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Third Deadly Thought: Avarice

We must understand that the lust for affluence in contemporary society is psychotic…We crave things we neither need nor enjoy.  ~Richard Foster

Avarice: Insatiable desire for wealth or material things. One of the Eight Deadly Thoughts that whisper in all our ears.

What do you have too much of? The question was an ice-breaker at a Women’s Retreat. Answers were shared: shoes, fabric (this was a crafty group), clothes, books. We all nodded in sympathy.

My answer surprised even me. What did the speaker have too much of?

Butter.

I was in the throes of the baking-cookies-for-kids-and-their-friends stage of parenting. At the grocery store, I could never remember if we had butter so, just in case, I would pick up a pound or two. One day I cleaned out the fridge and found 20 pounds of butter hiding in the back.

The last morning of the retreat, every breakfast table sent their butter to mine. In case I was worried I would run out.

Harmless And Prudent?

A mildly amusing story, but too much butter in the fridge is hardly a problem. This is my point–avarice sneaks up on us and claims to do no harm.

Covetousness we call ambition.
Hoarding we call prudence.
Greed we call industry, 

writes Richard Foster.

It may not be millions in an off-shore account, it may be twenties in an envelope under your mattress. Or a stash of food, supplies and weapons against the coming apocalypse du jour. Or a closet full of unworn clothes, a basement cluttered with barely used items “you might need someday.” We hoard,  “just in case.” We store up for bad times we can’t predict.

Jesus calls it irrational. In Luke 12,  he shares the parable of a wealthy man with crammed-full storage units, planning to upgrade to larger ones. What a fool, Jesus says. He’ll be dead by morning, and what good will stuff do him then?

Avarice distracts us from God, the simple enjoyment of life, and the very real need of others. “Wherever your treasure is, there your heart and thoughts will be also.” (Luke 12:34 NLT)

Why would we want to give our heart to things?

Arresting Avarice: ABC

  • Appreciate: God knows what you need each day–put him first and he promises to provide.
  • Be generous: Share your best things, not your cast-offs. Don’t keep anything–your home, car, clothing, food or cash–as “just for you.” Give it all to God for his use, for others.
  • Clear out your basement, storage unit, garage, attic, closets on a regular basis–give away what you haven’t used for a while.

Reading Luke 12 regularly is a great antidote to avarice. What others ideas can you add?

 

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Second Deadly Thought: Lust

We are not masters of our own feeling, but we are by God’s grace masters of our consent. ~St. francis de Sales

Lust is the alien impostor of love. And we live in the thick of its pollution.

So thick, we’ve forgotten what it feels like to breathe air unclouded and clean.

Lust is named one of the Eight Deadly Thoughts for good reason. Left to its devices, lust kills the most beautiful gift God has given–relationship. Richard Foster writes, “The relationship between male and female is the human expression of our relationship with God.”

Or so it is designed to be.

Lust: The strong physical desire to have sex with somebody, usually without associated feelings of love or affection.

That second part is key. Lust is sex with all the relationship drained away. A corpse.

You hold up a picture in your mind and say “I will love you.” You hold that same picture up and say “I will lust you.” Notice your thoughts travel in opposite directions.

  • Toward self-giving–the desire to encourage and serve for their good
  • Toward self-absorption–the desire to possess and enjoy for your pleasure

We’ve lost our way. Not only do we glorify lust in our movies and sitcoms, but the laugh-track implies something’s wrong if we don’t.

So, Is Lust Really A Problem?

  • A mind filled with fantasy can’t also discern.
  • A mind listening to lust can’t also hear God.
  • A mind willing to objectify others can’t also love.

How do we climb out of the smog, clear our heads and restore our vision?

Some Ideas:

  1. Care: Notice the millions neglected, abused or trapped in self-loathing. This is what unbridled lust has accomplished. Allow yourself to be sickened and sad.
  2. Confess: Notice what you watch, where you “surf,” what you read. When alone with your thoughts, where do they linger? What influences needs to go out with the trash?
  3. Community: Find an accountability partner or group. Prayer is the power that breaks lust’s deadly grip.
  4. Cultivate your appetite for wholesome fare. As the Apostle Paul urged,

Fix your thoughts on what is true and honorable and right. Think about things that are pure and lovely and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise…and the God of peace will be with you.

Philippians 4:8-9

A Few Resources:

I appreciate Barb Wilson’s blog post, 50 Shades of Frenzy, on the damaging effects of lust, glamorized in books like 50 Shades of Gray. Her website offers helpful resources for sexually broken men and women.

Dee Bright has written a great book, The Divine Romance, on healing for women trapped in harmful thinking . Click on her website to learn more.

What change can you make today to clear the air of lust?

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First Deadly Thought: Gluttony

Gluttony is an emotional escape, a sign something is eating us. ~ Peter De Vries

Gluttony. One leering face of an eight-headed bully is blocking my way. I’m hungry, my heart cries, as I swerve to avoid him. Stop here, he beckons, and I’ll show you a shortcut. Come, make your choice from the menu in my hand. As long as you’re filled, what could possibly matter? He waves it before me, the

Menu du jour

Specialty of the house: 

  • Food

Other popular items:

  • Drink
  • Luxury
  • Clothing
  • Cars
  • Technology
  • Travel
  • Entertainment
  • Work
  • Exercise
  • Applause

Check back tomorrow–new items each day. Don’t forget this is an all-you-can-eat buffet. Our motto: More is always better. Less is never enough.

The Problem With Gluttony

Gluttony, from the Latin, gluttire, lit. gulp down. To over-indulge, to over-consume. In our propaganda-swamped culture, everyone’s promoting the next-shiny-new-thing. And a voice assures us,

  • You deserve a reward
  • It’ll help numb the pain  
  • No one is hurt if you choose to upgrade.

But gluttony is deadly because of the lie it upholds:  God (he made every morsel you pile on your plate) hasn’t and isn’t and will never be enough.

For the 4th century monastics who warned of the Eight Deadly Sins, meals were simpler. But the voice of temptation sounded as strong: What difference does it make if you go back for seconds? But unconsumed food was set aside for the poor–if a monk over-indulged, he sent a child away hungry.

For many of us, the consequences of gluttony are more hidden, but the lesson is the same. We say “no” for the sake of God’s compassionate “yes.” We say “enough” so love will have its way.

Beheading The Bully: The Spiritual Practice Of Enough

  1. Make a habit of paying for groceries with cash. Remove from your cart any food low in nutrition. Place the money you save in an envelope for the poor.
  2. Borrow what you can; refuse to buy new until you’ve worn out the old.
  3. Purchase for usefulness, rather than status.
  4. If food is your weakness, bring a meal to a neighbor. If you’re a glutton for shoes, give them away. If you drool over luxury, share life with the poor.
  5. Write a letter “releasing” your chocolate, your work, or your iPhone from the burden of providing comfort and escape. “Remind” them of their true, but far lesser role.
  6. Keep a Journal of Contentment, listing all you’ve been given.
  7. Find ways to enjoy f00d-free, gadget-free fun.
  8. Aim for significance not self-indulgence when you travel.
  9. Cultivate a holy gluttony for God.
Share with us your ideas for beheading the bully!
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Stay Thirsty, My Friends

Deep in unfathomable mines of never-ending skill, he treasures us his bright designs, and works his sovereign will. ~William Cowper

Thirsty

People hang on his every word. He can speak French, in Russian. He enjoys inside jokes with complete strangers. Even his enemies list him as their emergency contact. Sharks have a week dedicated to HIM. He once had an awkward moment just to see how it feels.

He is the most interesting man in the world.

In case you’re wondering, I’m quoting beer commercials.

In TV and radio ads, actor Jonathan Goldsmith plays the daring, debonair mystery man described above.

Each segment closes with Goldsmith, surrounded by beautiful admirers, saluting us with the words,

Stay thirsty, my friends.

Here’s a sample if you haven’t seen these commercials, cleverly designed to leave us thirsty. Thirsty for adventure, thirsty for life. Thirsty to meet someone so brilliant, so at ease with himself that everyone else fades from view.

On a related note,

What do you picture when you think of Jesus? A flannel-board figure, a naive, disillusioned wonder-worker, or a white-robed vision smiling (or scowling) at you from the clouds? Or, worse, does he float in your mind as a composite of every well-coiffed, white-toothed celebrity speaker you’ve heard invoke his name?

Who could entrust the weighty matters of life to a caricature?

I open the New Testament and meet a Jesus impossible to ignore. Everywhere he goes, crowds gather. Outcasts and scholars alike are amazed and dumbfounded at his intelligence, wisdom and power. Or they are angry they can’t outfox him. No one is bored.

It was in Dallas Willard’s The Divine Conspiracy, one of the 15 Books That Found Me, I realized it. While wading with Willard through the entire New Testament to discern, “Who is Jesus and what does it mean to be his disciple,” the question occurred to me, “How can Jesus be Lord of my life if he is limited?”

He can’t. And he’s not.

Some Christians fear the educated “elite,” distrusting scientists and experts in every field. I wonder if it’s because they don’t believe Jesus is as comfortable in a physics lab or law library as he is at a hymn-sing.

Stay thirsty, my friends.

Stay thirsty enough to keep following after the one person in whom “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3) are found. Don’t settle for the limp imitation you may have embraced.

Have you considered the brilliance of Jesus?

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An Election Day Prayer: May We Be What We Wish For

But we are always praying that our eyes may behold greatness, instead of praying that our hearts may be filled with it. ~G.K. Chesterton

Election Day

It wasn’t a pretty sight. Me, playing intramural college basketball. A mild-mannered music major with no athletic talent, just spunk and dirt and fingernails.

The games would end, the competitive fog clear and I would shake my head, embarrassed. It wasn’t the finer points of basketball I learned that season. Instead I was faced with the unwelcome truth about me.

I hate to lose. I want to be proven right. And in the heat of the moment, I am quick to forget my opponent is not my enemy; the one who out-scores me could be a true friend.

Will We Win?

Today is Election Day. All over this country we place our mark and wait to see who wins.

We’ve learned a lot this year, not so much about candidates, but about us, and who we become when the stakes seem high. And it’s not a pretty sight.

We’ve been bruised and angered, judged and cajoled. We’ve guzzled paranoia and devoured the lies. We’ve excused our side (“They started it!”) and demonized the other. The “Self-Righteousness Detector” has registered an all-time high.

This is the unwelcome truth:

  • Our certainty exceeds our wisdom.
  • We trust in all the wrong things.
  • We would rather destroy community than admit we may be wrong.

I’m hoping for an Election Day miracle–a collective, courageous look in the mirror.

A look from God’s point of view.

It’s all on the table. God’s heard every word, every thought we entertained. He sees where we’re wounded, where we’ve wounded in turn. He’s well-acquainted with our platforms and protests, our doubts and disgust.

But His exit-poll query is not, Whom did you choose? The question He asks us is, Whose will you be?

Whom will you look like? Whose heart will you reflect? Of what stuff were you created–curses or blessing, darkness or light, loathing or loving, apathy or life?

The mirror never lies. The problem is not them, it is us. The problem is not us, it is me.

Election Day Prayer

Jesus, from this day forward,

May my words be wholesome and helpful, 

May my eyes always notice the pain, 

May my hands be used for your purpose alone, 

My feet, to bring hope in your name. 

May my posture lean toward the humble, 

Away from the arrogant spin, 

May my arms open wide to the lost and alone, 

May love matter more than a win.

Amen.

 

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Losing The Boxes: Why Accepting Others Is The Better Way

If I wait for others to be what I want them to be, I will never accept them. ~James Bryan Smith

I like boxes. Which is why the word acceptance can make me squirm. It seems too close to easy tolerance, the slippery slope into chaos that begins with a “whatever” shrug.

A substitute teacher reads the paper while the bullies have their way. Scout badges are handed out and slackers get the same. The neighbor boy grabs your toy and your parents think he’s cute.

We rightly fear a life-song with indifference as its tune.

So, perhaps like me, you draw a line, dole out your response. Approving applause or stiff-faced disdain, we sort people, good from bad; and put them into boxes, where we hope they’ll safely stay.

But what happens when the “bad” box is full and I stand  in the “good” box alone? Or what happens when it’s me I disdain, and I can’t find a way to get out?

Jesus’ command to “love your enemies” is for boxed-in moments like those. Love your enemies and pray for them, because there will be times when the enemy is everyone, and you still need people to love. 

God Has No Boxes

When we learn that God has no boxes, we find the courage to toss ours.

Accept one another just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God (Romans 15:7). The Greek word for “accept” means “to welcome someone into your home, into your closest circles of family and friendship.” Yes, God did that for you…and for the guy in the other box.

Outside The Box

I used to roll my eyes at people who had dogs. They smell, bark, pee, chew, whine, scratch, slobber. Why invite the mess?

Then sweet Pixie arrived, bringing delight and disarray. Hair on the couch, stains on the carpet, chewed up treasures–the list goes on and on. But she’s in our hearts, she’s family, and at her worst I know it best.

People aren’t dogs, but you get my point.

In Embracing the Love of God, James Bryan Smith promises, “God looks not to our strengths but to our weaknesses as a means of inserting his love in our hearts.”

A very un-boxlike strategy we can use.

Do you have boxes that may need to be tossed?

 

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Goodness Happens

I believed that here in Le Chambon goodness had happened, and I had come to this village on a high plateau in southern France in order to understand that goodness face-to-face. ~Philip Hallie

goodness happens when we answer the knock

How does goodness happen?

The villagers of Le Chambon, whom I introduced in my last post, didn’t set out to save 3,500 Jews from certain death.

They just answered a knock at the door.

And in the split second of decision, when certainty and safety were too slippery to grasp, something deeper than common sense made up their minds. Something that made it easy to open the door wider, to offer a weary refugee a warm, homely welcome.

Le Chambon kindness was shaped by experiences not easily forgotten. Centuries of persecution still haunted their collective memory, ancestors who faced torture and death because of  their Protestant faith. The villagers knew with biblical certainty, that to live with and love the enemy one must not copy the enemy’s ways.

Well acquainted as Pastor Trocmé and his church were with the cold winds of cruelty, compassion for those shivering before them was easily found.

The pattern is repeated in each human heart–we have a choice. The way of the enemy, or the strange way of Jesus. Yielded to him, we will notice the upside-down law: Not from outward success–any position of strength, but from our brokenness, goodness is born.

Goodness Happens. You’ve seen it:

  • Comforting words from the one well-versed in grief.
  • A wide-armed embrace from the one often left out.
  • An understanding nod from the one who’s ignored.
  • A generous gift from the one who has little.
  • A hospitable welcome from the newly displaced.
  • Deep wisdom flows from the one who’s been silenced.

Goodness happens where we’ve lamented our sin, where we’ve travelled the margins, or been pushed off the grid.

Goodness happens where, flawed and deficient, we have turned to a God of unlimited grace. In the place of our weakness, God’s strength gains a footing–when we’ve run out of ourselves, what’s left is all him.

And you?

Someone is knocking at a door only you can open, because you are the one who has stood where they are.

(Deuteronomy 10:19,  2 Corinthians 1:3,  2 Corinthians 12:10)

How is God using your past failures and sorrow to open a door for others?

 

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The Power of Small: Le Chambon-Sur-Lignon

From the point of view of the history of nations, something very small had happened here. ~Philip Hallie

small french village

In a world where success is measured in numbers, where GO BIG, OR GO HOME! is the cheer, the truth may escape us:

Christ is found in the small choices and seldom-noticed courage of  those who believe he meant what he said.

Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed, one of the 15  books that found me, is Philip Hallie’s gripping story of Le Chambon, a small village in the south of France, and “how goodness happened there.”

Few history books record the tale. During the German Occupation more than 3,500 French Jews, many of them children, were rescued by those living in this isolated village. For years, a little train delivered a stream of refugees right under the noses of the Nazis.

Hidden away in farmhouses, some were escorted over dangerous mountains into Switzerland. The high-plateau town, despite openly flouting Vichy orders, emerged from the war unscathed. A miracle.

But, just as compelling as what happened there, is why it did.

The Power of Small

Over the door of the Protestant church in Le Chambon are the words of Jesus, Love One Another. Pastor André Trocmé, later named the “soul” of Le Chambon, had the audacity to believe that Jesus really meant it when he taught us,

  • human life is precious–we must not harm,
  • love transcends categories–people are people,
  • we must not become the very thing we oppose.

In the late 1930’s, as the shadow of evil grew over Europe, Pastor Trocmé preached from the gospels of Jesus. He urged his community to search out little ways, small acts of goodness to undermine the forces of destruction now unleashed in their own country– but without doing evil themselves.

When the first frightened, half-frozen Jews knocked on their doors, his parishioners were ready.

Many years later, when interviewers asked Why? of the villagers, the inevitable response was a shrug. “Things had to be done, that’s all, and we happened to be there to do them. You must understand that it was the most natural thing in the world to help these people.”

Does “goodness happen” here?

Jesus claimed that mountains are shifted by mustard-seed-sized faith. I wonder if mountains seldom move around me because I don’t really believe he meant what he said.

What about you? How ready are you for the ones Christ will send your way?


 

 

 

 

 

 

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Jesus And His Unconventional, Inefficient Way

If Jesus had never lived, we would not have been able to invent him. ~Walter Wink

the desert way

I look at the road-end, the empty desert beyond. And a voice from behind says, keep walking forward. But my feet, and my heart, stay rooted in place.

Jesus, your way can’t possibly work. You see the clear signage–beyond here, no one goes.

It’s nice, but impractical to follow your way.

I Make My Case

Nothing will get done with life interrupted. My plans and intentions will die from neglect. I’ll find myself stopping for every touch in the crowd, or sitting to dine with types best avoided. And waste my time praying in the freshly dawned hours, or thumbing through pages, ancient onion-skin wisdom, when truth is as close as Siri’s sweet voice.

And a tweet or a text loving gesture enough.

Jesus, to me, your priorities seem off.

  • You tell me to let go when I want to hang on.
  • You tell me to trust when there’s reason to fear.
  • You tell me to love the very people I loathe.
  • You tell me to lose the same self I’m seeking.
  • You tell me to wait as my world heads for a cliff.

Your way is at odds with what’s obviously true:

  • Blessed are the meek in a world made for the bold?
  • Blessed are the peacemakers in a world filled with sharks?

Oh, I’ve lived long enough to see it may work for a moment. But for every “chicken-soup-for-the-soul” ending, there’s a follow-up report. The glad cheers of yesterday are today’s breaking bad news.

Your way doesn’t work, as the evidence shows. So I’ll stick to the paths, well-worn by long practice. And wonder why the world isn’t what it should be.

His Answer

His answer comes swiftly, scented with promise,

Follow me, in my unconventional, “inefficient” way. Someday you will see it, and dance in my joy. What you think is life wasted is you being made new.

(1 Corinthians 1:18-31, Revelation 21:5)

How is Jesus asking you to be unconventional?

 

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Violence Saves? What Popeye Didn’t Tell Us

The myth of redemptive violence is the simplest, laziest, most exciting, uncomplicated, irrational and primitive depiction of evil the world has ever known. ~Walter Wink

violence

The lights come back on. We walk with soda-sticky steps toward the exit, wiping popcorn off our fronts. Satisfied for the moment, we return to a world where nothing seems so easy.

In high-definition glory the good guys won. The bad guys were annihilated, the hero sailed into the sunset. And we sigh, “if only…”

From Popeye to Dirty Harry, Star Wars to 007, the same story is told: violence saves. But the plot-line is more ancient than we know.

An Ancient Tale (Enuma Elish c.1250 B.C.E.)

The pistachio-munching Babylonian crowds grip their seats as the climax of the creation story nears.  A bloody battle scene–the armies of chaos locked in mortal combat against the forces of order. Will the hero prevail?

The crowd cheers as the god Marduk delivers the fatal blow. With chaos now subdued he creates the cosmos (the heavens and the earth) out of the battered corpse of his opponent. As the credits roll, Marduk clutches his victory crown; the once minor god is now king over all.

Violence Saves

Though we call it a myth, that story runs in our veins. It’s the way things have always worked. What’s my first response to opposition, to a sucker-punch from life? What’s the easy answer to conflict and unkindness?

  • Retribution is necessary
  • Enemies must be eliminated
  • God is on my side

In my cleaned-up version, no blood is involved. A more subtle approach to getting even, getting rid of, and feeling justified works for me. And what about you?

A Better Story

The biblical writers told a better story.

Genesis begins not with battle, but with chaos that obediently responds to the life-giving word of the Creator. With only a rebuke, a look–by God’s voice alone–light appears, waters flow, the earth trembles, and the future unfolds. Read through the Bible and you learn that:

  • In wisdom, not violence, all was made.
  • Enemies are best eliminated by loving them.
  • God is sovereign and on everyone’s side.

The two ancient stories compete for our allegiance today. Which version is true?

Which do you embrace? 

Next Time: Part 3 of our look at The Powers That Be: Jesus’ brilliant answer to Marduk.

Read Genesis 1-2, Job 38-41, Psalm 104, Isaiah 40-45 for the biblical version of Creation. Also, Psalm 104:24, Matthew 5:44, Psalm 145:9

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