned circle of skin around her left ring finger. As if an actual band of precious metal representing a long-standing relationship or marriage had once occupied that space, but no longer.

She headed in the direction of the front counter and I continued scouring the shelves for bargains. That was the end of our short, no eye-contact interaction.

After we checked out, and as my wife strolled into another store, I opted to stroll our special-needs son, Jude, around outside the doorway as he let us know in no uncertain vocal terms he was quite bored of our shopping habits.

I pushed his stroller back and forth in wider and wider paths until we began passing back and forth in front of the store where I bought the bowls.

And there she was. The kind woman who had helped me only moments ago. Standing in the shop doorway.

Weeping.

Another woman around the same age had pulled her into a tight embrace and was trying very hard to help bring comfort.

“It’s going to be ok,” She was saying, “You won’t be alone, I am here for you…divorce isn’t the end…”

Woah. I didn’t see that coming at all.

Mostly because I wasn’t looking.

I wasn’t paying attention.

I was so busy eyeballing the sales, I completely missed an incredibly broken person standing right next to me.

Our hands touched, but I never even looked at her.

All day long she served customers who had absolutely no idea that as she smiled at them, her heart lay broken inside her.

A line from the film Crash that came out several years ago that’s always stuck with me sums up this moment powerfully:

“It’s the sense of touch. In any real city, you walk, you know? You brush past people, people bump into you…We’re always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something.”

In scripture, Jesus invites us to walk two miles when we’re asked to walk one…

to give our coat also when we’re asked for our shirt…

to bless…

to pray for…

to love…

And all those things specifically for people who appear as our enemies!

So, if that’s how we give our lives away to our enemies (which is a whole different topic for another day), then how much more so should we give care to the broken and indifferent?

We must learn to pay attention.

To our spouses and children and close friends (they should be the most obvious).

But to the server having a terrible day at the restaurant where we’re eating…

The clerk behind the counter with a bad attitude…

The smelly guy who cuts in front of us at the grocery store…

Create your own list.

Make eye contact.

Be merciful.

Give grace.

Offer second chances.

Speak life and healing.

Pay attention. (A command I give my children all the time, but one that I need more than they do.)

Generosity (in any form) is never wasted.

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“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”  // J.R.R. Tolkien // Lord of the Rings

Why I wanted to make my wife cry

Part 1 of some thoughts on love…Wednesday is part 2

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I’ve always counted myself to be something of a romantic. In fact, when my wife and I began our collision course toward marriage, I developed a plan where I’d pull off so many legendary moments of courtship bliss that her tears of appreciation would be as plentiful as coins on Super Mario Brothers.

That…did not work out. Mostly because I expected her to melt each time I gave her a Hallmark card, and she turned out to not be much of a crier.

One night at the end of a date, I took her by the church where I led worship. The entire stage had been decorated with a hundred various candles, and a soft blue spotlight lit the grand piano in the center.

This is it, I thought, After I finish singing her this love ballad I wrote, she’ll be a puddle on the floor.

So I sang to her.

When I finished, I looked at her with an incredible imitation of “the smolder” from Tangled, fully expecting tears to be pouring down her cheeks.

Instead…she looked back at me (completely dry-eyed), smiled and said, “That was beautiful, thank you.”

Are. You. Freaking. Kidding. Me?!

That was so romantic that I almost cried!

Why was she resisting my powerful gestures of love?

She wasn’t. I simply had a huge misunderstanding of the purpose of love.

The whole time I had been trying to use love as a weapon to garner a particular response. I was treating love like a stock; if I bought enough shares, at some point surely it would begin paying dividends. In a strange way, it was as if I was seeing her as an option in a vending machine…all I had to do was drop in the right amount of love coins, press a few buttons, and voilà! She’d be mine.

But that’s not how love works at all.

Actually, learning how to love will end up changing us far more than it ever changes anyone else.

Whenever you see a command for us to love mentioned in the Bible, it’s always associated with sacrifice.

When we love…we are changed.

Love chips away at our fear…

Love lays waste to our selfishness…

Love erases expectations and grudges…

Love requires us to give our lives away…

As C.S. Lewis so poignantly explains, “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”

The aptly named “Love Chapter” (1 Corinthians 13) is bluntly honest about what love should and shouldn’t be like.

The summary is this: love is generous. In authority, in service, in discipline, in difficulty, in hurt, in relationships.

Of course, the most incredible picture of this is shared in what must be the most famous verse in all of Scripture…John 3:16…

”For God loved the world so much that he gave…”

Before you even existed, He gave. Before you ever knew you needed Him, He gave.

In the same way, the story of our lives should be…

Because we love…we give.

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Who needs you to personify that today?

Sex, community and waiting for a better model

My wife, Jordana, and I went on a double date last night with another married couple we’ve been friends with for eight years. Somehow we ended up on the topic of Apple products, and how annoying it is that every time we take the plunge and make a purchase, within mere minutes a newer model is released.

And it doesn’t matter how fantastical what we just bought is…suddenly we feel like we’re missing out on something better. Then this little voice in the back of my mind whispers, If you had only waited just a litter longer…

In fact, whenever I see someone using an ancient Apple computer (i.e., older than 3 years) I’m in awe. I’ll say things to them like, “It’s so rare to see someone still using this version after so long…how did you make last?” I view those people as some kind of technology saint.

Can I get a witness?

What’s interesting is, I say almost the same thing to couples that have been married for a long time.

“How did you make it last?”

Perhaps we could chalk it up to a less upgrade-happy, less instant gratification addicted generation.

Perhaps.

But I’m 100% positive that marriages that last have the potential to face just as many challenges as the ones who don’t.

The difference is who we are when it’s time to step up.

What I’ve noticed recently, and what several have lamented to me is that when it comes to relationships, shallow is the new casual.

It’s as if people are choosing to only spend time in groups (safety in numbers), or not engage much at all (if I don’t go out, I can’t get hurt).

We’ll use terms like…

“Oh, I’m just guarding my heart…”

“I’m really trying to be more intimate with Jesus right now…”

“Community is my biggest need…I’ll have time for dating and marriage later…or maybe I’ll just hang out like this forever…who knows…”

But, really it’s because we know that when you step into a relationship…especially one that heads toward marriage, and possibly to (holy dirty diapers, Batman!) CHILDREN, it requires…

Risk.

Vulnerability. Selflessness. Style cramping.

For some, it’s simply not worth it.

The fear of what might happen if we do is just too much.

Fear of what they might find out if they get too close, maybe even fear of what we might find out about them.

Fear of getting in and finding out that if we had just waited a little longer we could have gotten a better model.

So we just stay shallow.

So we just don’t ask them out.

So we just…hide. Behind past hurts (we all have them), behind our addictions to comfortability (why rock the boat, right?)

But, if you find yourself having DTR (Define the Relationship) conversations with people who are just supposed to be friends, something is wrong.

If you find yourself playing fast and loose with your sexual life while ignoring all the deeper needs both you and the other person are carrying, it’s time to reassess.

If you find yourself over-thinking and over-analyzing glances, seating order at small group, the phone that never rings (or maybe rings too much)…take heart.

Remember? The difference is who we are when it’s time to step up.

Much of kicking shallow to the curb and choosing something more is about being generous first.

It’s not easy. It’s actually pretty difficult. People don’t always respond the way you hoped. You might even get disappointed, rejected or let down.

You can ask my wife…I have a lot left to learn about these things, but as the wise philosopher, G.I. Joe, always said: “Knowing is half the battle.”

If you can start looking at the people you are in community with and care about as people you should be giving your life to, not guarding your life from…those relationships will start to take shape the way they were meant to.

Love is about generosity. Life is about generosity.

Generosity is never wasted.

Generosity begins with us.

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We’ll continue chatting about relationships in the next post as well…

Have you experienced any of these issues? Please share your story!