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.
//
The university professor challenged his students with this question: "Did God create everything that exists?"
A student bravely replied "Yes, he did!"
"God created everything?" the professor asked.
"Yes sir," the student replied.
The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created evil, since evil exists, and according to the principle that our works define who we are, then God is evil."
The professor was quite pleased with himself and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that faith was a myth.
Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question professor?"
"Of course," replied the professor.
The student stood up and asked, "Professor, does cold exist?"
The professor replied "Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?"
The students snickered at the young man's question.
The young man replied, "In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Everybody or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is what makes a body, or matter, have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of heat. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat."
The student continued. "Professor, does darkness exist?"
The professor responded, "Of course it does."
The student replied, "Once again you are wrong sir. Darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact, we can use Newton's prism to break white light into many colors and study the various wavelengths of each color, but you cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a
certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present."
Finally the young man asked the professor. "Sir, does evil exist?"
Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course, as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil."
To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist, sir -- or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart. It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light."
The professor sat down.
The young man's name: Albert Einstein
(DISCLAIMER: I have no idea if this is for real, true, or if someone made it up. However, it's factuality doesn't have much to do with the point, does it?)
//
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.
//
A few more words of wisdom from our friend, the "other" J.D.:
"Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them -- if you want to. Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It's a beautiful, reciprocal arrangement. And it isn't education. It's history. It's poetry. I'm not trying to tell you that only educated and scholarly men are able to contribute something valuable to the world. It's not so. But I do say that educated and scholarly men, if they're brilliant and creative to begin with -- which, unfortunately, is rarely the case -- tend to leave infinitely more valuable records behind them than men do who are merely brilliant and creative. They tend to express themselves more clearly, and they usually have a passion for following their thoughts through to the end. And -- most important -- nine times out of ten they have more humility than the unscholarly thinker. Something else an academic education will do for you. If you go along with it any considerable distance, it'll begin to give you an idea what size mind you have. What it'll fit and, maybe, what it won't. After a while, you'll have an idea what kind of thoughts your particular size mind should be wearing. For one thing, it may save you an extraordinary amount of time trying on ideas that don't suit you, aren't becoming to you. You'll begin to know your true measurements and dress your mind accordingly." - J.D. Salinger, The Catcher In The Rye (p. 246-247)//
Thus spake Holden Caulfield:
"I felt like praying or something, when I was in bed, but I couldn't do it. I can't always pray when I feel like it. In the first place, I'm sort of an atheist. I like Jesus and all, but I don't care too much for most of the other stuff in the Bible. Take the Disciples, for instance. They annoy the hell out of me, if you want to know the truth. They were all right after Jesus was dead and all, but while He was alive, they were about as much use to Him as a hole in the head. All they did was keep letting Him down. I like almost anybody in the Bible better than the Disciples. If you want to know the truth, the guy I like best in the Bible, next to Jesus, was that lunatic and all, that lived in the tombs and kept cutting himself with stones. I like him ten times as much as the Disciples, that poor bastard. I used to get in quite a few arguments about it, when I was at the Whooton School, with this boy that lived down the corridor, Arthur Childs. Old Childs was a Quaker and all, and he read the Bible all the time. He was a very nice kid, and I liked him, but I could never see eye to eye with him on a lot of stuff in the Bible, especially the Disciples. He kept telling me if I didn't like the Disciples, then I didn't like Jesus and all. He said that because Jesus picked the Disciples, you were supposed to like them. I said I knew He picked them, but that He picked them at random. I said He didn't have time to go around analyzing everybody. I said I wasn't blaming Jesus or anything. It wasn't His fault that He didn't have any time. I remember I asked old Childs if he thought Judas, the one that betrayed Jesus and all, went to Hell after he committed suicide. Childs said certainly. That's exactly where I disagreed with him. I said I'd bet a thousand bucks that Jesus never sent old Judas to Hell. I still would, too, if I had a thousand bucks. I think any one of the Disciples would've sent him to Hell and all -- and fast, too -- but I'll bet anything Jesus didn't do it. Old Childs said the trouble with me was that I didn't go to church or anything. He was right about that, in a way. I don't. In the first place, my parents are different religions, and all the children in our family are atheist. If you want to know the truth, I can't even stand ministers. The ones they've had at every school I've gone to, they have these Holy Joe voices when they start giving their sermons. God, I hate that. I don't see why the hell they can't talk in their natural voice. They sound so phony when they talk." - J.D. Salinger, The Catcher In The Rye (p. 130-131)//