Mudshot Eyes

We stayed local for our first Christmas together. Krista’s brother Brad joined us for lunch, and we had a great day together. We started the day with a reading of Mary’s song from Luke 1, and then dove into gifts and food.

Click on the collage to view my Flickr photo page…

Come Thou Long Expected Jesus,
Born to set Thy people free:
From our fears and sins release us;
Let us find our rest in Thee.

Israel’s strength and consolation,
Hope of all the earth Thou art,
Dear desire of every nation,
Joy of every longing heart.

Born thy people to deliver,
Born a child, and yet a king,
Born to reign in us forever.
Now thy gracious kingdom bring.

By thine own eternal spirit
rule in all our hearts alone;
By thine all-sufficient merit
Raise us to thy glorious throne.

- Come Thou Long Expected Jesus, by Charles Wesley

I believe God is trying again to make it clear to me that the most valuable moments are not the ones in the “good ol’ days” or in the looked-forward-to future.

Two readings have emphasized this to me lately. The first one is from Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. I borrowed the audiobook from a friend and listened to the first chapter again today. I won’t attempt to outline the entire chapter here, but I can summarize his point. He effectively argues that our instincts are often right because our mind subconsciously picks up on clues in an instant, before we are consciously aware of why we “have a hunch.” It was a reminder to me that each moment is full of clues about Truth. If I am mindlessly moving through my day, I miss the daily reading of the Word that nature and relationships provide.

The second passage which prompted my thoughts was from Brennan Manning, in his book Ruthless Trust. There is an excellent chapter titled “The Geography of Nowhere” in which he challenges us to consider the significance of every moment while we are in the moment. Here’s one key passage:

“Now/here spells nowhere. To be fully present to whoever or whatever is immediately before us is to pitch a tent in the wilderness of Nowhere. It is an act of radical trust––trust that God can be encountered at no other time and in no other place than the present moment. Being fully present in the now is perhaps the premier skill of the spiritual life.”

Today is a Sunday, and it’s Christmas Eve. I’m not “looking forward” to Christmas for once. I’m going to church with Krista to bask in the rays of God’s Advent light as we worship with God’s now/here community. I’m sure that the future will beckon for our attention throughout the day. We need to make plans, schedule events, and prioritize our activities. There is no inherent fault in those things, but an over-attention to the future invites worry into our lives as we think through every what-if scenario, wondering if we will lose control when unforeseen factors come into play. Most importantly, it steals us away from the value of the now and here.

I am also going to resist the urge to get lost in nostalgia as we sing triumphant Christmas songs that I remember singing as a kid. I will seek to be fully present in worship with God’s people, not lost in a idealized rememberance of yesteryear. “If you glorify the past, the future dries up,” Bono once sang. I suspect that glorifying the past can result in the drying up of the present, too.

Last year was a tough year for “Merry Christmas.” It seemed like every corner store was banning the dangerous phrase from being spoken by employees. Instead, a “Happy Holiday” was wished upon us.

There is a HUGE difference between being merry and being happy. Merry people are busy saving the world by making sure that everyone acts like Jesus, even if they don’t know Jesus from Alice Cooper. The merry mission is to strongarm the entire world into behaving as if they already know Jesus. This comes at the expense of His reputation, but for merry people it is well worth it.

The new front line of battle last year became a simple phrase: Merry Christmas. If you don’t acknowledge Christ on Christmas, then you are in big trouble, pal. But the tables were turned this year. In almost every retail establishment I’ve been to, there is somebody saying the magic words, “Merry Christmas!” It gives me goosebumps, or should I say, a chill. With each Christmas salutation, I wonder if it was Christian peer pressure that forced them to do it!

Christendom has temporarily won the Merry Christmas battle, but we seperate ourselves further from the world and from Christ when we insist that the world act like Him without ever knowing him. It brings double damage to His cause: Not only are people given an inaccurate picture of what God is doing in the world, but they also are repelled by the people who represent Him.

God’s invitation is to a messy manger, in a messy stable, to worship a Savior who isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty. Can we find a way to invite people to such a scene without asking them to first clean up their act?

In the Spring of 2003 I ran 13.1 miles in the Country Music Half Marathon. I vividly remember the moment when the group running the full marathon split off and kept running forward, as I continued down the quarter-mile home stretch. “Those people are nuts,” I thought to myself. “Why would anyone run 26.2 miles? That is insane!”

Then the thought occurred to me that before I started training, 13.1 miles probably seemed a little extreme, too. But I did it… twice. I have also ran in the Rock-n-Roll Half Marathon in Virginia Beach, a terrific race mostly because of the last 2 miles on the boardwalk by the beach (after 13.1 miles of running, there is nothing like falling into the ocean for a refreshing salt bath). When asked if I had ever run a full marathon, I could almost tell them “yes,” since two halves make a whole.

On April 28, 2007, I am running in the Country Music Marathon, my first attempt at achieving the insanity I thought I would never experience. My inspiration to train for this insanity came from two places.

First, the story about Sam Thompson who ran 50 marathons in 50 days in 50 states is tremendous. Sam ran to raise awareness for the hurricane-battered Gulf Coast. It’s hard to believe that Sam can still walk, but he can, and he pulled off this unbelievable feat without any significant injury.

Then I have to point out Bruce Coleman, a coworker of mine. I’m not sure how old he is, but he runs like he is 25. Hovering somewhere in his fifties, Bruce races in triathlons, marathons, and duathons more often than most people go to church. His drive to stay in shape and maintain a high level of excellence athletically has been a strong motivator for me. Bruce was the first person to actually challenge me to do the full marathon in April.

I figure that if one guy can run fifty marathons in fifty states in fifty days and another fifty-something guy can run multiple triathlons and marathons in a year, then I can run in ONE.

I’ve realized that there is a moving on and a staying behind when losing someone we love. We move on from the intense pain of that first moment when we hear the tragic news. We move on from our dependence on that person for friendship and support. We then are given opportunity to move on to Christ as we rediscover his incomparable companionship.

But we also stay behind. We stay in the memories that have been sketched in the corridors of our mind. We laugh as we recall the stories that made times with him so special. We stay in those stories because they are the gift that we are left with. A gift of time and moments that are unique and permanent.

Today would have been my cousin Mark’s 35th birthday. A year and a half after losing him to a motorcycle accident, I still think of him on a daily basis, even if just for a moment when some little thing reminds me. I have decided that remembering is OK, even after so much time has passed. In fact, I can’t keep all the stories inside. I often turn to Krista and give prelude to a story that I suddenly recall: “I remember one time when Mark and I were…”

Today I remember how neither one of us ever remembered the other’s birthday. That’s why it was such a surprise to both of us when I called him on the birthday before he died. It’s odd that I can’t forget now that he’s not around to call.