judge not that ye be not judged

I don’t mean to brag— but there are so many good things that I do right that others do so wrong.

In the summer I’m a bicyclist. In the winter, I cross-county ski.  I exercise hard, every day. It’s a necessary discipline for decent health. And it is so apparent to everyone.

Also, I am a devoted husband, father—and often a devoted grandfather. I’m not stupid. I know nothing so affects my quality of life as my quality of relationship with my wife and family. I will do anything for my wife and most anything for my children, cheerfully and without complaint. That’s the truth!

Then I read and I think. I don’t just read fluff. I read hard books that I need to read with a pen so I can focus on what is meaningful in the book. When I am alone or in bed, I discipline my mind to think through things. When I am in conversation, I remember to consider and listen carefully. I pull up the walls of my own viewpoint so I can learn from an array of different intellects and vantage points.

And I’m a sincere Believer. While I am so aware of my own lack of holiness, I am deeply moved by the reality and the kindness of our Father in Heaven.

But here’s the rub:  I judge faster than the twinkling of an eye. That means I look at others, and I disdain. Then I look at myself and in the same judging fashion,  I wonder, “Is that all there is about me?”

So I become anxious and I groan inside myself, “Oh wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death?”

Sometimes I can remember, “For there is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” 

And sometimes the little chorus goes through my brain:

I love you Lord

And I lift my voice

To worship You, oh my soul rejoice

Take joy my King

In what you hear

May it be a sweet, sweet song

In Your ear

Can it be that the King of the Universe, the Holy One can be so unjudging as to take pleasure in the praise of punks like myself?

                                                                                 

why I am not an atheist, part 6

I agree, it’s outrageous that so many people insist their weird ideas have just as much validity as something that has been carefully researched and reviewed by the world’s scientific community. I’m a Believer in Science, because in today’s world, science is self correcting. When bad conclusions are made, there are any number of smart people out there who delight in figuring out the errors that were made that produced those bad conclusions.

And I understand, it is the nature of nature to adapt to new circumstances. I understand that a bird species that lives in an area where a longer beak would help in hunting insects will, in not too many years, be a species of bird with longer beaks. But to imagine that our intricate genome and our even more intricate brain just sort happened through this same simple adaptive process—it makes me crabby.

I can only see one reason for this mass ignorance among the intelligent, and that is a pathological passion to disregard God. For what else can explain such Faith in such absurdity?

Faith is humanity’s great equalizer. The very simple and the very smart, both have to make a choice: Will I believe God exists? And if so, am I willing to accept His authority, His intrusion, His goodness in my life?

Nothing has made me not an atheist like the blind Faith of most of the most intelligent in evolution.  

why I am not an atheist, part 5

The Apostle Paul gives a listing of the credentials of the Lord Jesus in the first chapter of his book to the Colossians: He is the image of the invisible God; by Him were all things created in heaven and earth; He is before all things and in Him all things hold together; He is the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might have the preeminence. But in the middle of this amazing list is: “And He is the head of the body, the church.” Col 1:18. Of course Paul is not writing a resume for Jesus, but if he was, and if I were him, I would leave out that church part. It is an understatement to say His church really is not that impressive.

In the New Testament, the church is defined as the whole body of people who have taken Jesus to be their Lord and Savior. That means every Believer is part of the church. Typically Believers come together as a local group on a regular basis to express together their appreciation for what the Lord Jesus has done for them. These groups are called churches. Most of these churches have some sort of affiliation with other churches. There are any number of these affiliated churches, most of which are affiliated together because of their disaffiliation from other church affiliations.

I had a college teacher who wrote of several of the church revivals in 19^th century America called, “Less than Conquerors.” His book told how each new revival merely added to the confusion and sectarianism of the American church.

Nearly every Believer who has been part of a local church group can tell you very sad stories how their church has been infected with hubris, apathy, antipathy, immorality, heresy, partiality and many other problems.

Several years ago, a good friend listened sympathetically to my story of a series of injustices that happened to me at the church where I attended. “You’ve been beat up by the church. But take heart, you are not alone. I don’t know of anyone who hasn’t been beat up by the church.”

I know some people who insist that the church is in disarray, and like Humpty Dumpty, it can never be put back together. They can give good evidence that it has been an utter failure for all of its 2000 years.

But there is something else going on in the church, in churches, in the little church of which I am a part. It’s something quietly supernatural; a sweet, sweet spirit. Together we remember the death (of all things) of the Lord Jesus: the One who was before all, in whom all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell; lifted up on the cross after being beaten, and spit upon.

I understand why the Church might cause one to become atheists. As the institution manifesting Christ here on this earth, we’re a motley crew.

 I wish I was a better person. Though I think I might be considered, comparatively, not so bad of a person, every day I am aware of my own failure of character. I could be much kinder, much less self interested.

I also wish my fellow Believers were better people. Every day I hear certain ones who are unable to forgive. Every day I see degrees of hypocrisy and judgementalism that just should not be.  

But when I come together with fellow Believers as a church, and we remember together the Lord Jesus, sometimes there is such a sweet, sweet spirit.

I am bewildered as to why Paul would list as one of the Lord Jesus’ praiseworthy attributes that He is the head of the church. I can hardly imagine why this could be true. But I’m delighted to imagine it, which is one more reason why I am not an atheist.

.

why I am not an atheist, part 4

A common human paradox is that the more accepting a person is ideologically, the more of an elitist he is, but the bigot tends to be the person who has the heart of gold. I knew a man who would say things that would make Rush Limbaugh blush, but he and his wife shared many friendly and fun meals at their kitchen table with a radically liberal college professor and a Black man. I know another man who is so very cocerned about universal justice. Every morning he wakes up in dismay at all the travesties perpetrated by the United States. But he himself is quite wealthy, and lives in a large house by himself. As far as I know, he has never shared anything with anybody, especially not some ignorant red neck.

Abraham Lincoln was an exception to this. Despite his amazing determination to bring justice to a despised people, Lincoln loved the company of any person of every type with whom he had contact, as that person was willing to accept his friendship. I believe more books have been written about Abraham Lincoln than any other person. To date there have been over 16,000 of his biographies published. And his biographies are read by people of every country. I have a friend who visited Burma and found a biography of Lincoln in a home where he stayed. I am one of Lincoln’s many readers. Like so many others, I am so drawn to Lincoln because of this god-like quality of his. 

If I am to have any chance with God, I need Him to be Someone who really likes me, despite what I am. I do not have the qualities that attract. I am short. I’m sort of ugly and sort of old. I walk funny. I'm edgy. I’m an introvert, which means I think a lot about myself. 

I get pretty emotional when I read the story of Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman. Like myself, this woman did not have a lot going for her. She was of a despised people. Her personal life was a mess. She was a poor woman in the first century.

But the Lord Jesus talked with her just like she was a real human being. Certain things that He said sunk in, and she believed in Him. She had come to a well to draw water and then she forgot what she was doing and left her water pot because she was so excited to run back to town to tell everybody, “Come see the man who told me all that I ever did.” (I’m sure the people in town already knew everything she had ever done as she had lived a scandalous, and thus interesting, life.)

How did the Lord Jesus react? When His disciples came to bring Him some lunch, He wasn’t hungry.  “I have food to eat that you don’t know about,” He told them.

When I am in the middle writing and it’s going well, food is not on my mind. I’m too happy to eat. I’m accomplishing what I really like to accomplish. After talking with this "unattractive" woman, the Lord Jesus was too happy to eat.

I wish I could just hang out with Abraham Lincoln. He loved to talk, so I would just listen and I would let him know by my laughter how much I liked being with him. Would I like to hang out with the Lord Jesus? It sounds scary. He’s the Son of God. I do know that if there’s anyone I’d like to hang out with, it would be someone like Abraham Lincoln who was someone like the Lord Jesus. The idea of life after death does not attract me. I don’t want to live forever. I didn’t need a play of Jean-Paul Sarte to teach me that. But I sure like how the Lord Jesus was so excited about the connection he made with the Samaritan woman. I think it means He would be excited about being with me--just with me, though I can’t understand how that will work with so many others also being His friends.

Regardless, I do like what I see in Jesus, so I’m hopeful. Which is another reason why I am not an atheist.

why I am not an athiest, part 3

“I’m putting all of the burden on Jerry, I’m not blaming you,” said my boss. “He’s the one who did not carry through on what I told you both to do.”

My new job came with a whole lot of stress. Besides coming into it with the insecurity of having just gotten fired from my last job of 32 years; without any training or mentoring, I’m using an entirely different set of skills. But it’s been even tougher going from being management to being managed.

My intent is always to respond precisely, quickly and thoughtfully to whatever my boss tells me to do. Sometimes that works out. My new job uses more of my God given abilities. But most days I come home from work frustrated with what went wrong, and most mornings I wake up with a sense of dread wondering what will happen next.

On my older son’s advice, I eat an avocado every day, and I faithfully take drops from a “herbal dietary supplement” that promises to be a “calming focus aid.”  Maybe this has helped a little bit. But to be told by my boss, “All the burden is on Jerry”—now that helped! In an instant the tightness in my throat disappeared,  and I could literally feel the knot on my stomach untie itself.

Which is my third reason I am not an atheist. There is no way I can bear to bear my own burdens.

About ten years ago I went to the funeral of the husband of a co-worker. For years I had listened to this co-worker express humorous contempt for her husband. One day I said to her, tongue in cheek, “Tell me one thing good about Edmund.

Suddenly the amusement was gone from her face. “You don’t know what you are asking,” she said and she then proceeded to tell me incident after incident of some really rotten things that Edmund had done.

Which was confusing. Whenever Edmund would come in to work to see his wife, I could see she was pleased to see him. She always had a smart remark for him and he was always amused. I could see he was proud of his wife and then at his funeral, she was truly sorrowful.

At his funeral, the pastor read the poem, Invictus:  

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul. 

William Ernest Henley

I laughed. My wife gave me a sharp nudge. Edmund was a nice enough guy. Whether she liked it or not, his wife loved him. I knew several of his kids, they loved him too. But he was a screw up. He was not the master of his fate. He was not courageous. He was not defiantly true to himself. He was just a good ol’ boy. He was just Edmund. And he fell way short of what he should be, just like me.

Last night I was reading in Isaiah 53: “Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him smitten by God, and afflicted. He was pierced for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace and with His stripes, we are healed.”

In John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian comes to the cross when the burden he was bearing, “loosed from his shoulders, and fell from his back, and began to tumble and so continued to do, till it came to the mouth of the sepulcher, where it fell in, and he saw it no more. Then was Christian glad…But he stood a while to look and wonder, for it was very surprising to him that the sight of the Cross should thus ease him of his burden.

While writing this blog this morning, I am feeling bad for Jerry, my new friend from work who my boss says he’s putting the whole burden on. I wish I could do something for him. I wish I could come to his defense. But I am so relieved to have my burden from work transferred to someone else.

But of course my work burden is only a small part of the burden I’ve been accumulating for about 59 years now. And just because I’m not feeling the burden at this moment , does not mean it is not there. Everyone who has known me can be my accuser.

I try not to think of bad things. I rarely read the crime section of the newspaper and I almost never watch the news. So only on occasion do I think of the crucifixion of Jesus on the cross, for I like to think the best of everybody.  Maybe if I think well of a person, maybe that person will reciprocate and think well of me. The cross is so sad for it shows everybody involved behaving so bad. But like Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress, I am so surprised (and shocked) at how happy I feel when I think about it. The cross tells me that my burden was transferred over to Someone else.

At my funeral I’m hoping the preacher will not be too honest about me. But if the preacher feels so compelled, instead of Invictus, I would just as soon he read the words of the Apostle Paul, “Be reconciled to God. For our sake, God made Him (Jesus) to be the sin offering (the burden bearer) so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” Amazing!

If an atheist is honest, as I believe is the intention of most atheists, I can’t imagine how he can live accepting full responsibility for his own behavior and the burden of all its consequences.  I’m no where near strong enough. I had to have Someone who could take over my burden.

.  

why i am not an atheist, part 2

At my new job I watched a man sitting in a wheelchair at a table. He looked at my display table and decided he needed to talk to me. He energetically pulling himself out of his wheelchair and haltingly took about ten steps to get over to me. He asked me several questions, and then I asked him about his disability. He told me he had Multiple Sclerosis for twenty years. A few months back his MS kicked in again which was why he was in now in the wheelchair. “When I was first diagnosed with MS, it was pretty hard,” he said. “I love to fish. I decided I was going to fish in all 50 states. I made it to 46. Michigan was the best. But I just figured there was nothing I could do about my MS so I wake up each morning happy to be alive.”

“Really?” I asked him.

“I have a lot of friends who give me a lot of help. He pointed to a lady sitting at his table. “That's my wife,” he said. “She's been been solid as a rock.”

“Amazing,” I said. “The Lord's been good to you.”

His eyes lit up. He nodded his head. “Yeah, He sure has.”

A few days ago I met a young man who told me he was retarded. “You are not retarded,” I told him. “You're plenty bright.”

“I was in a car accident five years ago. I was in a comma for four weeks. They told my mom and dad I would never talk again,” he told me.

“Wow,” I said. “Then you're doing great!”

“My memory is not good,” he said.

“My memory is not much good either,” I told him. “From what I can see, the Lord's been really good to you.”

His eyes also lit up. “He has been!” he said. “God has been good to me.”

Exactly where I get off telling people who are in the midst of a tragedy that the Lord has been good to them, I'm not quite sure. For some reason, it seems like the appropriate thing to say.

I've known too many people who have gone through tragedy. It scares me, for I see no reason why tragedy shouldn't happen to me. But something strange is going on. Tragedy typically does not make a person especially unhappy. As often as not, those in the midst of tragedy are grateful to the Lord for His daily blessings.

This is my next reason why I am not an atheist. —the Lord seems to especially reveal Himself to those who are in difficult circumstances, which seems to me like the appropriate thing for Him to do. “Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Luke 6:20

why I am not an atheist, part 1

I think there are several pretty good reasons to be an atheist. Pain and the randomness of evil are the two biggest.  Probably the hypocrisy of those who are religious is what clinches it for most people who identify themselves as atheists. 

I almost became an atheist from reading the Bible.  I decided when I was 15 years old that I was going to read through the Bible “objectively.” Three passages stuck out as being too hard to be believed. The first was the chat Balaam had with his donkey; the second was when a dead man was thrown into the grave of Elisha, “and as soon as the man touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood on his feet.” II Kings 13:21. And the third is the whole gospel of John. Everything Jesus said just seemed too weird for me.  I certainly didn’t want to be an atheist. I thought there must be something that I just didn’t quite get. 

One day, while in my first year in college, I read the story of the Good Samaritan. Having been raised in a Christian family, I had read and heard it many times before. But, finally, I really read it—objectively. It was so clever, and written with such lack of drama. And the story was so true, so real. I knew people (not myself) who were the Good Samaritan type.  Certainly it was a parable, for there was so much meaning in it, but it also was so true to life.  And it was then that I understood that I need not be an atheist, for the story gave an answer to all my major atheistic questions. 

If you were to ask the victim of the Good Samaritan story what was the best moment of his life, I know he would tell you it was when that very kind man came over to him and had pity on him and poured oil and wine on his wounds. He would tell you he never felt so at peace as when the Samaritan lifted him up on his donkey.  He would say the kindest gift he had ever received was when the Samaritan gave the innkeeper a wad of money and then told the innkeeper, “Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.” Luke 10:35 Was this outrageous beating this poor man took then worth it? Did the good balance the bad? With good and evil, there is no balancing, for the good is what gives meaning, and joy. Why do people act as good Samaritans?  Their behavior seems so random. There are good Samaritans among every group of people; the rich, the poor, the religious, the criminal, the wise and the very simple, the old and the young. Where does there behavior come from? Why would they so put themselves out for someone from whom they can derive no personal benefit? It’s so…God like! That was it. There was no other way to describe what they did, for I knew it was true. God is so random in His kindness. When I’d least expect it, suddenly, there was something good, so far beyond what I ever hoped. 

This eureka moment happened when I needed to find someone for a room-mate for the next school year. I thought, “How sad! I’ve spent almost a whole year at this Christian College, and I haven’t found one person who is a good enough friend that they would want to be my roommate. That afternoon I happened to sit next to a kid whose name I was pretty sure was John. I was so sure, I called him John. He answered to the name and we had a great conversation about nothing at all. Our sense of humor was an almost perfect match. He told me he had found a roommate, but since the college dormitories required three students, he wondered if I’d be willing to join them. I was, and John, whose name I later found out was David Harvey, became my good friend. Roxanne and I visited Dave and his wife Gayle this last week up in Grand Marais where he is the pastor of the Evangelical Free Church. We had such a good visit. The Lord is so good. Because of starting a new job, my life has been pretty stressful lately. A visit with such a friend was like oil and wine on a nasty wound. 

As an addendum: The story of the Good Samaritan gives some answer to each of my atheistic questions.
 

Why random pain and evil? Here on this earth, it seems like what is really good comes out of what is really bad. Take Calvary, for instance.

Why such hypocrisy among the religious? Who knows. The religious are just people like the rest of us. But a better question is: Why are some people so Godlike as to be Good Samaritans?

Why these weird things in the Bible? I’d really like to get more information on Balaam’s talk with his donkey and the man who popped back to life when his body touched the dead bones of Elisha. But I do know, no one ever spoke like Jesus. I could write volumes on lessons I have learned from this one short parable. As the Lord gives direction, I’d like to share another of those lessons on my next blog