IVP - Strangely Dim - August 2007 Archives

Something There Is That Doesn't Love a Wall

I have two cats, and I like them quite a lot. I don't like them at all, however, when they start freaking out on me, because watching cats freak out is like watching an exorcism gone horribly, horribly wrong.

Unfortunately, my cats freak out on a relatively regular basis, for reasons that are pretty predictable. The biggest contributing factor is the presence of undomesticated, feral cats sniffing around the windows of my house. I don't know if my cats are threatened by this uninvited interloper or simply jealous that some cats get to roam free while I, their tyrannical host, force them to stay inside near a steady supply of food and fresh water, presumably so that I can maintain the exclusive privilege of scooping up and dispensing their waste products. But I digress. Whenever a feral cat comes within view of my cats, they respond first by darting from window to window, trying to get the best possible vantage point, then by howling, hissing and screeching at levels that build quickly from mild agitation to what resembles demonic possession. And of course, because I'm a mean guy and won't let them outside, they can't take out their aggression on the feral cat, so they take it out on each other. Everyone involved is inconsolable for long stretches of time afterward--except for the feral cat, which just ambles away lackadaisically, its work apparently done.

I react generally by shaming my cats, speaking sarcastically to them about how proud I am of them for defending our home. I can't imagine what would possess a sentient being to react so irrationally to the mere presence of another sentient being. But this week I started to get a clue.

I looked out my window early one morning to see a strange-looking guy walking around on my driveway. Now, in his defense, he didn't look really strange; if I saw him at the mall or in the dentist's office I probably wouldn't give him a second thought. But in my driveway he looked decidedly strange and positively menacing. I started darting from room to room, trying to get a sense of where this guy had come from, where he was going and what he was doing on my private property. I was moving quickly from mild agitation to sputtering near-madness.

I should add that (a) I share a driveway with my neighbor and (b) I have a new neighbor, whom I've met only once in passing. Although I can't be sure, this stranger in my driveway was probably my new neighbor in his driveway. I came thisclose to welcoming him to the neighborhood by charging out after him in my bathrobe, ready to defend my turf to the death.

Now the question: Is this kind of behavior more excusable in cats or people?

I'm embarrassed by my vulnerability to the psychology of turf. We're conditioned in the culture we inhabit to protect our domain, to jealously guard the boundaries that we have established for ourselves and, more significantly, for our neighbors. "Good fences make good neighbors" is poetry quoted as often as "There once was a man from Nantucket," I'd wager, and it's usually quoted approvingly--even though the poem's tone is more aptly communicated in the more melancholy opening line "Something there is that doesn't love a wall." Good fences may make good neighbors, but in so doing they subvert what was good about us in the first place.

God hadn't said much in sacred Scripture by the time he said "It's not good for the man to be alone," and I think we do that comment an injustice by interpreting it (as we so often do) solely as the case for sexual intimacy. The psychology of turf was nowhere to be found in Eden--the only thing off limits was the thing that kills. Meanwhile no one in God's good creation was condemned to be alone. We've done that ourselves.

The mere fact that I share a driveway, my former neighbor in the real estate business tells me, is countercultural, a boundary transgression that most homebuyers wouldn't dream of committing. But having transgressed that cultural boundary, how now shall I live?

The Power of No Power

I'm not sure how the weather is where you all are, but it's been a little wild in Chicago the last few days. If you like water, skip out on Hawaii and come visit us instead. We have plenty. And, if Benny Franklin were still alive, we'd be his favorite city--lightning for hours on end.

What we're a little short on, unfortunately, is electricity, at least on my lovely block and in a few of the nearby suburbs. When my sister and I arrived home at our apartment yesterday, the power was out. And when we got home from Caribou after meeting friends in the evening, the power was out. And when we woke up this morning--the power was out. Thankfully, we like candles. A lot.

I'll admit, not having power is inconvenient. Food in our freezer and fridge could spoil. It also takes longer to do things in the dark. And, of course, there are many things we just can't do at all: cook dinner, iron (though I'm not so upset about that one), read, charge cell phones, watch TV (which usually wouldn't bother us much but is particularly disappointing this week since we happen to be in the middle of season three of Lost . . .)

I'm trying to see it as an "adventure." If you're Erik Weihenmeyer (you know him; he's the one who's blind, who climbed Mt. Everest and reached the top), power outages do not adventure make. But if you're as fond of routine and predictability as I am, just having to take a different way home from work can qualify as an exciting escapade. (You're in awe of how thrilling my life sounds, I know.) So a power outage could definitely fit into the "adventure" category. Or it could just be pure inconvenience and put me in a bad mood. My perspective affects my response, my attitude.

I was reminded of this yesterday as I was sitting in the local Secretary of State's office in the dark, waiting for the power to come back on (it didn't) after driving through a torrential storm to get to the Secretary of State's office before it closed. (Did I mention that power outages are inconvenient?) There was a young girl there with her parents; they were already there when I arrived, so they had obviously been waiting in the dark longer. I wondered, as I watched the girl, if she even noticed that the power was out. She played with the rope designating where lines should form. She chattered. She sang happy birthday. From all appearances, she might have thought this was the "fun family outing" for the day--not an inconvenient power outage that kept her parents waiting in line much longer than they expected. Watching her, you'd wonder what you really do need electricity for after all, since you certainly don't need lights and computers to sing happy birthday.

So, in an effort to gain perspective and stave off the bad mood, here's one comfort I take from her example, and from all weather-related disturbances like Chicago summer storms and winter blizzards that interrupt my normal routine: I'm relieved to discover that I'm not so tied to electricity that I can't make do without, and I'm not so dependent on activity that I can't simply sit in a dark Secretary of State's office, waiting and watching. In our work-driven, frenzy-paced culture, I love that there are forces that make us stop--and there's nothing we can do about it. It does my control-thirsty senses good to remember that really, I never had power, and actually, I'm not in control, and truthfully, right now--without electricity--I still have far, far more than most of the people in the world.

Tonight I may return home to a dark apartment. Is it inconvenient? Yes. Will I vote for the presidential candidate who proposes banning electricity to start paying off the national debt? Probably not.

But is this power outage good for me? Yes. And can I still sing? Yes. And will I have gained some perspective on my life when it's over? Yes. It's so good, in fact, that you should come visit. You can help my sister and me eat up our food, you can sit on our couch and chat with us, or listen to the quiet.

We'll leave a candle on for you.

Jesus Without Religion & Life After Church

We were apparently in a grandiose mood when we titled this season’s Likewise books. Coming soon to bookstores (and bookshelves, one might hope) everywhere are two books making bold statements about some of the foundational beliefs of the Christian faith.

First up is Jesus Without Religion, by Rick James, the king of faith-filled funk. Rick wrote his book as an attempt to look at Jesus through the text of the Bible and the culture of Jesus’ era, rather than through the institutional constructs put in place by centuries of church. Not that he has anything against church; Rick simply wants to get down to the nitty gritty: What did Jesus say, what did he do, and what was the point?

The only thing standing in the way between you and Jesus now is Rick’s Robin-Williams-esque sense of humor, which peppers each page and salts each assertion:

Genre is everything. The merit of the phrase “eggs, chili powder, prune juice and Captain Crunch” can only be assessed by learning whether the genre is that of a grocery list, a poem or a recipe. It’s a coherent grocery list, a lousy poem and a vile recipe.

To understand a particular section of the Bible, you simply must identify the genre. . . . Jesus’ . . . explanation for speaking in parables . . . is similar to the rationale behind a poem. The shocking truth is that Jesus doesn’t want everyone to understand him. Yes, that’s what I said, “Jesus did not want everyone to understand him.” . . .

In cloaking the truth in parables, Jesus allowed for people to be in a process, to be on a spiritual journey, to remain neutral if they chose. The parables are a dog whistle, piercing to the faithful but muted to the masses, graciously allowing the unready to avoid an out-and-out, final confrontation with the truth.

Pretty clever, huh? We see Jesus being controversial, then we see why. Add a little Captain Crunch and everybody’s happy.

On the heels of Rick’s book comes Life After Church: God’s Call to Disillusioned Christians by Brian Sanders. Brian is, and is writing about being, a leaver: in love with Jesus but dubious about the institution that carries his banner. Brian’s point is that many “churches” haven’t earned the title, or they’ve lost their way over time. It’s time to be honest, he challenges, and make lucid the hope that God calls us to as the church.

This isn’t, of course, some blanket permission to sleep in late on Sundays or to slander pastors and denominations or to sanctify your stool at the local bar. Brian’s helping us to understand what church really is and then pushing us to live into that understanding. You can do that where you are, within an existing church, or you can begin something new and revolutionary; either way, it needs to be done.

Try to be the church. Pray and serve and organize and dream and plan and give and welcome and sacrifice and form community and have conflict and reconcile and lead and share Jesus and behold and study and pray and teach and baptize and love and be a neighbor and meet needs and know people, all kinds of people. Be the church. Don’t be a victim of the structure you were born into; be a leader. Treasure Jesus, know him, study him, and then you will know yourself, who you were meant to be; then you will know the church and what it is meant to be. The vision God has for his bride is the same as the vision he had for his Son. It is the redemption of the world and the ushering in of the kingdom of God.

Brian’s book is a manifesto of sorts, a call to vital faith for people who feel their faith being gradually eroded.

These are only the latest books to emerge from our Likewise line. Plenty more where that came from, so keep us in your sights.

Something Old, Something's New

There's something about new. I have to admit, I like it. Not change, mind you. But new. New music to listen to (thanks to Dave for graciously lending me his new Andrew Bird CD, Armchair Apocrypha, last weekend). New shoes (there's nothing like new running shoes to motivate you to get out of bed at 5:30 a.m.). New recipes (I highly recommend sautéed eggplant, mushrooms and tomatoes over pasta, compliments of Real Simple). Ann said goodbye to InterVarsity Press and Strangely Dim for a new job, a new routine that will allow her to spend more time with her husband and sister. New holds with it the possibility of something better.

Maybe that's why I still like my birthdays. They are a second New Year's Eve for me, prompting even more processing in my brain than usual and bringing about a certain glazed, "I'm analyzing the past year of my life" look in my eyes. But after the reflection comes a peek at what lies ahead: an untouched year, in which anything can happen. A new age. Maybe that's why I like mornings so much too. No matter what happened the previous day, there is something powerful about waking to a day that's new, fresh, completely clean.

My sister and I are feverishly working our way through the television series Lost. We are, admittedly, somewhat addicted. The series follows the lives of a group of people whose plane crashes on a mysterious, seemingly out-in-the-middle-of-nowhere island. People who were mostly unknown to each other before they crashed. As the episodes reveal their histories, you realize what an opportunity this is for many of them: a new day and place, a chance to start over, to separate themselves from the painful, broken lives they were living before they crashed.

A new day doesn't offer that grand of an opportunity, of course. Nothing magical happens when the clock changes from 11:59 p.m. to 12:00 a.m. We still have to face our problems, our sins, other people's sins. The characters on Lost, too, even with their unique situation, cannot completely escape where they've come from. They have to face the habits that follow them to the island, the shadows of the past, and the ways their choices and experiences have shaped and formed them. The reality is that each new day contains some of the old.

And yet, I still feel amazed that there is something new in each day. At least a new sky--a sunrise or cloud formation that has never been duplicated before. New conversation. New insight, perhaps. New courage, maybe. New opportunities to affirm others and speak truth and show grace.

It's one thing God is all about, actually: new. Every day, his mercy is new. And, as I drag my weary, needy self to him, his new mercy becomes more tangible, more visible, I think, than even the morning's new sky.

We've been memorizing Philippians 1:6 ("being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus") at my church this summer, and I've been struck by its power when someone else speaks it to me. I have to have others telling me that they're confident that he'll complete his good work in me, because I have trouble seeing it. But the reality is, every day he is doing new work in me and new work in you and new work in places and people we have never heard of.

New shoes, for all their shine, at best only make me optimistic that maybe I'll run faster, or the run will be easier, or the impact on my body will be lessened. In a week, they're old, and the alarm goes off at 5:30 and I lie in bed and moan. But God's new--his work, his grace, his mercy--keeps giving me hope, despite myself, despite the old that clings to me.

So here's to waking tomorrow and Sunday and Monday and seeing the sky and giving grace and receiving mercy. Here's to helping each other see God's new.

I promise, it won't get old.

One Less Rabbit

Well, today begins a new month and a new, post-Ann Swindell era at Strangely Dim. Rabbits are supposed to multiply, not subtract, aren't they?

The site feels a little less strange today and yet a little bit dimmer. We'll miss Ann here at Strangely Dim, but we wish her well. Here are the highlights of her all-too-brief tenure as a Likewise blogger:

Product-ivity
Academic Polemic
A Walk Down Memory Lane (from the now-fabled Fortnight of Cliches)
A Short Reflection on a Little Cicada
Saying Goodbye

Ann will, of course, keep writing, so keep an eye out for her byline. And if you happen to see her on the first of the month--any month--be sure to tell her "Rabbit" for me.