Reflections on Yesterday
If you are my friend list on facebook, you might have seen the status that I posted yesterday, regarding a lady that rammed her shopping cart into my 10 year old son at Costco because he “walked in front of her”.
Stuff happens. Sometimes a 10 year old boy will not be looking where he is going, and may get bumped by a shopping cart. But in this case, the hit appeared to be very deliberate. In fact, even after the initial hit, she kept on pushing her cart against him until he was physically pushed out of the way. She ran over his foot in the process (he was wearing sandals), and she didn’t even seem to care that the arm he was using to protect himself from her onslaught was in a cast.
I called her on her actions, and all that she said to me was, “he walked in front of me.” I told her at that point that she wasn’t watching where she was going, but she wasn’t interested in entertaining the idea that she might be at least partly responsible for the incident. I’ll freely admit that my son probably had walked in front of her. Sometimes 10 year old boys don’t look where they’re going. That’s a simple fact of life when you are dealing with children!
I dropped the argument at this point, as I didn’t really want to make a bigger scene than had already been made. A little while later, as we were coming out of one aisle, we saw her walking down the lane. She passed right in front of me. My wife was pushing our shopping cart at the time, which is probably a good thing…if I had been pushing the cart, I would have “bumped” into her cart and then told her, “You walked in front of me.” Yes, I admit, sometimes I want to act a bit childish too.
Complaining about the actions of the lady at Costco is not the true intent of this article. I’m more interested, right now, in exploring my own reaction to yesterday’s incident. I already confessed that I wanted to react childishly…but even after we left Costco, the incident wouldn’t leave me alone. My wife and I discussed the situation numerous times over the course of the evening – what we could have done, what we should have done.
When I woke up this morning, “that lady at Costco” was one of the first things to enter my mind. I was still angry at her (and that feeling of anger is not entirely gone yet!)
Eph 4:26-27 tells us “Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil.”(ESV)
Clearly, last night’s setting sun found the cinders of anger still smoldering in my heart.
I’m not sure what caused the lady to do what she did. Perhaps she’s normally a very nice person, but had just finished a really rough day at work…or maybe she’s one of the people who are rude all the time. I don’t know her. I don’t know her story. I’ll likely never see her again, so I can’t even ask her. Somehow, I had let a complete stranger ruin my evening!
My 10 year old son, on the other hand, seemed to be completely unaffected by the incident within about 10 minutes (a friend of mine commented on my facebook status: “The lesson here is that some children are more mature than some adults.” I doubt that my friend realized that she was talking about me as much as the lady.
I guess the question that I have, after all of this, is: How do I let something like this go? It’s not like my anger does me any good…in fact anger causes me to lose focus on anything of value…it causes loss of sleep…it could potentially cause all sorts of health problems unless I bring my anger under control.
I don’t have a lot of answers for my question – but I think that a key component to closure of this issue is prayer and forgiveness. In that order. Without God’s help, I don’t have the strength to forgive. Once I have prayed for the strength to forgive, I need to decide to forgive. That means that every time the situation comes to mind, I need to forgive…repeatedly if necessary, until I’m no longer plagued by a situation that is over (and completely out of my control anyways).
Does forgiveness excuse the behaviour of the offender? No. Her offenses are still hers to deal with. What forgiveness does do…is release me from obligation to worry and fret about the situation…and yes, releases me from the need to remain angry.
Psychology and Selfishness
I came to an interesting conclusion a while back. All sin…or evil…or human badness…or whatever you want to call it comes down to one over-arching problem. Selfishness. At first glance, that may appear to be an over-simplification, but think about it for a minute. Why does someone rob a bank? Greed (selfishness). Why does someone commit murder? Hatred. Hatred at its root can be traced back to selfishness (I hate because I have been offended, or I have been wronged).
Sometimes, perhaps, someone might commit some sin/crime because of circumstances…consider the person who has lost everything due to civil war…but even there, selfishness is a contributing factor at a second-hand level as war could never begin if someone (or some group) did not selfishly demand something.
So…what is selfishness? The Oxford Dictionary defines selfish as: “adjective (of a person, action, or motive) lacking consideration for other people; concerned chiefly with one’s own personal profit or pleasure.”
If you want my definition of selfishness, it’s a “me first attitude”.
Jean Piaget (1896-1980) came up with a theory of cognitive development divided into 4 major stages:
- Sensorimotor Stage (0-2 years of age)
- Pre-operational Stage (2-7 years)
- Concrete Operational Stage (7-11 years)
- Formal Operational Stage (11+ years)
(note: ages are approximations)
Without getting into all the details (see above link for more information on all the stages), the first two stages are characterized by egocentrism – or the inability to view a situation from any perspective other than one’s own
Piaget theorized that once somebody reaches approximately 7-11 years of age, they begin to be able to see the world from the perspective of someone else. In other words, they begin to have a capacity for unselfishness – not to say that selfishness ends at this point – far from it! They simply gain the capacity to be unselfish.
I have a new theory: Somewhere in the last 50 years or so, the number of people who cease to view the world egocentrically has seriously declined. Yes, they may be able to consider somebody else’s perspective, but they are unwilling to do so.
For example, I had a run-in with a man who was playing his car stereo so loudly that he was causing dishes to vibrate in our cupboards half a block away. I was polite as I could be under the circumstanced, but I asked him to turn his music volume down. His basic response was that he likes loud music, and so he would play his music loudly. When I and a few other neighbours explained our perspectives to him, he didn’t seem to “get it.” He seemed to wonder how it could be that we would be bothered by his music when he liked it? I thought at the time that he was simply very rude, but now I’m beginning to wonder if he has a psychological inability to view the world from the perspective of his neighbours. I’m starting to wonder if something happened during his developmental years that caused him to stop maturing while he was still in the egocentric preoperational stage.
I know that we are all guilty of egocentrism to greater or lesser degrees, but I’m really starting to think that our society has a major issue with adults who are unwilling or unable to think and behave as adults.
Unfortunately, I have only observations and no solutions at this point, but I suspect that there has been a dramatic change in the way that children have been raised over that past few decades, and if unchecked, we will find ourselves in an ever increasingly narcissistic society.
Stickers for Dishes
I love my church. I love the pastor of my church. I love the passion that Russ has for the Word of God, his passion for the lost, and his passion for the less fortunate of our community. Pastor Russ has a large ambition: he wants us to be a church that changes the world. Perhaps this seems like an overly lofty goal…how can one church in a small Canadian city impact the entire planet? One step at a time. If the individuals in our church start to look at the needs of those around us, we can change our community. If those in our community begin to look at the needs of those around them, we’ll change our province. Our province can affect change in our nation. Our nation can change the world! In the past year, Russ has regularly spoken of the “Quartet of the Vulnerable”. This includes widows, orphans, immigrants, and the poor. In the past year or so, among other things our church has partnered with Hands On Ministries (an organization that works with inner-city street kids), and has been helping a refugee family from Myanmar to adjust to life in Saskatoon (and is working on helping them to bring more of their family members to Saskatoon as well).
Sometimes as individuals, we wonder, “What can I do?” ”How can I be an agent of change in my church/community/world”? Start by looking at the small things you can do.
In the province of Saskatchewan, there is a chain of grocery stores (C0-Op) that runs a promotion each year for their customers. They started this promo 2 years ago by offering knives to customers who collected enough stickers (different knives were worth a different amount of stickers). Last year they offered pots and pans in the same way. This year the offer is for plates, bowls and cups. Stickers are collected by spending money on groceries at the store (for each $10 spent, one sticker is earned). This year’s promotion just began a few day ago, and will run til mid June.
My wife and I were in need of knives…our old set of sharp knives could barely cut warm butter (OK, they weren’t that bad, but they weren’t in the best shape anymore), and the pots and pans were greatly appreciated as well. Plates, bowl and cups, though? We have more than we need already. So my wife came up with an idea: She suggested that we should collect the stickers as usual, and then get some dishes for a needy family in our community…or perhaps for the family members still to come over from Mynamar. The needs in our city are numerous enough that finding a recipient shouldn’t be too difficult.
We recognized that, although we can contribute some, we likely couldn’t contribute an entire set of dishes on our own. So we decided to involve our church and other friends in the city. If numerous people were to “join forces” in sticker collection, we might be able to provide an entire set of dishes for a family…or maybe multiple sets for multiple families!
I know that some of the readers of this post will be from the Saskatoon area, and for those of you who live in the Saskatoon area: if you’re interested in helping us out in this endeavour, I’d encourage you to leave a comment at the end of this post.
For those of you who live elsewhere, you might not be able to help us out, but you can do things to help the needy in your own communities. Do you have growing kids? Consider taking the clothing that your children have out-grown and donate them to an organization that helps out young moms who can’t afford to clothe their children. Or have a garage sale and instead of using the money for yourself, consider donating it to a local charity. Or…find your own creative way of doing something for the betterment of somebody else.
“This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor.’” (Zech. 7:9-10)
What better way to ‘not oppress’ than by actively seeking ways to help them out?
Jesus Has Come to Town!
There is a popular song that is often sung around Christmas time called “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” The lyrics are as follows:
You better watch out/ You better not cry/ Better not pout/ I’m telling you why/ Santa Claus is coming to town
He’s making a list/ And checking it twice;/ Gonna find out Who’s naughty and nice/ Santa Claus is coming to town
He sees you when you’re sleeping/ He knows when you’re awake/ He knows if you’ve been bad or good/ So be good for goodness sake!
O! You better watch out!/ You better not cry/ Better not pout/ I’m telling you why/ Santa Claus is coming to town/ Santa Claus is coming to town
If we’re going to be honest with ourselves, this is an incredibly depressing song! How much better to know that instead of Santa, Jesus has come to town!
The song starts out by telling us “You better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout.” How many of us can say that we never have a bad day where we have complained about our circumstances, or the people that we have come in contact with? Perhaps you are in a difficult financial situation, or are in/have recently been in a bad relationship? Unlike Santa, Jesus doesn’t expect us to be emotional zombies. He knows that we are going to weep and cry, and yes, sometimes even pout! Instead of telling us not to do that, he invites us to come to him with our difficulties. In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus gives the invitation: ”
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, 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. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”(NIV)
In the second stanza, we are warned that Santa is “making a list” and he’ll use it to see if we’ve been “naughty or nice”. Let’s be honest here! We can probably all think of a dozen times in the last week alone when we’ve said or done something hurtful to somebody else. Even if we’ve felt bad about it, the damage is already done. If we’re being judged by Santa to see if we’ve been “naughty or nice”, I’m afraid we’re all doomed! Yes, the Bible speaks of a “list” of sorts…it’s called the “Book of Life”. If your name is in it, you will be saved. Unlike Santa’s list, however, getting your name on this list doesn’t depend on your works…
The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He [Jesus] was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. (John 1:9-13, NIV)
The first part of stanza 3 warns us that Santa sees us when we’re sleeping and knows when we’re awake. In the song, it almost seems to come across as a threat. According to Psalm 121, God is watching us too! But when I read this psalm, there is nothing threatening about it:
I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth.He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;
indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.The LORD watches over you—
the LORD is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.The LORD will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;
the LORD will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore. (NIV)
The second half of the 3rd stanza tells us that Santa “knows if we’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake.” Again, we face a dilemma – how many of us are truly “good”? How good do we have to be to make the “nice list”? According to the Bible, it is impossible, on our own, to appear “good” before God. Romans 3:10 tells us: “…There is no one righteous, not even one.” and again in Romans 3:23 we hear “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Fortunately, though, that’s not the end of it! No, we can’t on our own appear good before God, but…
and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:24-26)
Basically, this passage is telling us that even though we can’t possibly be good before God on our own, God has provided a way for us to be good: He sent Jesus to be a sacrifice for us…and that sacrifice washes clean those who put their faith in Jesus!
So even though we all “cry and pout”; even though we’ve all been bad and can’t get ourselves on the nice list through our own effort, we can be thankful that Santa is not the way of Salvation – we can rejoice instead that Jesus Christ has come to town. Hallelujah! Jesus Christ has come to town!!
Are You Ready for Christmas?
This morning, just before the service, I spent a few minutes chatting with my pastor. The topic came up: ”Are you ready for Christmas?” I responded that I’m almost ready for Christmas, as I only have one gift left to purchase…and that my wife and I have actually been getting gifts all through the year instead of doing the last minute panic thing.
A little while later, after sitting down in the service and singing some worship songs, our pastor started to give his message. As he spoke, I started to reflect on our previous conversation
The Scripture passage for his message came from Luke 2:18-20. From this passage, he gave us four main points:
- Jesus is Good News: ”…And the angel said to them, ‘Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news’…” (verse 10)
- Jesus is Great Joy: “…’of great joy that will be for all the people.’…” (verse 10)
- Jesus is the Savior: “…’For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior,’…” (verse 11)
- Jesus is Lord: “…’who is Christ the Lord.’…” (verse 12)
(podcast of his message available here)
As I listened to his message and reflected on our earlier conversation, I couldn’t help but wonder: ”Did I miss the point?” Somewhere around 2000 years ago, God became man and dwelt among us. Without this intervention in human history, we would be cut off from fellowship with God. We would stand condemned in our sins. We would be without hope of salvation. When Jesus came, that all changed. If we allow him to be our Lord and Savior, then his birth is good news indeed! What could cause us greater joy than to know that we are not separated from God? That we have hope?
Here I had been saying that I was ready for Christmas because I was almost done buying gifts?? This morning I was reminded that we might have bought every gift imaginable, and we could still be utterly unprepared for Christmas. Christmas is about a gift…but not the gifts that we give or get. It is about the gift of Jesus. It is about being his followers and doing his will.
Revisiting that conversation, I have to ask myself again: ”Am I truly ready for Christmas?”
Snow
I’m not a big fan of snow. To me, snow represents cold. It represents winter. It represents shoveling…all things that I really don’t enjoy much. I live in Canada, though, so it is something that I have to put up with every year. When I woke up this morning, I looked out the window to see that the ground was covered in the stuff.
On the other hand, I have some young boys who love snow. To them, it is snowmen, snowball fights, sledding, and everything else that is fun!
I have to admit, though, that even though I’m not a big fan of the stuff, it is pretty! Perhaps the best thing about snow is the instant transformation that it gives to the world. It doesn’t matter how messy or dirty a yard is, a few centimeters of snow makes it appear clean, fresh and new.
This clean and fresh look is possibly why The Psalmist used the imagery of snow in Psalm 51
For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me. Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. (Psalm 51:3-7 ESV)
We’ve all messed up. We’re all “dirty” from the things that we’ve done. We’re all in need of cleaning. I’m thankful that we have a God who is willing to wash away our sins! Unlike a blanket of snow, God does not merely cover up our sins…he gets rid of them completely. Like the appearance of fresh-fallen snow, we are made clean when we allow Christ to cleanse us.
Imagine a messy yard filled with rusting old cars, huge weeds, animal droppings and muck. In our sinful condition, that’s about how “clean” we appear. But now imagine that yard the day after a huge snow-fall. The sun shines down on fresh white, sparkling snow. The visual assault of the mess of that yard is completely covered by the new snow. Now imagine that when the snow melts, that yard no longer has the rusted old cars…the muck and weeds and all other un-cleaness are gone, and in their place is a luscious green lawn with beds of sweet smelling flowers in neat tidy beds.
When God washes us clean, we are clean! The filth of our old lives is taken away completely. I’m not saying that we become perfect…even the best Christian still sins…but we are forgiven. Basically, our guilt is taken away instead of constantly accumulating.
This is one reason that, even though I’m not a big fan of snow, I still see some benefit…it reminds us of God’s forgiveness through Jesus Christ. The old is gone…we are made fresh and new!
God Is In Control!
Then Noah built an altar to the LORD and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And when the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, the LORD said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” – Gen.8:20-22, (all Scripture quotations are taken from the ESV)
The flood is officially over. Noah, his family, and all of the animals have left the ark. So Noah worshipped in the way that he knew: he made sacrifices to God. We read that “Noah…took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird” for his sacrifices. (Remember, that Noah did not merely take 2 of each kind of animal, but he took 7 pair of each clean animal [Gen.7:2], so there would have been no forced extinction by this action.)
It’s obvious that God was pleased with the sacrifices, because God said in his heart that he would never again destroy all life as long as the earth would last. But at the same time, God recognized that sin was not destroyed with the flood. “…for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth.” Not exactly a glowing letter of recommendation for our species – but unfortunately all too true. I think that if we are honest with ourselves, there is nobody who can say that their good deeds are entirely without selfish motive. Whether because we hope to gain something, or even if just to achieve recognition, even the good that we do is tainted. Isaiah 64:6 puts it this way: “We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.”
Yes, we are all sinful, yet God loves us enough that he promised not to destroy all life again…at least not until the end of the world. I suppose that this might be seen as a partial redemption of humanity after the fall – a more complete redemption would come later through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ – but for now, the salvation of Noah and company, and the promise not to destroy all life might be seen as a sign that God was not about to abandon his creation – God had something bigger and better in store.
One verse that I find particularly interesting in this passage is verse 22: “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease”. I’m not a big supporter of the theory of Global Warming. I suspect that given enough time, scientists will discover that there are periods of global warming, followed by periods of global cooling. I believe that this verse as much as promises that our world will not be destroyed by global warming. Don’t get me wrong – I’m not saying that we should go out and pollute the world without a care – we were called to be stewards of God’s creation. I am saying that we don’t have to panic about every report that the average temperature of the world is going up, because God is STILL in control!
The Waters Subside (Gen.8:1-19)
For any of you who have been waiting for me to get back to blogging through Genesis, your patience is finally being rewarded! My last post on Genesis was posted back in August of 2010. Yes, 9 months have passed since we left Noah in the ark, floating on a flooded earth. Thankfully God did not forget about Noah for as long as I did!
In fact, the very first verse of Genesis 8 tells us that we have a God who does not forget:
But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided. (Gen.8:1 – all Scripture quotations taken from the English Standard Version)
After 40 days of rain…and not just a light drizzle, but I suspect torrential downpour, the rain finally stopped. It hadn’t been just rain though either: Genesis 7:11 says that ”the fountains of the great deep burst forth”. Needless to say, there was a lot of water – enough to cover all the hills and mountains. Anybody who was not in the ark had now perished. With this much water covering the earth, it took about a year before the water subsided enough for Noah and all of his passengers to disembark (the flood began in the 2nd month of Noah’s 600th year (Gen.7:11), and those on the ark finally disembarked in the 2nd month of Noah’s 601st year (Gen.8:14-19)
Imagine, for a moment, that you had spent the last year in a boat, surrounded by every kind of animal imaginable…and finally, your boat strikes something solid and comes to rest. You haven’t seen land in so long that you’ve almost forgotten what it looks like. I imagine that Noah and his family (not to mention the animals) were getting pretty anxious to set their feet on solid ground again! No wonder Noah was so anxious to send out birds to “scout out” whether or not there was any dry ground yet! It took a while, but finally…
In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth had dried out. Then God said to Noah, “Go out from the ark…” (Gen.8:14-16a)
…they got the go-ahead to exit the ark. What a parade that must have been!! At long last, solid ground. It had been a while, but once again, God proved Himself to be faithful!
The Window
There is a perception held by many that, whether we get to Heaven or go to Hell, depends on how well we live our lives. Do more good deeds than bad, and you’re home free. Basically, the model is that of an old-fashioned balance scale. Put more rocks in the “good” side, and the scale will tip in your favour. Put more rocks in the other side, however, and the afterlife might not be so pleasant for you.
But how does this view line up with Scripture? Romans 3:23 tells us, “…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…” (all scripture quotations taken from the ESV translation). Romans 3:10-12, in quoting the Psalms, says, “…as it is written: ‘None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.’” A pebble of sin outweighs a boulder of righteousness!
I think, based on the above verses, that we can take the scale illustration and throw it out the window.
Speaking of windows…perhaps a window would be a better illustration! Imagine, for a minute, that you are planning on buying a window to put in your house. You go to the hardware store and go to the window section. The first window you see is absolutely shattered…just pea sized pieces of glass on the floor. “Too broken” you say. The next pane isn’t shattered, but it has a spider-web crack, covering about 75% of the glass. Once again, you pass this window by. The third window you see is still cracked, but after careful examination, you determine that only 49% of the window is affected. Would you buy this window? Of course not! Despite the fact that it’s “more good than bad”, it’s still rendered unacceptable. To take my illustration further, would you buy a window that is flawless…except for one small chip? Probably not! When we look for a window, we look for perfection. Nothing else will do. Even the smallest of cracks or chips simply will not do.
We are like the window. “…For all have sinned…”. One little stone-chip. “…and fall short of the glory of God…”. We are damaged goods. Imperfect, and fit for the garbage bin. But thanks to the grace of God, He has provided a solution. One of the best known passages of Scripture is John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” You might say that Jesus takes the broken windows of our lives and fixes them. He doesn’t just patch the window…He completely removes the cracks – even the shattered window is not beyond His ability to repair! Psalm 103:11-12 says: For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.
We need to take a step of faith and ask Jesus to forgive us of our sins. We cannot save ourselves any more than a window can fix itself. But if we put ourselves into the hands of Jesus Christ, he can and will make us right before God!
