Resolutions 2010

It's hard for me to come up with a bunch of resolutions with a half-empty pitcher of white Russians sitting on the window sill next to me. But I realize that my loyal Green Room readers are waiting with bated breath for a New Year's post, so here goes.

My resolutions for 2010:

1. Listen to new music. One really great way to stay in touch with my kids is through music--but probably not through Dan Fogelberg and Boz Scaggs. I'm just sayin'. My kids have already introduced me to some enjoyable music that I would otherwise never have encountered, like Human, by The Killers.

2. Work out on Wii Fit two or three times per week. That might sound lame to you marathoners and extreme fitness freaks--but for those of use who enjoy the sedentary lifestyle, it's huge. I may alternate with a bit of drumming on Rock Band II, however. I'm sure that'll burn the calories just as much as a lunging lemur or whatever the heck the yoga pose is called.

I've already created my Mii, and the stupid game has informed me that I am obese. I prefer to think of myself as Rubenesque, or pulchritudinous, or zaftig. However, I do realize that my bones and muscles and internal organs could stand for me to be a wii bit more active. (See how I did that with the "wii"?)

3. Write my book. I don't know if I'm a writer--a real writer--or not. But I have to give it a shot. I'm heading up to Grand Rapids for a writers' conference (maybe I'll see you there?), at which I hope to find inspiration and a publisher.

Here's the thing. I'm terrified. I know I can tell a story with a modicum of appeal. I know I can sustain interest for 800 words or so. But 40,000 words? For a wanna-be-writer with undiagnosed ADD, mood swings, mild depression, and a teensy case of OCD (I swear this is true, even though my therapist insists that you can't actually have a "teensy case of OCD"), it's like a guy with no arms and no legs looking up at Mt. Everest with the summit in his heart.

4. Yesterday Reverend Moses Butcher reminded us that "Resolutions don't have the power to change you." This could be problematic in a post about resolutions -- except Rev. Moses Butcher was talking about sin, of course, not about things like using music to connect with your kids, using an insulting electronic toy to have a slightly healthier lifestyle, and putting words down on paper because some part of me believes that another part of me has something worthwhile to say.

Sin is something I know a little bit about. (If "sin" is not in your vocabulary, you can think of this as personal responsibility.) I often fall short, far short, of the person I want to be. I'm far too sarcastic with my children. I'm irritable, impatient, and self-centered, and self-righteous. I frequently put my own needs and desires ahead of the needs and desires of other people.

I don't want to be this way--but I see these behaviors in myself over and over again. So instead of resolving to behave better, to sin less, to be more Jesusy--which will only lead to failure and despair--I will instead resolve to take those sins and carry them, like Pilgrim in John Bunyan's beautiful allegory (a Christian classic, which, if you haven't read it, I recommend that you resolve to do so this year), to the cross, and dump them out there, over and over again.

This is the gospel; this is what has the power to change me.

What are your resolutions?

I am Jonah

I am Jonah.

My pastors have been preaching on Jonah, and every single week I leave church thinking, "I am Jonah. I am just like him."

Jonah gets a bad rap because, well, he's an idiot. Just like me.

First, he runs away from God. Dumbass. You can't run away from God, Jonah. You can act like God can't see you, can't hear you, can't find you--but duh! Of course he can. He can find you on the ship to Tarshish when you're supposed to be traveling to Nineveh. He can also find you when you're holed up in your bedroom with an open bottle of wine and a high-def TV. And he can find you when you're just minding your own business, trying to be a good person, but deep down beginning to realize that that's not good enough. (Hello, Roseanne?)

Of course God can find you--and the truly amazing thing is, he's actually coming after you. He'll stir up the sea until your shipmates threaten to throw you overboard. Or he'll allow a different kind of storm in your life--maybe cancer, maybe a sick child, maybe unemployment or a really horrible boss, depression, or a million other storms that, if you're smart, will make you remember that God wants you, or wants you back.

He's waiting for you to look up and say, Um, God? Can I get a hand, here?

He's also waiting for you to remember who and what you are. You are Jonah, the guy God called to do a really important job, like preach to the Ninevites, or raise a child, or be an honest cop, a loving spouse, a generous friend, a talented musician, or a million other callings that, if you're smart, will make you remember that God is the one who gave you that calling and is going to help you follow it.

He's waiting for you to look up and say, God? Thanks. And help, please.

God is also waiting for you to remember that you are not God. You do not get to decide what justice looks like. You do not get to point to other people and say, Smite them, God! They are bad, bad people because they worship idols, or take drugs, or fail to live up to your own exceptionally high standards of housekeeping.

But that's what Jonah did, Reverend Moses Butcher told us today at church. He became annoyed at God because he wanted to see justice done to those sinners of Nineveh--just like I become annoyed at the sinners around me, who don't parent like I think they should, or don't obey me as promptly as I want them to, or have the right opinion about social justice issues.

I am such a Jonah.

Jonah was miserable. "It displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry...Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me for it is better for me to die than to live" (Jonah 4:1, 3). Why was he miserable? Because he was waiting for the fireworks of God's destruction of Nineveh. He wanted Nineveh to pay for their sins; he wanted justice.

But, Reverend Butcher pointed out, Jonah's notion of justice does not look anything like God's justice. God is (thank God!) "a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster" (Jonah 4:2). Jonah wants people to pay for their sin; God wants people to repent, and be brought back into relationship with Him.

Like Jonah, I often want people to pay. I want to hear them say, "I was wrong, I am a worm." I want them to pay if they've wronged me, or someone I love. This is how I often deal with Mr. Peevie, with my kids, with my co-workers--not to mention the stranger who has just cut me off in the street.

But wouldn't it be better if Jonah and I, and all of us, were more like God, slow to anger, and willing to wait and work for reconciliation and redemption? God said to Jonah, "Should I not pity Nineveh?"

I am always telling my kids that retaliation is never the answer. But, boy it sure is an instinctive reaction. On Saturday, a bigger boy was sitting on his bike near M. Peevie, who was minding her own business playing with a skip-ball (one of those ankle-jump-rope things), and as he moved his bike to get past her, he said in a tough-guy voice, "If that thing hits my bike, you're gonna pay."

After a decade of telling my kids, "Retaliation is never the answer," I wanted to get up and knock that little boy right off his bike. This is my instinct--not to gently help him understand that bullying and threatening a smaller person is wrong, but to hurt him for trying to intimidate my baby girl.

I am Jonah. But I want instead to be like Jesus, the literal epitome of God's mercy. That's my prayer.

I picked up the images from Biblical Art on the WWW.

The Alabaster Jar

This is Holy Week, when Christians remember the events leading up to the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. My Esteemed Reverend Moses Butcher preached from Mark 14 about what he called The Beautiful Waste--the woman who broke a valuable alabaster jar and poured the rare and costly ointment over Jesus.

The alabaster jar, Rev. Moses said, was probably a family heirloom; possibly the most expensive thing the woman owned. It was her family's financial security, worth almost a year's wages: if they fell on hard times, they could sell the jar and live off the proceeds until their circumstances improved.

The alabaster jar did not have a resealable flip-top; the jar had to be broken, destroyed, in order to pour the perfume. The ointment itself was rare and powerfully fragrant. Imagine the ointment running down his clothing, and making sweet-smelling puddles in the dirt floor.

This woman--Mark doesn't name her, but John says it was Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus--intentionally broke and poured out her most valuable possession without regret or hesitation. She gave no thought to what the onlookers might think of her or her action. The intent of her heart, Jesus discerned, was to do a beautiful thing to honor him.

When the dinner guests criticized Mary for her wasteful extravagance ("the perfume could have been sold and the money given to the poor!"), Jesus rebuked them. His words may seem uncompassionate ("the poor you will always have with you") and self-promoting ("you will not always have me")--but Jesus merely reminded them who he was--the divine, long-awaited Messiah (Mark 8:29). He pointed out that Mary had her priorities in the proper order: First Jesus, then everything else, including her own wealth and security, her reputation, and the important social concern of caring for the poor.

Mary's gesture was extravagant and beautiful. She probably didn't realize the significance of her act--that it symbolized the annointing of Jesus' body for burial--but she did what she was able to do, and gave what she was able to give.

I want to have the kind of faith that is extravagant and beautiful. I want to offer up my treasure and my security, so that I can find them again in Jesus. This Holy Week, to tell the truth, I feel far apart from God and from grace. There's nothing extravagant or beautiful about my faith at the moment.

Luckily, or rather, providentially, my feelings are not a factor when it comes to Jesus. I know who and what I am. I know how unfaithful I am, how self-centered, angry, idolatrous. But I also know I can lay the ugliness of my sin at the foot of the cross, where the ransom was paid; I know I can believe this crazy, scandalous story because of the empty tomb.

This is Holy Week. Welcome to the infamy of the cross, and the hope of the resurrection.