I had coffee last week with my friend Greg, and, as always, we had some great conversations about church, life, and the meaning of basically everything.
In the Christian Bible, there's a story about a rich young man who, one day, approached Jesus, wanting the inside track to the Kingdom. Jesus responds by reciting a bunch of commandments to follow, and when the young man says he already does all those things, Jesus tells him that he has one more thing to do: go sell his stuff and give it to the poor. The man was rich; he couldn't do it. It's in this context where Jesus introduces that timeless sticky idea we've all heard about a camel trying to squeeze through a needle's eye, in reference to how difficult it will be for the wealthy to actually find his Kingdom.
If you grew up in the Christian world of "church," you've probably heard this story a million times (I know I have). And outside of painting a pretty cool picture in my head -- "As hard as that big 'ol camel tries to suck in his camel-fat, he can never fit! Haha!" -- I never take too much away from it, honestly.
But today, Greg turned me into the rich young man.
I typically don't think of myself as rich. I look around and notice the wealth of the world, and, honestly, I don't see me. I see a lot of other people, and strangely (or not), they're all probably the same people you see when you think "rich." But the fact is (and you probably already know where I'm going with this) that compared with the rest of the world, I'm pretty stinkin' wealthy.
Take a look at this clip from Rob Bell's NOOMA entitled "Rich":
The fact is, I think I often don't value truth very much.
I make comparisons all the time, but only when they're in my favor. I compare UP when it benefits me ("I'm nowhere near as wealthy as Mr. Gates!") and then compare DOWN when that works better ("I'm giving a full 10% of my income to my favorite charity. I'll bet they don't even give at all!"). But this is ignoring the whole truth; I'm disregarding most of the facts.
Once in awhile, I think it's good to compare in the direction I'd rather not -- UP to, say, a Mother Teresa. Or DOWN to kids in Rwanda. Might be good for me.
Otherwise I start to look at lot like that stupid, fat 'ol camel.
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Tonight Allison, I, and Housemate Kris watched a brilliant movie from the good 'ol days (read: 1998) that you may have heard of entitled Can't Hardly Wait.
In case you live under a rock or were born after 1990, this was one of many late-nineties movies where the nerdy, yet heartfelt, love-struck white dude gets to finally make out with the super hot girl in the last scene. Another one of my favorites would come out a year later: She's All That, where they switch it around and the girl is the dork, but other than that it's pretty much the same movie. And I still love it.
There's a classic scene in the middle of Can't Hardly Wait when William (another, more different nerd) performs Paradise City. Behold:
The brilliance of this scene is, of course, that William goes from outcast to extreme super-lovin' stud in the time-span of a Guns 'N' Roses song. Housemate Kris says he calls this the Beck Principle -- if you do anything long enough and with enough gusto (e.g. dance like a fool to a song by a hair band, and/or, be Beck), eventually it, and you, will become "cool." In this method, "coolness" has more to do with simple longevity and stamina than it does with actually being cool.
This actually works pretty well for me, because I've never known what the hell "cool" was anyway (and if you had a picture of me from '98, you'd know that's true).
So I suppose I'll just keep doing what I do.
So thank you Beck. And William. Rock on my friends -- rock on. And Ethan Embry, you kiss that girl.
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Morgan Spurlock, who is quickly becoming one of my favorite people, recently released a new film called "What Would Jesus Buy?"
From the movie's website:
"What Would Jesus Buy? follows Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping Gospel Choir as they go on a cross-country mission to save Christmas from the Shopocalypse: the end of mankind from consumerism, over-consumption and the fires of eternal debt!"I haven't had a chance to see the film yet (unbelievably, it's not currently playing in Los Angeles -- Iowa City and Lawrence, KS, but not L.A.), but the more innundated I become with marketing which insists Christmas=Debt, the more I'm drawn to a different message. I also came across this interview with the Reverend Billy himself. In the interview, I found this part to be especially interesting:
INTERVIEWER: Do you consider yourself a religious or spiritual person now? REVEREND BILLY: I've just kind of moved beyond calling myself labels. I think a part of resisting consumerism and giving people the example of resisting consumerism is to stop imitating products. That's why we don't get any money from foundations. Are we political? Are we religious? Are we artistic? Those are three labels that would come to us from the foundation world. Well, the political foundations think we are clowns. And the artistic foundations think we are political. And the religious foundations think we are atheists. So the thing that makes us powerful to people is also the thing that makes it hard to define.Related Reading: Creative Cures for the Common Christmas (by Shane Claiborne) //
Listening to Ron Paul is kind of like reading a history textbook, which I realize could make him sound boring or antiquated, but, believe me, this one's not.
It's refreshing, like hearing history re-told for our current context. When I hear Dr. Paul speak, suddenly the ideas our American forefathers believed in seem to make sense again. Like, for example, the Constitution was actually a really good idea, and very well written. And while we're on it, why haven't we heard much about it in the past 70 years?
If you'd like to catch the fire about why Ron Paul is really an incredible presidential candidate, check out this video:
Something I learned about Ron Paul from this video: he loves roundabouts.
There are cities that have intentionally replaced stop lights with roundabouts. The idea is that with stoplights, people become dependent on something else (e.g. the stoplight) to tell them when it's safe to go or when they need to stop. This can be good, but unfortunately, stoplights also allow them to be much less careful, considerate, or even conscious of what the heck they're doing.
By installing roundabouts, the city takes the power from the stoplight and puts it back in the hands of the people. Now, the onus is on each individual to pay attention to what they're doing. In a roundabout, people need to look around, constantly be courteous, and pay attention to the other drivers.
It's probably time we start paying attention again.
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Today my friend and coworker Kevin said that he knows that we (the "staff" of Journey, where I work) all want to help "change lives."
But I'm not sure I do.
For me, to "change lives" means to develop, to bring about incremental growth, to help someone off drugs, or to stop drinking, or to be nicer to their wife, or to otherwise clean up their life. And while I recognize the obvious value and necessity of all of those things, his statement helped me realize that I am something else.
I am more about maximizing the potential of humanity. I instigate ideas, catalyze thought and action. I am a leadership firestarter, igniting flames of passion in others so they can go out and use their lives to change the world.
Maybe it's semantics, a small distinction. But for me, it was a light bulb.
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