Noon on Christmas

It's noon on Christmas here in the suburban midwest.  You know how that feels, right?

The kids have hours ago shredded the last vestiges of wrapping paper.  They're now buried in piles of plastic or immersed in vast video games - quietly pursuing mastery over their newfound treasures.

Of course that leaves us parents padding softly through the house, packing trash and wandering amid the opened boxes and half-assembled amusements.

It's over way too soon, isn't it?  I mean, for all the fuss and for all the energy spent procuring piles of plastic so adamantly petitioned and pined for by our petite progeny - it ends so abruptly as to be absurd.

I overheard one mom say to her impatient and unruly child, "Just sit still and imagine what you've got under the tree.  Focus on that, Johnny, an' git yer mind offa yer problems." 

Of course that mother's words came back to me a moment ago as the silence crept back into the house.  All that hustle and energy and focus and wind and fire and attention - now spent, now over, now done.

I think we model the abridged version of Christmas for our kids - a truncated, frail, materialistic and emotional skeleton now abbreviated "Xmas".  

But then just a moment ago, as I installed a wireless network card in Josh's new computer - I remembered something.

I remembered (and then thought to remind you) that Christmas is really all about something so revolutionary, so radical, so subversive - so long lasting - that it couldn't be further from what the plastic amusement industry, and we their willing accomplices, have made it into.

Truth is, endings have no part of Christmas.  Christmas is all about beginnings.  In fact, it's all about The Beginning.

In theology, we call it "inaugurated eschatology".  In everyday life, we call it "the coolest thing ever."

Messiah Jesus came a few millenia ago to kick off a New Kingdom that would grow and touch every nook and cranny of the planet - a Kingdom that will one day make everything (and I mean Everything) brand-spankin' New.

Yep, it's been a few thousand years.  The human race is somewhere in the middle now - perhaps one might say it's noontime.  But unlike today's Christmas Noon at my house - not all the presents have yet been opened.

Like I did today - Messiah's saved the best for last.  He's got the good stuff comin' for those that are looking for it.

Christmas is just the Beginning.

The Struggle for Significance

A good friend of mine is leaving a long-held job and finds a certain sadness in it.  Another has just returned to the familiar only to plot a new course toward the unknown.  And yet another is in waiting, hoping to be discovered by those he holds in high esteem.

I look at all these.  And then I think of all the people over the years I've been privileged to encourage and to minister to.  And in them I see pieces of myself. 

What is it that drives us?  What is it that churns our emotions and motivates us to take action, or in some cases merely stand by in muted desire?

Psychologists have long discussed the need buried in each of us for significance.  The need to be validated by others.  The need for our lives to mean something.

In some of us, this struggle for significance has erupted into full-blown narcissism.  We simply must have more and more accolades and ever more fawning fans.  We see, and we wish others to see, only ourselves.

On the other end of the spectrum, some of us have become so tentative that we have nearly become invisible.  We cannot imagine that our lives will ever amount to anything, and this sense of inadequacy has brought paralysis.

And then of course, most of us are somewhere in between.  We're neither self-centered egoists nor immobilized underdogs.  We just bump along somewhere in the middle.

You know, I realize every day the truth of something my mom told me many years ago.  She said that everyone - the narcissist, the underdog and everyone in between - is stricken with a sense of inadequacy and self-doubt.  They all feel, to one degree or another, "less than".  Yep, I think she was right.

So let me take this opportunity to encourage you to take your eyes off other people and simply be what God made you to be.

You have been uniquely made to do and to be something significant!  You have a special set of gifts and passions that, when discovered and fanned into flame, will bring you into that place of significance and satisfaction you've longed for.

I've seen this so many times over the years.  The depressed student that saw something new, perhaps in class or on one of my adventure trips.  They took the new, made it a part of themselves and in the process a world of possibilities opened up.

I've witnessed many a fearful young man - more able to say what he couldn't do than what he could - realize his unique potential and then blast off into the future with the resolve that he could achieve his goals after all. 

And I've seen this principle at work in myself.  As I learned that my real boundaries were far more distant than what I thought - as I learned that I could make a difference and that I could overcome - I found a comfort in my own skin that I never had before.

Remember this during the Christmas season - God has placed in you gifts and talents and energies and abilities and desires and dreams and strengths and weaknesses - all for the purpose of having a significant part in building his Kingdom.  And that's no small thing!

I dunno who needs to hear this - I dunno who this is for.  But according to Mom, there's probably more than one!  :)

Paradigms and Percentages

I spent the morning at an excellent Christian school, giving a talk during the high-school chapel and then in religion class.  My challenge to the students was to figure out why they believe what they believe - to honestly question the basis of their faith and see how firm it really is.

The discussion today reminded me of a question I've been asked many times.  That is, "How can intelligent people that have the capacity to think critically - how can they believe in something they cannot see?"

They've asked me to come back and help the students answer that question - to help them map out a path to maintain their faith in spite of the onslaught of doubt and skepticism coming their way at the secular university.

I can't wait to dig into it with them!  I think I'll start with something like this.

A paradigm is:

"A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline."

Here's a piece of my "Christian paradigm".   At the highest, most abstract level - this is where I start.

First off, I always play the percentages.

I spent most of my adult life in the hard sciences.  And pure science, as you know, is all about hard facts.

But I can't prove (to myself or to you) that orthodox Christianity is the one right way. And I refuse to hold a set of beliefs just because my mother or some churchman told me to.

So what's a thinking man to do?

Well, I tend to go with that which has the highest percentage chance in my (admittedly peculiar!) mind of being "true". That goes for just about everything in my life.

So why then do I hold fast to orthodox Christianity? Because I think it has the highest percentage chance of being the truth.

Am I 100% sure?  Nope - I won't be until I'm standing in New Jerusalem.

But you know what?  The list of things I'm 100% sure of is really, really short.

I think I'm about 99% sure of Christianity, and that's fine for me.

I'm just being honest here - I think most Christians would fear such an admission. Not me. And I should tell you that my trust in this approach to my faith has led to what many people would call "extreme acts".

For example, I cashed out my interest in my software development business and moved my family to another part of the state so I could teach Christian theology. I took a 90% pay cut - so you've gotta know I'm either insane, or I really really believe this stuff (maybe both!).

My confidence lies in the historical person of Jesus for the following reasons:

a) Anyone who believes he never existed isn't thinking hard enough. He certainly
existed.

b) Anyone who believes he was not substantially who he said he was, or that he did not substantially perform the acts the Gospels record that he did - isn't properly examining the evidence.

I say that because there were too many opposing interests (Sanhedrin, Pharisees, Romans) that would've proudly and loudly exposed any substantially fraudulent view of the early Church.

That didn't happen. No Roman produced his dead body - no Jewish leader said, "All that never happened". Again, they'd have done so if they could've.

So in my mind, Jesus was who he said he was, and Jesus did what the Gospels record he did.

Is there, in my mind, a small chance that a wholesale fabrication got by the Roman and Jewish antagonists of the first century? Yes there is.

Yeah, there's a chance (!) that the disciples stole Jesus' body out from under the noses of the burly Roman soldiers guarding the tomb (with a huge rock rolled in front of the entrance).  But not a very big chance!

Let's get silly for a second. Being generous to the naysayers - what if there's a 5% chance of wholesale fabrication? Even 5% against leaves me with 95% in favor - and that'll do for me.

By the way - just so you know - the atheists, evolutionists, postmoderns, Muslims, Hindus and the rest - they're offering no better odds!

So here's the fundamental premise upon which I've built my worldview, and by which I strive to live my life each and every day.

"Since the evidence indicates that Jesus indeed existed, and substantially did and said what the gospels say he did and said, he is without peer in the pantheon of spiritual leaders. No one else comes close.

As such, Jesus is worthy of my complete devotion. I must spend my life seeking to understand him, his words and his actions in the proper context.

I must try and understand his paradigm - to understand what he believed about the past and about the future - and then I must believe the same."

Now, if you want to find out what's so special about what Jesus "did and said" that causes me to say that "no one else comes close" - well, you'll need to read the New Testament for yourself!  :)