change

Posts Tagged ‘change

Feb

A Changed Life

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: change, God, Guatemala, Jesus Christ, John 3:3, life, new, Nicodemus, perspective, transform

Several years ago, Joan and I took a little vacation trip to Orcas Island.

In case you are not familiar with it, Orcas Island is located squarely in the middle of the Straits of Juan de Fuca in the Puget Sound area of the state of Washington. It is a beautiful place where you’ll find trees, mountains, waterways, charming shops, quirky, creative restaurants, and friendly, engaging people.

It’s so quaint it’s practically Canadian.

We stayed in a spacious room at a local bed and breakfast. Our room featured a wrap-around balcony where we could sit out, drink coffee, and contemplate the miracle of God’s creative genius.

During our time there, we shared this bucolic place with two other couples. As you do at B&Bs, we crossed paths with those couples at the breakfast table. After exchanging introductions, we began swapping notes about our favorite parts of the whole Orcas Island experience.

One couple – I don’t remember their names, but let’s call them Fred and Ethel, just for fun – absolutely RAVED about their experiences with tandem ocean kayaking around the island. No, Fred and Ethel did not RENT a kayak from a local outfitter. They OWNED their own.

At one point Fred explained their enchantment with ocean kayaking by saying, “You know… we came up here about five years ago and rented a tandem ocean kayak. And it CHANGED OUR LIVES.”

Joan and I smiled, nodded politely, and shared our experiences about one of the local hikes. But when we got back to our room, I’m sad to admit that we got a little catty. We stopped, looked at one another and said,“Really? Tandem ocean kayaking changed your LIFE? Really??”

Since that time – thanks to Fred and Ethel – I have tried to be especially cognizant of the things I describe as “life-changing.” For me, the bar must be set a bit higher than finding a cool new hobby. For example…

Falling in love? Life changing.
Becoming a parent? Yes. Also, life changing.
Accepting Jesus Christ as the Lord and Savior of my life? Absolutely life changing!
Tucking in to a transcendently delicious peach cobbler? Splendid, yes. But not life changing.

In order to say a thing was life changing, something profound and elemental about WHO I AM must shapeshift from THIS to THAT. According to my concise rulebook, a person needs to be able to paint a vivid “Before” and “After” picture of their entire identity and self-understanding before they may use this weighty, loaded phrase.

And it is with this background in mind that I dare to proclaim to you that my first trip to Guatemala was truly life changing.

It was a trip I took with 11 other seminary students in 2003. It was called an Immersion Trip because the purpose of the trip was to immerse ourselves in the baptismal waters of the stories of the people of Guatemala. From their bloody history of the 36-year-long civil war, to their long litany of exploitation by the American government, to the rich, proud indigenous Mayan culture, to the crushing poverty of 90% of the population, to their endlessly buoyant spirits…

… that trip met all the criteria to justify the label “life changing.”

I went down as one person and returned as someone else entirely. And oddly enough, something very similar happens every time I return there.

Joan and I just got back from spending a week on a humanitarian mission to Guatemala. It was a week that gave us new eyes. New hearts. New minds. And certainly, new backs and hands because of the work we did there.

Along the way, I discovered another quirky quality about life change; that is, its impermanence.

How often does it happen that we are catapulted out of our familiar orbit, only to fall prey – once again – to the gravitational pull of old habits, old mindsets, old routines, and old beliefs?

All of which brings me to the subject of Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent. Lent is a time set aside in the church calendar to stop… take stock… turn around… and to recalibrate.

Lent is not just about giving up chocolate or alcohol. It is about being ritually reminded to look at the entirety of our lives and to dare to ask, “Why do I think that?” “Why do I DO that?” “Why am I attracted to that?” “Why does that occupy such an important place in my life,” and “Does it really deserve that place of prominence?”

Yes. Change is hard. They say that babies in wet diapers are the only ones who actually like change.

But it’s kind of like what Jesus told the priest, Nicodemus during their famous midnight meeting: “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” (John 3:3, NRSVU).

Happy Lent, and abundant blessings;

May

Holy Unsettledness!

By revruss1220 6 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: adventure, call, change, comfort, familiarity, God, Jesus Christ, routine, settledness, YES

I love to travel.

In fact, Joan and I just returned from a great, nine-day trip to the state of New Mexico. In fact, if you’d like some tips on things to see and do in Taos, or White Sands National Park (Sand. The attraction there is SAND), or Cloudcroft, or at Carlsbad Caverns, drop me a line. (revruss1220@gmail.com).

There are delights and surprises around every corner in New Mexico. We discovered that it is a very EMPTY place, too. Small wonder our government chose it as the perfect place to blow up atomic bombs, test missiles, and hide aliens.

Enchanting, indeed.

Along with the adventure of travel, though, comes no small degree of unsettledness. What I mean is, you spend the whole time driving on strange roads, sleeping in strange beds, seeing strange sights, eating strange food, and meeting all manner of strange people.

Yes… you are correct to remind me that breaking out of the daily, predictable pattern of life is the whole point of travel. But it is also no surprise that I usually return home from a trip carrying a peculiar mixture of sadness and relief in my heart.

“WHEW!” I said out loud as we finally pulled into our driveway. “Home again AT LAST! Back to predictability. Back to my OWN bed and back to our ‘normal’ lives. Back to settledness.”

Later that day… after the car had been unpacked and the first load of laundry started… I began thinking. As I listened to the gentle “ka-thump ka-thump, ka-thump” of the clothes dryer, I wondered, “As good as it is to be back to the predictable places and patterns of HOME, is it possible to fall too much in love with this kind of ‘settledness’? Could I – or could anyone for that matter – ever make an idol out of ROUTINE and PREDICTABILITY?”

I think we all know the answer to that question, don’t we?

As much as we gasp in horror when our apple carts are unceremoniously upset, we each know the truth. And the truth is this: sometimes apple carts need to be upset. Sometimes routines need to be disrupted. Sometimes sacred cows need to be turned into delicious hamburgers.

We see plenty of stories of that very thing happening in the Bible. God plucked a very settled, successful man named Abram from the middle of the comfortable life he was living there in Haran and told him to go to “a land which I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1, NRSV).

Later, God set a bush on fire in the middle of the Sinai wilderness, interrupting the quiet afternoon reverie of a shy, stuttering young shepherd, and told him to, “… bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” (Exodus 3:10, NRSV).

Over and over and over again in the Bible, we see God snatching the TV remote out of people’s hands, tossing them off the couch, and yelling, “Get up! I’ve got a TASK for you… a task that will UPEND the comfortable, SETTLED life you are living right now!”

You might even say that this kind of thing happens SO often we might conclude that it happens ON PURPOSE! God seems to keep pulling people – ordinary people like you and me – OUT of our routines to accomplish God’s purposes.

It MAY BE that God is calling you RIGHT NOW to step out of your comfort zone and do something extraordinary to accomplish those purposes.

Then again, it may not be. I think back to the 13^th century monk, Brother Lawrence, who spent his life cooking in the monastery kitchen as his act of devotion. He found ways to infuse holiness into every pot he washed, every potato he peeled, and every brick of every floor he scrubbed.

Whether settled or not. Whether routine or not. Whether predictable or not. I think the point is to be READY to respond completely and unequivocally to God’s call.

Happy travels!

Abundant blessings;

Feb

Karma, Karma, Karma, Karma…

By revruss1220 3 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: adjust, chameleon, change, fit, Jesus Christ, morph

I once knew a guy.

We called him, “The Chameleon.” Cham (pronounced “CAM”) for short.

We called him that because of his great talent for effortlessly blending into his surroundings.

If you were ever to ask him, “Who are you?” his answer, inevitably, was, “Who do you need me to be?”

Through some innate sixth sense, this guy could read the room and BECOME the person he thought everyone required in that moment.

Need a practical joker? Cham was your guy.

Need a trusted confidant? He’s right there.

Need someone you can kick an idea around with? At your service.

Everybody liked Cham. That was his aim. He figured that if he could avoid being too loud, or too pushy, or too high-falutin’, or too goofy, or too brainy, or too shy, he could be on good terms with just about anybody.

Yes, he knew the price he was paying for adopting this presto-chango personality. Cham knew his genuine, honest-to-goodness self might vanish FOREVER beneath the surface of his continuous shapeshifting!

He didn’t care. That was a “somewhere out there” danger. Right now, today, things were working out. He was fitting in… making friends… pleasing people.

If it sounds like I know a lot about “Cham,” you’re right. And there is a very good reason for that. It’s because Cham was ME. And I am beyond thrilled to be able to use the word “was” in that last sentence.

And it’s about damned time, too.

I am finally free. Liberated from Chameleon Prison.

My jail break was anything but easy. You see, the tricky part of this whole thing is being able to recognize “Perennial People Pleasing” for the dysfunction it really is. The pleasers themselves don’t recognize it. They just think they are doing everyone a big favor by blending in seamlessly. The pleasers’ “audience” doesn’t recognize it because they are having such a great time being catered to.

It is only when the Chameleons of the world are asked to stand up and give an accounting of themselves (ourselves) that their (our) personal hollowness becomes apparent. That’s when they (we) start counting the cost.

And it is at that exact moment that the anger starts to rise to the surface. The target of that anger should be the one who looks back at them from the mirror. Because THAT one is the real mastermind behind this brazen heist.

The trouble is, the Chameleon doesn’t know that person. He/she is a stranger. And so, the Chameleon lashes out at everyone else. Everyone who played along and enabled the crime.

But some chameleons are lucky. Some of those lost chameleons get found by Jesus. Some chameleons hear that sweet, sweet voice whispering, “Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you, I give people in return for you, nations in exchange for your life,” (Isaiah 43:3, NRSV) and realize that the voice is speaking to THEM!

Those lost, lucky chameleons also hear the Good News telling them that their life is not a mistake or an afterthought, that their flaws, sins, errors, and missteps are completely known, accounted for, and FORGIVEN! And then, upon hearing that impossibly great news, they realize that they have been measuring themselves against the wrong standard their entire lives.

They sometimes break down in tears when they hear that their life’s mission is NOT about gaining the approval of spouses, brothers, sisters, co-workers, neighbors, friends, or total strangers on the street. They also know with absolute certainty that Jesus spoke directly to them when he said, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Matthew 11:28-29, NRSV).

That is when they relax, shed their chameleon skin, and say, “Hallelujah! I’m FREE!”

“Now… how can I use what is left of my time and energy to help share this amazingly GOOD NEWS with everyone on the PLANET???”

What do you think? Any ideas?

Abundant blessings;

Jul

A Way in the Wilderness…

By revruss1220 2 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: Apollo 11, astronaut, change, faith, God, Jesus Christ, moving, resistance, Unknown

Fifty-two years ago today, an epic adventure took place.

Footprints were placed on a new, unfamiliar landscape.

Eyes were opened. Discoveries were made… discoveries that were both earth-shaking and life-altering.

Old barriers were broken down and we witnessed the dawn of a sparkly new era, brimming with exciting possibilities.

And today, July 20, 2021, as if in an homage to that destiny-packed moment in history, the richest man in the world took an 82-year-old woman and a few other folks for a wild ride beyond the edge of the stratosphere.

Yes, of course I am talking about that time in 1969 when I moved – along with mom and dad and my four siblings – from Hilliard, Ohio to Lynnwood, Washington, just north of Seattle.

It was the summer before my senior year of high school. It was the summer when my girlfriend, Terri Finn and I finally declared our undying love to each other. It was also the summer – ironically enough – when the TV program, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers debuted – featuring its catchy theme song that declared, “The bluest skies you’ll ever see are in Seattle. The greenest trees you’ll ever see are in Seattle.”

Well, at least half of that lyric was true.

A couple of months earlier, my United Methodist pastor father had accepted an appointment to a small church in Lynnwood, Washington. His tenure began on July 1, and so after much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth (mostly by me), the seven of us packed up the U-Haul truck, the Mercury Colony Park station wagon, and the Coleman pop-up camper and headed west.

Somewhere along that journey – I like to think it might have been in Kansas City as our little caravan crossed the Missouri/Kansas state line – I had a revelation.

As much as this whole move seemed like the worst idea in the world… as much as I fought against it and tried to keep it from happening, I realized I had a very clear choice.

I could decide, A.) to be miserable about it and scowl my way through the coming school year. Or, I could decide, B.) to call this something like “an exciting new adventure” and eagerly anticipate the new sights, sounds, smells, and scenarios that lay ahead.

Somehow, I chose B. And that choice made all the difference in the world.

July 20, 1969 was a Sunday night. So, I asked my parents if we could invite the kids from the church youth group over to our house for a cook-out and to watch the televised account of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

They said, “Sure! Great idea, Rusty!” and immediately got busy putting plans and menus together.

I replied, “Gee, thanks a lot! But folks, here is something else. I have also decided that ‘Rusty’ was the name from my old life. From here on, call me Russell. OK?”

It has been said that the only people who like change are babies with wet diapers.

I get that. But change is something that just comes with the territory of being a human being.

To live is to be subjected with regular changes. Changes in circumstance, changes in weather, changes in understandings, changes in health, changes in economic status… in short, changes in just about every facet of life.

Often change feels unwanted, like an assault… like something cruelly imposed by a parent who accepts a pastoral appointment 2,400 miles away from your buddies and girlfriend the summer before your senior year of high school [if I can be a little personal for a moment].

In most cases, we don’t have a choice about the change. But we always DO have a choice about how we will respond to the change.

Much later on in my faith journey, I discovered – much to my surprise – that God is actually a gigantic fan of change. In fact, you wouldn’t be wrong to call God The Cosmic ChangeMaster.

God created the something of the universe out of the nothing (or out of the chaos) and has never stopped changing or creating since. The prophet Isaiah spoke on God’s behalf and said, “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:19, NRSV).

So, I pray today that regardless of the change you are facing in life, you might be able to find a way to lean fully into it and come to embrace it as perhaps a “way in the wilderness.”

Abundant blessings;

Dec

New Shoes

By revruss1220 6 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: change, courage, faithful, fear, God, new, shoes, steadfastness

This past weekend I observed a personal ritual known as, “The Changing of the Shoes.” It is exactly like the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, except without the pageantry, fuzzy hats, Corgis, Englishness, formality, or really anything else.

My ritual doesn’t even operate by a set schedule.

It happens when it needs to happen.

The Changing of the Shoes is set in motion when my daily walking shoes finally bite the dust. That moment sends me to the shoe store to buy a new pair. My old walking shoes then “graduate” to the status of yard work shoes, and my dirt-and-dog-doo-encrusted-grass-stained yard work shoes go to that happy Shoe Recycling Place in the sky.

And as that ritual unfolds, I learn again the lesson that new seasons beget new roles. New roles beget new duties. New duties beget new self-understandings.

And sometimes, new self-understandings beget new questions about how we each fit into the cosmic scheme of things.

[By now I suspect you have guessed that I am no longer talking about SHOES, haven’t you?]

This time of global pandemic has required the adoption new self-understandings by almost every one of us, hasn’t it? Those of us who derive our identities from our work, or our relationships, our hobbies, or our affiliations have struggled to embrace this New Normal.

And unlike my shoes (who slip easily and without complaint into their new roles) many of us scratch and kick and complain loudly when forced into a new way of being… a new way of seeing… a new way of understanding our place in the world.

Heck, even though it has now been true for 1.25 years, I still find myself resisting the wholehearted adoption of my new “retired guy” identity. “You’re too young to retire!” says the tape that plays repeatedly in my head.

The thing is, CHANGE doesn’t care.

CHANGE rolls on, as inexorable as the seasons… inviting us to either dance or die.

Our gut tells us that CHANGE is the enemy… something to be feared. Our gut wants things to stay as they are; predictable, stable, orderly.

Our gut wants us to worship something besides the wild, ever-renewing, explosively creative God of the Universe.

Our gut tells us not to trust the extended hand of the One who whispers to us, “Come ahead, my child. Don’t fear. I’ve got you.”

But then, if we listen really closely, we will hear our faith speaking up and saying, “The God who brought you TO this, will surely bring you THROUGH this.”

God always has. God always will.

We learn that the God who said, “I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.” (Isaiah 43: 19, NRSV), is the same God who said, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.” (Isaiah 43:1-2, NRSV).

New times.

New roles.

New understandings.

Same God. Same rock-solid promises.

But definitely time for some new shoes.

Abundant blessings;

Sep

Editing Myself

By revruss1220 2 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: change, edit

[**WARNING** This post has been edited!!!]

Just yesterday, the moment I’ve been waiting for all these years FINALLY HAPPENED! I was SO excited!

See, this guy – out of the clear, blue sky – zinged me with an unnecessarily harsh comment. But this time, instead of leaving me perplexed and speechless the way these things usually do, I had the PERFECT comeback!

The only problem was, my “perfect comeback” didn’t cross my mind until five hours after the original zinger. And, of course, by then it was too late.

Has anything like that ever happened to you?

That is probably the reason I find myself so drawn to the written word. When I write, I don’t have to be sharp… witty… spontaneous… or nimble with my communication. I can sit, stew, ponder, and carefully choose my words before releasing them.

And then, if that first combination of letters and syllables doesn’t quite fit, I can go back, cross them out, and choose different words to take their place.

Come to think of it, that “editability” factor may be part of the reason for the popularity of social media. (Although, I have yet to see much evidence of editing in most of the Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram posts I am privy to].

Too often, left to my own devices (and the demands of the moment), my words are anything but polished gems. They spill out, roughhewn, onto the ears of innocent bystanders… sometimes illuminating, sometimes irritating, sometimes amusing, sometimes utterly baffling.

In this I suspect I am not alone.

Which is why I find it so important to remember God’s profound understanding of our weaknesses and shortcomings. God knows that when I snap at Joan or a neighbor, or say, “expecially” instead of “especially,” it is because I am a flawed and sinful being.

God remembers who I am and God forgives me.

But maybe more important than remembering God’s abiding forgiveness of US is the task of remembering Paul’s advice to the church folks at Colossae: “As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive…”(Colossians 3:12-13, NRSV).

The state of our separation from God and what theologian Paul Tillich called the “Ground of Our Being” is profound and irreparable… except through our humble confession and the grace of Jesus Christ.

My personal hope is that I will remember both God’s rich forgiveness of ME and Paul’s guidance to forgive OTHERS. And if that happens, maybe my words will come from a different place than that blemished, mercurial emotion-pot inside me.

And if THAT happens, maybe it will cut down my “editing” task just a bit in the future.

Abundant blessings;

Sep

Time for a jolt?

By revruss1220 2 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: calm, change, conversation, God, hyperbole, Jesus Christ, jolt, peace, prophetic, protest, revolution, unrest, violence

As a child of the 60s, I’d like to think I know a thing or two about protests.

Granted, most of my participation in the anti-war or civil rights protests of that era consisted of watching them on TV from the safety of my parent’s living room.

Then again, there was that one time when five or six of my friends and I “took over” the roof of the administration building on our college campus for a few hours in order to protest the Vietnam War.

The quotation marks around the words “took over” in that last sentence stem from the fact that no one really seemed to much mind us being up on the roof of the admin building. They studiously ignored our chanting and passionate singing of “We Shall Overcome.” We maintained that righteous rooftop vigil right up until it was time to head home and finish the term papers that were due the next day.

While it is true that I was personally a bit of a protest weenie, I see real value in taking a grievance to the streets. I believe that the Vietnam War might have dragged on for years longer had it not been for those anti-war peaceniks. The struggle for civil rights – though far from resolved even today – might not have gained even token footholds without the people who were willing to gather publicly and express their collective outrage at America’s Jim Crow status quo.

As I think about protestors, I also think about the Buddhist monks who set themselves on fire… the young man in Beijing (and his friends) who faced down tanks in Tiananmen Square… and of Nelson Mandela sitting alone in a South African jail cell for 27 years.

At the time most of these people were labeled extremists… kooks… dangerous radicals. So-called reasonable people denounced their tactics as wholly unnecessary. They urged calm, cogent conversation as the preferred way to solve society’s problems.

But as history has demonstrated again and again, calm, cogent conversation doesn’t always move the needle. Sometimes, it takes an abrupt JOLT!

As it turns out, no one understood the strategic use of the abrupt JOLT quite as well as Jesus of Nazareth. He employed it regularly in the rhetorical technique known as “prophetic hyperbole.” A great example shows up in Mark’s gospel where we read these jolting words: “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell^, to the unquenchable fire.And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell.” (Mark 9:43-45, NRSV).

Does he really mean people should cut off their own hands or feet?

Or when he told the rich young man that salvation meant selling everything he owned, giving the money to the poor and following him, did he mean that literally?

My guess would be that Jesus didn’t really intend for his words in Mark to be taken as a literal command. In the other one, maybe he did. But maybe not.

You see, Jesus was a revolutionary. He came to turn the status quo of the world upside down. He did not come for calm, reasoned discussions. He came to instigate radical, top-to-bottom life change.

In fact, when this man – sometimes called the Prince of Peace – talked about his earthly mission in Luke’s gospel he said, “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” (Luke 12:51, NRSV).

Jesus sought to WAKE PEOPLE UP! To shake them from their complacency! To stress the urgency of the moment.

Please understand… I am not saying that the people taking violently to the streets today are shining examples of Christ-like behavior. I have no insight into their hearts or minds. Many, I feel certain, are interested only in mayhem and destruction.

What I AM saying is that sometimes the world finds itself in a place where a good, old-fashioned JOLT of prophetic hyperbole is exactly what the doctor ordered.

What do you think… is this that kind of time?

Aug

The Heartbreak of RPD

By revruss1220 2 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: calling, change, God, grace, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, ministry, Proverbs 8, resist, resistance, spouse, stubborn, thick, will, wisdom

Chocolate on face In a wholehearted endorsement of the axiom advising us that confession is good for the soul, I offer this mea culpa today:

Sometimes I suffer from RPD… Resistant Personality Disorder.

What this means is that I will sometimes resist something just for the sake of resisting it. You know, sort of like the child who sticks out his tongue and says, “You can’t make me!”

No one is better suited to bear witness to the truth of this confession than my sainted spouse. She might, for example, point out that I have a smear of chocolate icing on my chin. To which I sometimes reply, “Well, maybe I really want it there!”

Or else she will lovingly point out that the shirt I’ve chosen doesn’t really go with those shorts. Then, in return for her caring compassion she will hear, “That’s OK. I like it, so I’m wearing it.”

And yes, you are right; there is surely a very special place in heaven waiting for her.

Hearing about RPD, you would be right to ask, “Who does that kind of stuff anyway? And why do they do it? Surely everyone is interested in receiving tips on how to be a little bit better version of themselves, aren’t they?”

I will answer your good question this way: sometimes I do it just to be a playful pill. You know… to liven things up around the house a little bit.

At other times, I am probably genuinely miffed. Miffed that someone else saw something amiss with me (my clothes, my hair, my grooming, my attitude, my personality, my whatever) that I did not see myself. And so I become irritated.

In this morning’s meditation from Fr. Richard Rohr (Franciscan priest, author, and founder of the Center for Contemplation and Action in Santa Fe, NM), I was comforted to learn that I might not be alone in my propensity to resist helpful insight. Fr. Rohr wrote, “We all come to wisdom at the major price of both our innocence and our control. Few of us go there willingly; it [wisdom] must normally be thrust upon us.”

Does that sound like YOU at all?

In my own life there was probably no greater example of RPD than my resistance to God’s call to ministry. I can point to moments when I heard – with shocking clarity – a voice saying, “Come serve me” at least 25 years before I actually responded to that call.

My excuses were endless; I knew better. I had my own plan. I wasn’t ready to stop having fun yet. I needed to use my gifts and abilities to “do cool stuff.” I could do “God stuff” around the edges and on the weekends when nothing else was going on.

Thankfully, God didn’t give up. Thankfully, God finally seeped through (actually, more like BROKE through with the full force of a 2×4) my thick skull and got my attention.

Sadly, all these years later and with so much formational experience, I still catch myself occasionally resisting wisdom. Hopefully not as consistently as I once did.

The writer of Proverbs personifies wisdom as God’s co-existing, feminine partner at the very beginnings of the world and gives her these words, “And now my children, listen to me: happy are those who keep my ways. Hear instruction and be wise… For whoever finds me finds life.” (Proverbs 8:32, 35, NRSV).

How about you? Are you eager to hear wisdom? Do you embrace it, even when it threatens to upset your plans and send you in a new direction?

Or are you still suffering a bad case of RPD?

The cure might be closer than you think.

Abundant blessings;

Jun

Agents of Change

By revruss1220 2 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: anarchy, animal rights, calm, change, George Floyd, incremental, justice, negotiation, ordinary, peaceful, PETA, profound, rational, revolt, revolution, structural, Viet Nam, violent, voices

Fists up It is no startling revelation to say that we are in a time my friend Max would have referred to as, “… a yeasty moment.”

Something is bubbling. Strong, unseen forces are at work, above and below the surface. Change is afoot everywhere you look. I walk apprehensively as the ground seems to buckle and surge with every step I take.

THE GIVEN: Life on this planet will not be the same on the other side of whatever-this-is as it was before. Hard truths are being voiced. Ancient wounds are being uncovered. Old, solid, accepted solutions are being exposed for what they really are: defense mechanisms for an oppressive status quo.

There will be no “the way it used to be” to go back to. It was lost in the fire.

All of which makes me ask: how does authentic change happen in the world? And when I say CHANGE, I mean lasting, elemental, paradigm-shifting change. BC/AD-level stuff.

Sometimes change is violent… sudden and unavoidable. Mount St. Helens blows up and redefines an entire part of the map.

Other change – changes in the way we treat deadly diseases, for example –happens only through a creeping, glacially slow evolutionary process.

Changes in social structures and the laws that support them seem to fall somewhere between those two extremes.

Describing the process of change is easy: first comes the recognition of the need for change. That recognition grows and spreads until some empowered person (or group of people) takes the necessary and effective steps and institutes the change.

Lastly, the change leaders dig in and prepare to defend that change against the inevitable assaults from those who oppose it.

As I said, describing the process of change is easy. Carrying it out is anything but.

Thinking back, I can recall one change in my own life I made with relative speed and ease. After watching this video of a TED Talk, (Click here), I immediately decided to change the way I tied my shoes.

Just about every other change in my life has been preceded by much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth… even when I agreed the change was needed.

Right now, we are at the “weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth” phase of the change in our way of being a nation. The killing of George Floyd by four Minneapolis police officers last week has ignited a tinderbox of rage, sweeping up even those most committed to staying on the sidelines. The brazen injustice of that act combined with the frustration of the coronavirus lockdown, the rampant loss of economic security, and an already bitterly divided electorate are all helping feed the flames engulfing our cities today.

Some of us want immediate, wholesale, revolutionary change. We spray-paint obscenities on public buildings, set dumpsters ablaze, lock arms and chant in the streets. We ignore curfew orders, police loudspeakers, and clouds of teargas, daring authorities to arrest us.

Some of us want to sit calmly at a bargaining table and rationally work out the size and shape of the change. We want to be social engineers, carefully drawing our blueprints. We disapprove of the tactics used by our boisterous sisters and brothers and wish they would stop breaking things and alienating people.

What neither of us quite seems to realize is that BOTH of these voices are needed to affect change. I have no doubt that were it not for the loud, obnoxious voices of the sit-ins, peace marches, and draft card burnings, this country might still be mired in the swamps of Viet Nam. Without the rude PETA people throwing buckets of red paint at people wearing fur coats, there might never have been any meaningful animal-welfare laws passed.

The loud voices call the moderates “sellouts.” The calmer voices call the loud ones, “radicals” and “anarchists.”

I pray that each extreme in this debate might see the vital role played by the other and that real, lasting, just change will arise from this troubling moment of national anguish.

Of course, the only real, lasting, soul-deep change in the world AND its people is the change of comes from faith in Christ. As Paul reminds us, “So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation…” (2 Corinthians 5:17-18, NRSV)

Praise God for change. Praise God for justice. Praise God for reconciliation.

Abundant blessings;

May

By revruss1220 Leave a Comment

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: alter, change, destiny, fate, God, goodness, Jesus Christ, joy, justice, life, love, mercy, peace, universe, world

Universe picture What moves the world?

What kind of force does it take

To cause even the tiniest shudder?

And alter – even microscopically – the unflinching orbit

Of lives?

Of fates?

Of destinies?

Of kingdoms?

Of stars?

Is it great beauty?

Unbearable suffering?

An explosion of wisdom?

The threat of extinction?

Or is it all just a whispy candycloud

Covered in dreams?

Are we all merely following tracks?

Tradition tracks

Carved in the

Bedrock marble of our souls

By forces beyond our influence

And greater than our gods?

It is not unheard of, you know.

Gravity has been defied

In days gone by.

The poles have been reversed

The die has been uncast

The other shoe has been arrested midfall.

Once upon a time.

These are the times to remember…

HE is the only one who can.

HIS is the strength to cleave time itself.

In HIM – him alone – do we find

HOPE

POWER

LIFE

LOVE (the unconditional kind)

PEACE

JOY

MEANING

REDEMPTION

“Behold! I am making all things new,” said the One In Charge. (Rev. 21:5, NRSV).

Russellings of the Spirit

Posts Tagged ‘change

A Changed Life

Holy Unsettledness!

Karma, Karma, Karma, Karma…

A Way in the Wilderness…

New Shoes

Editing Myself

Time for a jolt?

The Heartbreak of RPD

Agents of Change

CHANGE

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