My Christmas Tradition

A while ago, in a group of friends, we somehow wandered onto the topic of everyone's personal movie kryptonite--you know, that movie that you've seen a million times, but you just can't help watching again anyway?  Even if it's already halfway over, or you were already on your way to bed, or you only turned on the TV to watch something else?  I know there are some movies like this that have their own almost cult following, like The Shawshank Redemption.  Or, in my dad's case, The Outlaw Josie Wales.  Everyone in the circle was sharing their own favorite.  Someone turned and asked me, "So Lisa, what's the movie you always watch whenever it's on?"  I answered immediately, without thinking, "That's easy.  Talladega Nights."  There was a silence.  Glances exchanged.  Then someone said, "Really??"

So maybe the Ballad of Ricky Bobby doesn't hold the same appeal for everyone as it does for me.  But at least at Christmas time, I ask you all to indulge me.  I won't try to write about it again.  But I will link to what I wrote about it last year.  Give Ricky Bobby a chance, folks--that's all I ask.

I Like to Think of Jesus

So This Is Christmas

Today at my workplace, we celebrated the first day of our Christmas event.  Our store will be open every day this week as a Christmas shop, with games, toys, decorations, gift wrap, and many other holiday items for customers, all at greatly reduced prices; so many fun things will happen, from candy cane hunts to visits from Santa.  We've been so excited for the last few weeks, planning it.  Hours of time and care have gone into every detail, working hard to create an event, an environment, where families can come and shop for Christmas in a way that is affordable, enjoyable, and uplifting.  It's a highly concentrated example of the effort and sacrifice our staff makes every day, the mission of working alongside families to offer support and encouragement while preserving dignity and empowerment. 

The doors opened this morning, a waiting crowd of customers came in, Christmas toys were purchased, candy canes were found, cookies were eaten, and all went as planned.  Well, almost all.  Also, in the festive chaos, with so many people moving through the building, someone went into a staff member's private office, dug into her purse, and stole her wallet.  Removed all the cash, and gift cards--tokens of love from her family and friends--and tossed the rest of her possessions like so much junk in our parking lot. 

Of course, there were other offenses also, such as switching price tags and swiping items from the donation area, all less egregious, less personal.  Less of a violation.  But honestly, even this event isn't that unusual or unexpected in our line of work.  As our executive director said to me when my new truck got keyed on my third day of working here, "Welcome to ministry at Salt & Light!"  But there is something about its happening as a part of the Christmas festivities that makes it seem so much more of an affront.  In a season that is intended to be about peace and goodwill, when it seems the whole world makes an extra effort to be kind and generous, it's a rude reminder of reality when we encounter the always-present (but temporarily forgotten) existence of greed, cruelty, or any other form of common human evil.

However, this is the nature of our work--laboring with our greatest strength, to the best of our ability, to make a better way for many others, some of whom will steal from us in a heartbeat as soon as our back is turned.  And somehow, I find it particularly appropriate that it happened today, during our fledgling celebration of Christmas.  Because, as I thought about it during the day, what better picture of the Christmas story?  It seemed to everyone who heard the story today such a shame, such a pity.  We all understood intuitively why it seemed so wrong that someone would choose to repay that way to one who had given so much for their benefit.  And yet, that is the story of Christmas.  While we find it so hard to continue to give selflessly in love to those who may repay with evil, Christmas is the story of the ultimate selfless gift, given to make a better way for so many, some of whom would participate in his actual killing, while all of us, through our very brokenness, shared in the responsibility for making it necessary.  It's writ large the same love, sacrifice, pain, and betrayal as the drama that played out on the small stage of my workplace today.  And while for those of us who minister here, events like the one of today are unexpected, the fate of that undeserved gift of long ago was always known.  Christmas is the story of the God who gave, knowing fully how he would be repaid.

Such is grace.  There is nothing more free, and nothing more costly.  May we continue to find the strength to give it in the same measure we have received.

Hourglass

A few days ago, I overheard a conversation at work.  Two people were talking in the break room, and one woman was describing a painful incident from her past, and how over time, things had become more and more distant and difficult between her and the other person involved.  She talked about how she felt even more hurt, more angry, as the situation wore on.  "Time doesn't make things better like people say," she said to her listener.  "It just makes things worse."

I wondered if she was right.  Conventional wisdom tells us that time heals.  Time gives everyone the chance to cool off, calm down, think again.  Time brings maturity, growth, and change.  However, we all know of situations in which, over time, resentments fester, bitterness grows, hurts deepen, distances widen, and hearts harden.  What makes the difference between a story where time brings healing, and one where time brings only more hurt?  I might be wrong, but I'd like to propose a theory--time does what we tell it to do.

If this is true, that makes how we use our time a rather heavy responsibility.  It seems that the way we choose to use our time will determine what that time does for us in return.  If we use it for things that promote growth, healing, reconciliation, then it will do what we ask.  But if we waste it, squander it, or use it badly, in ways that promote bitterness and hurt, then it will turn ugly, just as we have requested, recalcitrant and hostile, and bring us nothing but pain.  This idea reminds me forcibly of the bewildering story the Mad Hatter tells to Alice at his tea party, about why time will no longer do anything he asks, due to a badly-sung rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat.  ("He's murdering the time!" shouts the Queen, "Off with his head!")

Last week, I asked my 14-year-old, "So, how are you feeling with the holidays coming up?"  He replied, "I don't know.  I haven't thought about it.  Why?"  I said, "Well, this time last year, you were feeling a little stressed.  As though you didn't know what was going to happen."  (If you missed last year's version of this conversation, you can catch it here.)  He looked thoughtful for a minute, then shrugged his shoulders, and said, "Huh.  Well, I'm a different person this year."

And so he is.

To me, what does this mean about the way we are using our time, and what time is doing for us in return?

I believe it means we are defining our new normal.  We are making time to cook together, read together, camp out in the living room together.  We are making memories that we can hold to and cherish when things are rough, which they often are.  We are talking, talking, talking, about what to do, and what to do differently, when things go wrong.  We're going out to that special-release movie, or that once-in-a-lifetime concert, because life is too short, and our time together will pass so quickly.  We're tackling projects that are out of our comfort zone, building our team--sharing responsibility for the things we share ownership for.  And we have every intention of continuing.  We will gather on a Sunday with friends we love, and be just as happy and thankful as on that arbitrary Thursday designated by the calendar, on which we will celebrate together with extended family and apart from each other.  We will start new traditions.  We will continue to learn to be the family we want to create.  We will look to the future with hope and expectation.

We're using our time well.  And time is doing oh, so much for us in return.  We're all different people this year, I think.

Redeemer

 So she went down to the threshing floor and did just as her mother-in-law

 had commanded her.  And when Boaz had eaten and drunk, and his heart was

 merry, he went to lie down at the end of the heap of grain. Then she came softly

 and uncovered his feet and lay down.  At midnight the man was startled

 and turned over, and behold, a woman lay at his feet!  He said, “Who are you?”

 And she answered, “I am Ruth, your servant. Spread your wings over your servant,

 for you are a redeemer.”  And he said, “May you be blessed by the Lord,

 my daughter. You have made this last kindness greater than the first

 in that you have not gone after young men, whether poor or rich.  And now,

 my daughter, do not fear. I will do for you all that you ask, for all my fellow

 townsmen know that you are a worthy woman."  (Ruth 3:6-12, ESV)

I have always been drawn to the story of Ruth.  If you have never read it, it's a lovely, surprising, tragic, amazing story--part biography, part family history, part historical record, part love story.  It begins as the story of one family, becomes the story of one woman, and in the end becomes the story of a new and different family.  And Ruth herself is the central character, the one who ties the threads of the story together.   

It begins with a typical, two-parent, two-child family, and their move to a new country.  Both sons, young men, come of age and marry women in that place--one of the new daughters-in-law is Ruth.  But exceptional tragedy strikes this unexceptional family, and the father and both sons are lost, leaving three widows behind.  With no providers and no prospects, the three women are left with no choice but to retreat to the safety of their respective families.  Naomi, the mother, sets out for her home country, and sends her daughters-in-law back to their homes.  But Ruth, in a remarkable act of cultural rebellion, refuses to return to her family of origin, and instead returns with her mother-in-law, to try to eke out a subsistence together in what, to her, is a new land among an unfamiliar people.

In Naomi's homeland, two women surviving alone, with no man to earn for them, protect them, or represent them, are in a fragile and vulnerable position.  But an eminently respectable man, Boaz, a prominent community member, soon begins acting as their benefactor, and ultimately, his kindness and respect leads Ruth to ask him to consider a far greater act of generosity--becoming the man to care for her (and, in this culture, for her mother-in-law as well), officially, legally.  Permanently.

I often puzzle over Ruth.  In many ways, she fascinates me.  Why, I wonder, did she refuse to go home?  Why stay with Naomi, why defy the odds?  Where did she gather the strength for this, and for so much more--the difficult journey to a new land, the back-breaking work she did to support herself and Naomi, the amazing vulnerability she showed in approaching and offering herself to a powerful man who might have ruined her in every way with his rejection?

But as much as I am compelled by Ruth, in the last couple of years my thoughts have been captivated by Boaz.  Who is this man?  I find it so remarkable, the story of what he did for Ruth.  In our day, the magnitude of it is difficult to comprehend, but in Ruth's time, the ramifications of it were astounding.  He saved her life, and her future--not only with companionship and love, as we are first inclined to think of in our romanticized, modern culture--but legally, socially, and economically.  He erased not only the pain of her personal past, but the tragedy of her family line--Naomi, who earlier in the story names herself "bitter" with loss, in the end renames herself "joy", as she cradles her new grandson.  All of these are things that were completely outside Ruth's power to do for herself or for her family. 

And yet, his response in the passage above is not to assure Ruth of his own generosity toward her.  Instead--look carefully--he THANKS HER.  He talks about her kindness, her worth.  He considers himself the lucky one here. He sees, not his own act of blessing, but hers.  This man, Boaz, is strong enough to lead, to save, yet secure enough for humility.  This man of integrity does what is right for Ruth, even when it flies in the face of the expectations of others.  He takes the role of redeemer, he pays the price, he changes Ruth's life, not out of a sense of his own generosity or goodness, but out of a selfless love for another.

So how is this possible?  What can make a man see things, see people in this light?  There is only one thing that I know of.  Boaz is not using the world's math; Boaz is seeing things in the way of the Kingdom.  He does not see Ruth as a poverty-stricken immigrant widow, unloved, undesirable, and of no worth.  He sees Ruth as God sees her--as a woman of beauty, a woman of valor, a woman worthy of being desired, loved, honored.   How incredibly fortunate was Ruth, to be found by this redeemer who acts to save her life, to assure her future, and to bring beauty from the ashes of her past, and in the process, sees himself not as the benefactor, but as the recipient of a beautiful gift.

And how like that other bridegroom is Boaz, that divine bridegroom of us all, who arrives at the altar of marriage possessing all the wealth, all the status, all the power, and gives himself up for his bride, the church, who cannot save herself, and can never repay his act of love.  And yet, that bridegroom is motivated, not by a sense of his own obligation, or even his own generosity or goodness, but by a deep love and desire for his bride.  This is that same story, the ultimate story, of a God who, in spite of his immense, incomparable greatness, created us, not so that we could love him, but instead created us to be loved.

The most beautiful thing about this story, for everyone, is that this God, the one who seeks us, desires us, redeems us--this God is out there.  But another beautiful thing about it is this--I believe that means this man is out there too.

Beloved

"I'm always late because I'm a procrastinator and I procrastinate because I'm overwhelmed and I'm overwhelmed because I'm a perfectionist and I'm a perfectionist because I need affirmation and I need affirmation because I feel unworthy and I feel unworthy because somewhere, sometime, something in me cracked and the idea that I am lovable leaked out... I broke."

I've been thinking today about this passage from a recent post by Jamie the Very Worst Missionary.

I've shared it with many of my women friends, especially many of my single mom friends, and it resonates with every one.  Many have messaged me back to thank me for sharing, to say how it went straight to the heart of their own fear, anxiety, and struggle.  I want to ask us all today--why is that?  Why do we all feel so unworthy?  Why do we believe we are unlovable, unacceptable?  I think back to a long-ago conversation with a beloved friend, one of those people who makes the world better just by being in it.  His life was filled with good deeds, and his heart with nothing but kindness and good will for other people, specifically, and humanity, generally.  But he spoke that night on the phone about a nagging feeling of incompleteness.  Somehow, these things could not make him enough.  No matter how good you are, how hard you try, nothing you do on your own can ever make you good enough.  You cannot make yourself lovable, acceptable, beloved. 

Religious people will tell you they have the answer to this conundrum.  "That's why we need Jesus," they will say--"because we can't do it on our own."

Raise your hand if you just heard me say, "That's why we need Jesus--because Jesus can help us be good enough."

Yep.  That's what I thought. 

Why is this so hard?  Why must we insist on making ourselves good enough?  On seeing even Jesus as simply a system of self-help so that we can finally accomplish it?  Why is it that, as my friend Bill said recently, "We're Midwesterners!  We have to EARN our grace!"  My pastor, Randy Boltinghouse, just finished preaching through the New Testament's parables of grace, and a few Sundays ago he spoke about the story of the Pharisee and the tax collector.  In the story, the tax collector asks God for forgiveness, and goes away accepted, but the Pharisee simply thanks God that he is already so righteous.  The Pharisee doesn't ask for anything, Randy said, because he doesn't think he needs it.  I guess that might be right.  But I suspect the Pharisee does know.  I suspect he knows, and is afraid to admit it, even to himself.  Especially to himself.  We are all afraid to admit that we are in need of grace.  Why?  Because we think Jesus will be horrified at how much fixing up he has to do.  In fact, maybe our worst fears about ourselves will be realized, and he will even declare us unfixable.  Jesus himself will confirm what we have always known, deep down--we are unlovable.  Unacceptable.  Even he cannot do anything with us.

But grace is not about fixing us up and making us good enough.  Grace is about accepting us as we are.  Randy spells it out for us this way:  "Through Christ's sacrifice, we are accepted before we start.  He will refine us later, yes.  But he qualifies us first."

Grace is not there in spite of the mess-ups.  Grace, as Jamie the Very Worst so beautifully puts it, is there FOR the mess-ups.

I've written in an earlier post about Henri Nouwen's claim that being God's Beloved is the core truth of our existence, and how truly possessing that knowledge will affect every relationship in our lives.  But it not only touches our relationships--it is realized in our every individual action.  The procrastination, the perfectionism.  The way we see ourselves when we look in the mirror.  Behind everything we do, we find we are carrying that aching emptiness, in the space where we should be holding tightly to the consciousness of being the Beloved.  But there is hope for us.  We can realize our true identity, if we are willing.  It can happen, and, as Jamie the Very Worst says, when it does....

"...Jesus finds me like that, leaky and late, and He scoops up the pieces and makes me new. I'll probably break again tomorrow, or in like five minutes, but He'll keep scooping, again and again, until the day I finally get it, until the day I learn that I was created to be loved. And that day, that glorious day, the angels will sing in Heaven and, by God, I. will. be. on. time."

10 Things I Wish I'd Learned Sooner

1.  Not everyone is trying to do the right thing, or even to do their best.  Sometimes people don't care, don't try, don't know any better, or actually don't mean well.

2.  While giving the benefit of the doubt is important, and so are second chances, it is vital to know the difference between the generous gift of grace and the unhealthy absence of boundaries.

3.  If you take a day off, the world won't come to an end.  Everything does not ultimately depend on how much you personally can accomplish in a prescribed amount of time.

4.  You deserve to be treated well.  And it is your responsibility to put yourself in a situation where that is going to happen.  (My dad actually told me this one when I was 19.  But it has taken me the last 24 years to really understand and begin to apply it.)

5.  There will be some people who just don't like you.  It might be you.  It might be them.  It might just be the way it happens.  Either way, you can live with it.  Everyone doesn't have to like you; you only have to live with yourself.

6.  If the weather is really bad, stay home.  Nowhere you have to go is that important.

7.  Sometimes, you'll know that you have done the right thing, and you will be the only one who thinks so.  That's OK.

8.  Sometimes, you'll think that you have done the right thing, but you will have screwed up royally.  That's OK too.  This is what grace is for.  There is no prize for always having done the right thing.

9.  Sometimes, you'll have done everything right, and things will still go horribly wrong anyway.  Doing the right thing is not a promise of any particular outcome.

10.  When you're eating mixed nuts, don't pick out all those brazil nuts that you hate and eat them first.  Still pick them out--make no mistake.  But when you've found them all, go throw them away.  You hate those.