Expect Delays

Have you noticed how often people tell you "the way its gonna be" and then it simply doesn't turn out that way?

The other night I was riding home from the office on the tollway I typically use to get home. I'm way past thinking about how much I pay in tolls each day to ride on that highway because the road surface is so superior to anything else in the area and being one of the least used roadways in northeast Dallas... it is worth every dime to me to enjoy it on a motorcycle! Anyway... the tollway features the kind of electronic roadway information signs that inform drivers of detours or delays. These are the same kind of signs that told Steve Martin's character in "L.A. Story" all about life and love. Anyway...

On the way home the other night I was traveling from much farther west than I normally do and I saw one of these signs that I typically don't see on my daily commute. On this day, the message informed all eastbound traffic to "Expect Delays Ahead."

As a motorcyclist, I appreciate any helpful information that can assist me in keeping the playing field "even" against the big "cages" (cars). Seeing the sign "Expect Delays Ahead," I backed off the throttle a bit and covered the brakes waiting for things to really bind up in traffic delays (accidents, unexpected road work, whatever...). Mile after mile proved not only to show no evidence of delays, but there wasn't even the slightest bit of slowing. Finally... after over half my commute was completed, I finally just "cracked" the throttle and let it fly completely unencumbered by traffic or delays!

So much for "intelligent" road signs!

Which reminds me of how many times I've heard people "tell me the way it's gonna be" with regard to particular situations and circumstances in life and as a result... I've eased off the throttle... covered the brakes... and then waited for the "worst" to come. I can't count how many times the prediction hasn't come true.

This happens all around us in life all the time... work, school, church, friends... have you ever noticed it? "We are never going to get this project in on time." "This test is going to be the worst ever! "This church is really gonna be in trouble now!" "I don't think our friendship can ever be the same again."

We've all heard it before, haven't we?

More often than not we choose to believe it, too. Sometimes we simply give too much credibility to the message because we assume the "source" can't be wrong. (In the Steve Martin movie, it wasn't anyway). Strangely enough, when things don't go as badly as everyone else said it would, we're surprised that things turned out as well as they did!

I wonder if there is another way?

Within reason (I'm not going to start blowing through red lights or anything...), I'm choosing more and more to assume the better and then be surprised if things don't go well. It seems inherently reasonable for Christ-followers to expect things to go well, even when things are rough or life takes an unpredictable turn for the worse. I think of some things Jesus said like, "I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Matt. 28:20) or "You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it" (John 14:14) Or other scriptures that suggest things like God works for the good of those who love Him and have been called according to His good purpose (Romans 8:28).

So, the next time you see the signs that point to "delays ahead" what are you going to do?

Objectification

I'm off to the gym in a few minutes... trying to get back into an abandoned fitness routine that though once had me in relatively good shape, but now has now left its weighty mark on my mid-section. Funny how age can catch you!

While I'm at the gym, I'm going to have my ear buds in listening to any number of artists in my "workout" playlist. That will take care of the auditory sensors available to me, but the "eyes" will still be available and Rob Bell has me thinking again about how subtle "lust" can be. I dove back into his book, Sex God (yes, the title is provocative) and he has again reminded me how brutally carnal we humans can be.

I'd like to think that with my thickening mid-section and not being the "body" I once was physically, that maybe, just maybe, I'm at least becoming more of the Christ-follower I long to be on the inside. But that is always up for grabs by our own assessments and by another's observation, I suppose. But for the past several years, I've really been working at seeing people with more righteous eyes.

Jesus talked about if a man even "looks at a woman lustfully" he has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Bell suggests that we are all "sexy" people because we long to be "connected" emotionally, spiritually (and physically) to the One who created us and, consequently, to each other. Of course, there are appropriate ways in which we are to be connected to one another, but when people "lust" and/or "act out" according to lust we circumvent the connectedness we are supposed to have for something much less. When we merely condescend to flesh, we are simply treating each other as nothing more than objects.

A girl gets stares at the gym... shoot, a guy may get stares back... but what does that have to do with the "real" person inside? Objectification allows us to merely treat each other as objects rather than beautifully created beings... created in the image of God. And so much is lost in the process -- though our culture thinks it is all good and all gain.

Now... I've got my ear phones... but my eyes will be exposed. So, God, let me see all the people in the gym tonight with Your eyes... as real people... real beings... created in Your image... and may You glory in what You see!

The Big of it All

Most people I know are basically goal oriented folks. We want a "win" and we want to know when we've "won" it. Now I don't know if that is simply the kinds of personalities I gravitate toward or what, but my hunch is that most of us live with some expectation of "life achievements" and realized "goals." It seems so common (at least to me) that we don't even give any alternative viewpoint much thought. Someone who isn't "goal oriented" is often considered "lazy" or "unmotivated."

Watch ESPN for more than 10 minutes and you'll see that "goal orientation" saturates the world of sports. "We can have a great season, but if we don't get to the championship game, does it really matter?" "So & So had a lifetime ERA of...." "If she wins this tournament, her name will be added to the list of greats!" The quotes run ad infinitum.

I've been wondering lately if maybe goal orientation is a little "off-kilter" with God's way of looking at things. Studying the life of Abraham, I've always thought of him as "Father Abraham... from whom God's people come." That is ultimately what God promised him, but in this round of study recently, I've been considering more how he got there. Besides God's calling on his life, of course, what was it that really "drove" him to be the "great" Abraham? Belief comes into play as the New Testament recounts his life. Belief was credited as righteousness. But lately I've been thinking how that fits into the whole picture.

Like all of us, Abraham's life journey with God had it's "ups and downs." There were times Abraham chose wisely and waiting on God's plan and there were other times when he got out ahead of God and ill consequences followed. Which brings me to think of things a bit differently.

What if the really "big" part of life is in how we live the "little" things as opposed to being so set on the "big" things? Could we begin to see our lives as a series of "little" daily events of faithfulness, belief, obedience, trust, honesty, sincerity, etc.? What might be the result? Sometimes I get so fixated on the "big of it all" I miss the daily things that make me truly available (or not) for God's plan. Maybe the "little" things are really the "big" things and the "big" things are... just details?

It would perhaps make for boring television to see how great athletes got to where they are for the "big win" (hours of practice, study, diet, rest, etc.) but in a life journey with God, maybe that is precisely the point!

Your thoughts?

Reflections

Raising kids is an amazing proposition. Generally we willfully step into these shoes, at times by accident and occasionally we walk in them by force. I've heard 80+ year old parents say of their 60+ year old children, "You're never done being a parent." How true that is!

Overall, partnering with my wife to raise our two daughters has been an amazingly joyful experience. People tell us we have great kids. We accept the compliment and whisper a prayer that people will always see our kids this way and that things will keep going well for us and for them. I remember my mother telling me with some frequency, "The way people see you is a reflection of how they see your father and me." That has always stuck with me. I believe it did leave me with a sense of preventative "guilt," but I guess it also somewhat guided my behavioral choices.

Recently, as my own kids navigate life and choices, I find another helpful angle of reflection. When my kids make hurtful choices, I have to deal with those choices as a parent and the reflection I'm concerned about in helping them is the reflection I see of the choices I made at their age staring back at me in their behavior now. Painfully staring right back at me, I might add.

At the time, I knew some of the choices I made as a kid hurt me when I chose them. I knew they hurt my parents when they found out about those choices (and perhaps they would have been hurt even more if they had found out about other choices). I realize some of my choices even caused damage to how people saw me and my parents. But now, looking into my own kid's choices and seeing myself... that is a new level of hurt I've not experienced before. I find it fascinating that there is still pain associated with some of the choices I made growing up... a foggy, abstract mirrored reflection of the choices I made so long ago.

As parents, we protect our kids. Early on it is protection from dangers in the "outside world" and we protect from all the injuries that can be levied against them. As they grow a bit older, we guard ourselves as parents and hopefully protect them from our own neglect and missed parenting opportunities. But keeping them from hurting themselves at any age is down-right difficult, if not impossible.

I remember teaching both my kids how to ride a bike. Walking behind with my hand on the seat... then running along side... then letting go... then running closely behind... then standing and then finally, only watching from a distance (this is why bicycle training is meant for younger parents, I'm convinced!)... it was inevitable they would eventually fall, scrape a knee and come crying for Mommy and Daddy. And they did.

Teenage scrapes, adult child falls... don't necessarily show up on the surface. Sometimes the injuries are really deep and take a while to surface. When they do... reflection may be the best cure for the pain.

I find letting my own self-inflicted pain and the pain it caused others come back to the surface may be a suitable salve for aiding the hurts and pains of my own growing kids as their choices hurt themselves and others. It is reflection of a different kind. Letting the pain come back to the surface helps me see redemption from a new point of view. It allows me to at least see some good come from what was once so painfully bad.

Life gets messy... sometimes we get hurt (and we certainly hurt others) living it. But when the pain of the past potentially offers healing for the present, that may be a reflection worth making.

Your thoughts?

Potential

It's late, I'm tired and I'm also so wired there is no way I'm going to find sleep anytime soon. I get this way at least once per week, especially after teaching or facilitating a group of Christ followers. There is something about the energy both expended and received in those contexts that stirs one's soul making the body hard to sedate and the mind difficult to rest.

Tonight, the "buzz" is more a product of having spent 5 hours with a truly amazing group of people. Male, female, relatively old and relatively young, assorted degrees of education and a bunch of life experience thrown in for good measure... we all engaged in something that is truly fascinating: potential.

As cursed as it is blessed, "potential" is one of the most amazing things I can think of. Back in the late 70's, I sketched a design idea on a cocktail napkin and showed it to a professional friend. His comment as he gazed at my sketch was something along the lines of, "Wow, that has a lot of potential!" Full of the sounds of "potential," I walked out of the restaurant feeling pretty good about my idea. I left the napkin on the table.

I never did anything with the idea. About two years later, I saw my idea roll down a street. A guy named Phil Baechler had developed the "Jogging Stroller" and within a few months of his prototype, the idea of a jogging stroller was everywhere! Potential? Yeah, I guess!

Now, I don't suggest that I was the first to ever venture onto that idea, nor do I pretend to think that someone found that napkin sketch of mine and made something of it. That would be a bit too self-assuming. Instead, my issue is with the whole concept of "potential." How many great ideas, sketches, concepts, paradigms have had great "potential" but never "got off the cocktail table" because of the limitation of the humans involved? Either an individual's lack of will or drive to execute the tasks necessary to reach the realization of potential or a group's inability to build enough community and cooperation within itself to get the job done, has likely been the bane of a bunch of "potential."

We live in an amazing age. This laptop I'm using is a contemporary icon of "potential" fulfilled (and continuing to be fulfilled, I might add). Quite likely, as I write these words there is some "techno-genius" lying awake in bed - or sitting at her desk in these wee hours of the morning swimming in the wispy thoughts of the potential of her idea as she tries to figure out a way to "make it happen."

In Genesis 11, laptop "potential" took the form of a tall tower made of bricks baked to a new level of firmness (instead of stones) with tar (instead of mortar). I'm guessing this new design had significant potential because the Lord chose to confuse the common language of the people doing the building because this was "only the beginning of what they will do. They will be able to do anything they want" (11:6).

Tonight, I met with a group of people whose talents and individual gifts are impressive. Some possess qualities that are truly remarkable. And together, tonight we began looking at the "bricks" and the "microchips" that could be the very building blocks of something with more potential than any of us have ever experienced before. Oh... the potential!

While all that potential was being expressed, we also had to lament some of the lost potential we've all experienced along the way. Many, if not all of us in the room, owned varying levels of lost potential. Some were ideas that never made it off the table top, others were moments of responsibility lost and confessions of neglect. The weight of the moment was palpable, uncomfortable and both corporately and individually indicting...and yet... right there in the middle of it all... there was this thing called "potential"... hovering like the nexus of new things to come.

What will take this group to another level? We all took comfort in something that is eternally true: "God can do anything" (Luke 1:37). Now that, has potential!

What potential are you waiting to experience? How might God fit into that plan? Does it help you to know "God can do anything?"

Adopted

Sitting around a friend's pool one Sunday evening not too long ago, my wife noticed something moving from under our friend's back fence. Seconds later, a little black puppy dog nose reappeared and poked its way further under the fence. Knowing my friend's garage was open and the side door to the backyard also standing wide open, I whistled out to the "little black nose."

Almost instantly, as if she'd done it a thousand times, a little dog came trotting across the pool deck with a rather desperate and dismayed look on her face. She was just a tiny little thing possibly no more than 6 months old. As I sat in my chair reading the Rolling Stone article on The Eagles comeback tour, the little dog made her way over to me first placing her right front paw on my leg. Instinctively, I reached down, picked up the toothpick thin bodied dog and placed her in my lap. I kept reading...

Within seconds she was asleep, but I was beginning to get strong whiffs of this little canine urchin. Clearly she had never been combed, let alone groomed. By the looks of her face, I was guessing a breeding of Bichon Frise with possibly an ounce of Poodle. Her face was sweet, but her hair rivaled the likes of any dreadlocks I'd ever seen! She smelled of things so foul I won't write of them here... but within a couple minutes, she was fast asleep in my lap.

When it was time for grilling some meat, I sat her down on the ground and she and our friend's dog got along quite nicely. After eating a great meal together, my friend's wife asked, "What are you going to do with this dog?" The first thing I thought was to give her a bath. When done with that she smelled all the better, her hair was all the worse! Next she suggested, "Why don't you try grooming her?" And the fun began...

Valium could not have given this dog a better sense of calm. Standing on the picnic table for nearly 3 hours, this little puppy let me cut all her matted hair off her snip by snip until only her face was left to be tended. She didn't look like much (I'd never cut anyone's hair before, let alone a dog's), but she looked a lot better. Then came the pivotal question... "What next?" my friends asked.

My wife is normally a big dog lover... but for some reason this time she was running the other way! But by now, this puppy wasn't moving from my side. As if she'd taken out an ad on Ownerfinder.com, this puppy had found her match! Forget the video interviews, phone messages or a first date... she was ready to move in!

Long story short, we took her home, named her "Chloe" and now you'd think she owns the joint! She's been with us for seven weeks now and it feels like she's always been around. Constantly vying for a dominant position among the other animals (another Bichon and a Manx cat named "Tiger"). She approaches any human being who sits still for more than 2 minutes, she has become a joy (and a minor pain) to the Greenhouse.

We looked for "Lost & Found" signs and none ever appeared. We had her professionally groomed and now, if she ever even had original owners, they'd never recognize her. She's put on about 1.5 pounds (which is a bunch when you only weigh 7 pounds) and is beginning to act less and less like a puppy. No doubt, she has found a home and we've found a new addition to our family

I think there is a blog "lesson" in there somewhere... Sometimes we get abused, neglected or left to ourselves. And the evil one doesn't care much if we run free, get dirty, injured or just plain die. But then Jesus takes us in... pulls off the ticks (so to speak)... cleans us up (spiritually washed in His blood)... grooms us after His nature (much better than I did with a pair of scissors)... and gives us a good home, a good name, and a life filled with love.

Chole has had a few "accidents" around the house since we've taken her in. She's adopted her former pattern of behavior on a few occasions and bolted down the street through a neglected front door. She pesters the longtime canine resident Max (an 8-year-old Bichon) to no end and makes the cat mad more often than not... but she's also fun to watch run across the yard, she tilts her head in that innocent way little puppies do as if they are trying to figure something out for the first time, she's cuddles like no other dog we've ever shared life with, and makes our whole home a more interesting place to live.

I've found myself wondering... isn't this story familiar?

What do you think?