John Fischer The Catch

Recently I received a comment from one of you that the Catch had “changed” ever since we started talking so much about the Isaiah House and our teleconference Bible study. The implication being that since they are not involved in either that the Catches don’t relate to them. I can’t think of anything further from the truth. Because comments like this are usually indicative that more than one person feels this way, I decided to address it in this Catch.

The Catch has always relied on everyday life for its food for thought. The fact that stories often stem from our involvement with the Isaiah House and our Bible study is merely because these things form an important part of our lives thus informing a lot of our insights and reflections.

The teachings being developed in the Bible study are central to our message of taking Christ to the marketplace through our presence there; and the lessons learned from the Isaiah House women about how we are more similar that different are essential to how we view those around us wherever we find ourselves in the world. You may not be sharing our experiences at the Isaiah House, but you certainly can learn from the insights gleaned from those experiences.

Somewhere in the telling of your own story is the finding of other’s stories as well. If you learn how to tell better, you will learn how to listen better.

Some people misunderstood what Marti was tying to accomplish with these stories. If they only looked on the surface, they might have even thought we were taking advantage of these women. Nothing could be further from the truth. This was not about creating a documentary about the sordid details that put these women in the situation they are in now. We wanted no part of that. These were stories directed at their significance – stories of how they made a difference in someone else’s life – things that in their present circumstances they might be prone to bury or forget. The cameras, the lighting, the professional cameramen, the makeshift “studios” all were props to allow these women to be someone and find significance in their lives.

It is our firm belief that if we interviewed anyone from any walk of life in the same manner with these same questions, in the end you would not be able to tell the wealthy from the poor, the homeless from the homeowner, the incarcerated from the celebrity. This was a huge lesson learned.

All of this to say, I’m concerned that we have not received many stories from you. Please don’t go, “Oh, he’s talking about Isaiah House again; this doesn’t relate to me.” All of this applies to seeking stories of significance from those around you. There are things to learn on both sides of the camera.

So this Catch will end like Friday’s. I am going to include Marti’s directions on story telling because they are also directions on “interviewing.” You may send your story as a comment, or simply reply directly to this email and it will come to me. I can’t wait!

Tell Us a Story of a Time When You Know You Made a Difference in Someone Else’s Life

We invite you to contribute a story from your life. We understand how challenging this is-it requires such intimacy that no one else can do it but you. Yet, we can guide you through this process by offering these suggestions.

Be specific. Think of your own experience and tell of the things you know that no one else knows. Your story need not be heartwarming or gut-wrenching-it can even be funny-but it should be real and highly personal.
 
Be brief: Your story should be between 3 to 5 minutes spoken or 1 to 2 pages written.
 
Name your story: Before beginning your story, try naming the story in a sentence or two. This will help you get off to a good start and stay focused.
 
Be positive: Please avoid preaching or editorializing. Tell us what you do believe in your story, not what you don’t believe. Make your story about you; speak in the first person.
 
Be personal: Use words and phrases that are comfortable for you and that truly echo of you.
 
Tell Your Story in Present Tense
Before beginning close your eyes and see your story as if describing a picture.
 
Think about what you want to share to bring your story to life. Let your mind’s eye bring up a picture of your story. What do you see in the picture? From left to right pan the setting for details including colors, sounds, smells, and people present.
 
As you look at this picture in your mind’s eye, what’s going through your mind? What are you thinking about?
 
As you look at this picture in your mind’s eye and think about what is going on in your mind, what are you feeling? (Hint: If you say, “I feel good” or some other generic feeling, ask yourself what “good” feels like until you are connecting to the story and are in the story and feeling as if the story was occurring in the present tense.)
 
As you look at the picture in your mind’s eye and see, smell, and hear what is in the picture and as you think about what you are thinking and feeling, how does what you are feeling relate to your story?
 
May we have your contribution?

As it turned out, she desperately wanted to tell her story, just not on camera, so she told it to me.

Last night was Isaiah House night and Marti had three professional volunteer cameramen set up in a store room, the garage and the dining room respectively to take private interviews of as many women as would be willing to participate. Marti’s genius was to have them focus their 3-5 minutes on one thing: tell a story of a time you made a difference in someone’s life. At Marti’s direction, she didn’t want superman stories, or “when I was on Meth and my children were drowning in the bathtub” stories. She wanted ordinary stories (“I helped an old woman across the street, I taught my child her ABC’s, etc”.) And her goal was not to get the story, but to get them in the story – “to where she can bring up a picture in her mind that she can emotionally step into and speak from.”

From early reports, it worked. There was not one interview that didn’t bring tears to the eyes of everyone involved including cameramen… good tears, I am told. And every one of the participants came out of their interview beaming, and thanking everyone for the opportunity to experience their story. Why wouldn’t they? Marti went on a treasure hunt and found a gold mine.

While the interviews were going on, I wandered around the patio hearing the stories of those who were considering participating. What I found was that their eagerness to talk defied their hesitation to go in front of a camera. Twice, I heard stories from women who had just insisted they had nothing to say. I found myself wishing for an invisible camera until I realized I could be one if I listened carefully enough.

On one occasion, I had been talking to two women who said they were choosing not to be interviewed when Marti walked up, took one of them by the hand and said, “Ready?” and they were gone.

“How does she do that?” I asked her friend.

“There’s a certain vulnerability Marti has that makes you open up to her,” she said, “and then she’s got you.”

So I sat down next to her as she took up a ball of tangled yarn her friend had been working on and deftly untangled it as if she’d done it a thousand times before while launching into her own story of a time she taught a six-year-old girl in a housing project how to sew on buttons. Soon she was lost in the little girl’s excitement to learn and the details of exactly how she taught her. She told the story as if she had permanently altered this little girl’s life. Then she stopped and stared off. “She’s 23 years old now.”

This woman would not be on camera, at least this time, but she still got the benefit of finding value in her life. In the end, it really didn’t matter if you were on camera or off, if the story was there, it was told to someone.

Yesterday I took a chance. I stepped into the light and the light did what it always does – it reveals what is there – and what it revealed was unpleasant for me especially, and for some of you. It really depends on what you are looking for. If you are looking for strong, capable leadership from someone who has all his affairs in order and whose behavior is exemplary at every level, well I lost you. If, on the other hand, you are looking for leadership from someone who is willing to be vulnerable, and is at least trying to stay in the light of truth about himself while pointing to the Lord, then you’ve come to the right place. But be prepared to be disappointed. You will be disappointed by me before you will be amazed by the Lord in and through me. That’s actually the way it works. The treasure of Christ is in the cracked, breakable clay pot of our lives for a reason, so the power will obviously be coming from God and not from us. (2 Corinthians 4:7)

Come on, you guys, if it was coming from me, it would be John Fischer, Inc. and you would pay to get it from me and take it home and find out it would work for a while, but sooner or later you’d be back to you and your incapability while I would be off doing another seminar on how to be capable.

We discussed this in our teleconference study last night and Carole from North Carolina came up with an incredible illustration of this.

She mentioned that she often likes to sit in a chair in her sunroom and watch the birds come feed outside her window. Especially on cold mornings, the warmth of the sun through her window is delicious. But she also noticed that often when she gets up to do a chore or make a phone call and comes back to sit at the window again, the sun has moved and the chair is in the cold.

Here’s my guess. Those people who appear totally capable in life are probably sitting where the light once was. They haven’t moved their chair in a while.

If you want to stay in the light, you’ve got to go where the light goes, and each time you do, you find out something else about yourself that points out how much you need the Lord. That is our message: the Lord’s capability laid over our incapability. Both parts are necessary for the whole story to be told.

When you’re in the darkness, you can portray anything you want. You can control your image, but that’s just it… you’re in control, the Holy Spirit is not. For the Holy Spirit to be in control, we have to be in the light and vulnerable.

Feeling pretty smug? Move your chair. Feeling all alone? Move your chair. Feeling cold? Move your chair. True, it’s a little scary, but the light of the Son is deliciously warm.

Here at the Catch, we believe one of our primary purposes as followers of Jesus Christ is to make visible that which is invisible.

It starts with Jesus. Is there any better way to explain His mission in life except to reveal the invisible God to us? How many times did He say, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9)? He was constantly berating the religious leaders of the day for thinking they knew God without recognizing Him. If they truly knew God they would have recognized that He came from God.

Why do we study Jesus? Why do we hang on His every word? Because He is the visible expression of our invisible God. He is God in human form. He is God in a way we can understand. What a brilliant idea: to create people like you (in your image) and then become one of them so you can reveal to them who you are. Only God could have thought of that! Only God could have pulled it off.

But then – get this – He asks us to be like His Father, too. “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). And ever since, you’ve had people trying to do this and failing. Why? Because they can’t. So you’re telling me Jesus told us to do something He knew we couldn’t do? Precisely. Now what kind of donkey talk is that?

Jesus told us to do what we couldn’t do because it would make something else visible: our sin, our frailty, our human limitations and our need for His grace.

Take our present circumstances as a case in point. Try as I may to come out smelling like a rose in all this, I can’t. I’m a financial screw-up. I say I’m going to do things, I have great intentions, but when it comes down to it, I don’t follow through and then I shroud all that in denial until something bad happens that I can’t avoid. I told the man I would pay him back by a certain time and I didn’t. Now he is acting out my judgment and he has the law behind him. Though it is unreasonable and unbiblical the way he is doing it, he has every right in a court of law to do what he is doing. That law has made visible my sin, and he is showing me no mercy.

But this is where God and you come in. You folks, on the other hand, are stepping in and deciding you are going to be agents of God’s grace to me. You are saying, “Wait a minute, we love John and Marti and we don’t want to see them kicked out of their house. We know John’s a screw-up, but God has also touched us through his life and we do not want judgment in a court of law to be the only story here. We’re telling another story through all this. We’re a family and we do not want to see a part of us displaced. We believe this man is wrong; he is not listening to the Holy Spirit; this is not the story for the Fischer family right now. Besides there’s enough of us here to step in and settle this man’s judgment, just as Christ has settled ours. Let’s face it, if it weren’t for Jesus, we’d all be eventually dead on a cross somewhere.”

And that’s quite a statement you’re making.

So my sin, something I’d much rather keep invisible, has been made visible, but look what else has happened: God’s grace is being made visible right now through you. And Marti and I are overwhelmed.

Want attitude? Here’s attitude:

What have I ever done
That was worth even one
Of the pleasures I know?
What did I ever do
That was worth loving you
For the kindness you’ve shown?
 
Lord, help me Jesus,
I’ve wasted it so, help me Jesus,
I know what I am.
Now that I know
That I needed you so, help me Jesus,
My soul’s in your hand. – Kris Kristofferson

The title of this song says it all: “Why me, Lord?” Why did you pick me to be a recipient of you grace over anyone else? I am so undeserving.

When you focus on the similarities you have with the people around you, you end up with the right attitude about yourself, about others, and about God’s grace. Actually when you are truly overwhelmed with God’s grace, as we all should be all the time, you have absolutely nothing to say about anyone else except to tell your story, and want to hear theirs.

Like Marti says, “We all like to be treated with dignity. We all like to have fun. We all like to be a part of something bigger than ourselves. These are universal values shared by everyone, and therefore can be foundations from which to begin open-ended questions in the discovery of one another – an opportunity to be “personality journalists” drawing out one another’s true stories of how we make a difference in other’s lives.

“When entering a relationship from the place of similarities, even the conflicts that emerge can be ways of connecting and embracing what makes us different. Respecting one another’s differences allows for us to be voices of reconciliation because it is in the contrast of us as Christians who are the greatest of sinners (and we know it) to Christ’s glorious saving grace where the power of the Spirit can be found to bring us all to him.”

Being born again doesn’t make you better; it makes you grateful. It doesn’t put you on another level; it puts you in a state of astonishment that this would happen to you. You are certainly no more deserving of God’s grace than the next guy. And when you realize that Christ died for everybody, not just for an elite group, then you want to get down and dirty with everyone and tell them the good news.

Want attitude? Here’s attitude…

“For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not” – Paul (Romans 7:18).

“It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all” – Paul (1 Timothy 1:15).

A couple weeks ago, when we were encouraging one another to call someone we lost track of before losing that opportunity altogether to the natural processes of life and death, Steve, one of our readers, sent me the following comment:

I called my dad who is an atheist. I haven’t had a real conversation in several years because I felt like we had nothing in common. I also have been really mad about his belief, or lack thereof. We talked for an hour or two. We never argued about faith but I did take the time to listen. He also listened to me. I am not trying to tell him what to believe, I am just telling what God has done and is doing in my life. I have shared my last two mission trips with him and I plan on sharing the two trips I will be going on this year. I am not saying we are both on the same page, but at least we are talking again.

There will always be a strong desire and need among Christian believers to emphasize what makes us different from those who aren’t Christians. We need to learn to resist this practice. Though it may come from good intentions, it almost always sets us up for Pharisaical attitudes and behavior that separates us from the very people we need to be close to like Steve and his dad.

I can’t think of anyone who should have more in common than a man and his father. Think of the genes, the background, the environment, the people they know, the things they like to do, and unless they have been separated most of their lives, these would all be the same. Yet we have the tendency to think that if our faith isn’t the same, we have nothing in common.

Yes, we are spiritual beings, and what we believe, spiritually, can be considered central to everything else in our lives, but not at the expense of what makes us human. We are human beings as well.

Being “different” is a dangerous shortcut to spiritual pride.

1) It happens only in our minds.
2) It divides (Steve and his atheist father hadn’t had a real conversation in several years).
3) It puts spirituality on a measurable plain. This is the most tempting part. We long to see that our Christianity has made changes in our lives, but if those changes are only artificial or they only exist in our minds, then they are merely a means of positioning ourselves above others – a very bad place to be, indeed.

Here’s the cool thing: Steve and his father are talking again, and assuming that his father is still pretty much the same guy he was over the last few years when they weren’t talking, it appears what changed was in Steve’s head. He’s going back to what he has in common with his father instead of trying to raise differences all the time.

Yes, we long to be different, but those differences are not up to us to determine or even be aware of. We need to focus on what makes us the same as everyone else, and let God be in charge of what makes us different.

Maybe it won’t be anything at all, so He can show up and be Himself.

“I believe in a higher power,” he said, “I just don’t think I have to believe some preachers interpretation of who that is.”

“Well, you don’t,” I said. “You don’t have to believe anything. But don’t you think you owe it to yourself to find out why some people do believe in God – even this God? I mean, if the higher power you believe in revealed himself to us in the Bible, wouldn’t you want to at least get closer to that? That’s the beauty of the Bible; you can check it out for yourself. You don’t have to rely on the preacher’s interpretation.”

He thought about that for a minute. “Yeah, but the Bible is full of contradictions. How can I trust it?”

I was suddenly aware of the fact that I had heard these excuses before, and I imagined he had used them many times. This conversation was probably not going to go anywhere it hadn’t already been. I didn’t even sense his heart was in it. This was the pre-programmed religion discussion we were having, and his answers were a way of keeping this all at a safe distance.

Suddenly I got an idea. “You know, I grew up in a world where no one questioned any of this stuff. The Bible was the word of God; Jesus was who he said he was; the preacher was telling the truth. It wasn’t any big deal; that’s just the way it was. But here’s the deal: in believing it, I experienced God. Even as a kid. There were times I was so flooded with the presence of God that I knew he was there and I knew he loved me.”

I thought I saw him perking up a little as I said this. Something was getting through. “Later,” I went on, “I did go through a time when I questioned these issues you raised… Was the Bible reliable? What about the preacher? Did I believe this stuff just because I was raised in it? If I’d been raised in a Buddhist family, would I be a Buddhist? I wrestled with all those questions, and I got answers that cleared my doubts, but it wasn’t those answers that did it for me, and I don’t think if I could somehow answer your questions right now that it would necessarily make a lot of difference to you. But I bet it would make a big difference if you could experience God. I mean really experience God.”

“It might,” he said, trying to be casual about it, but I could tell he was much more engaged than that.

“So what are you going to do?” I asked, surprising myself that I was throwing it back on him. He looked surprised, too.

“I – I don’t know. What do you think?”

“Ask him.”

“Ask him what?”

“Ask him to reveal himself to you.”

“I’ll have to think about that,” he said, and somehow I knew he would.

A recent Los Angeles Times editorial about religion in American politics triggered a couple letters from readers, one of which contains what I think is a priceless comment. “[The] march of religion into American politics raises the question: Whatever will God do on Judgment Day when all of our opportunities for making the ‘wrong’ decisions have been removed?”

It’s a little tiny doorway into a huge question: Why did God allow for evil in the first place? Why did he create a world where wrong decisions were possible? I don’t think we can fully answer that, but I do think it is important to notice that He did. And if God would do this, it does at least give reason to pause and wonder how much we want to try and rule those wrong choices out of the little piece of the universe we control.

Take the example of teenagers and sex. Do you preach total abstinence and leave them at risk for sexually transmitted diseases should they decide not to listen to you (and statistics show that the majority of them will not, Christian kids included)? Or do you prepare them for the wrong choices as well as the right ones? What would God do?

God has created a universe of right and wrong. His rules are not so much to live by, as they are to show up how wrong we are. Law brings about transgression, Paul taught. Rules come with the delightful appeal of breaking them and doing things we wouldn’t have even thought of had the rule not been there. Law shows us how bad we are and leads us to Christ and an entirely different way to go about change – through the heart.

I remember those anti-rock seminars that used to tour our churches and Christian schools, and parents would bring their kids to learn about all the dangers of rock and roll, and the seminar leaders would pick the raunchiest music they could find to convince everybody how bad it was, and you know what happened, don’t you? The first opportunity the kids had they would go out and find that raunchy music that they wouldn’t have even known about had not the anti-rock seminar came through town.

This is why Christians should never major on morality. It’s bound to backfire. It’s human nature. Law brings about transgression, and we keep thinking it will make people better.

I’m not by any stretch suggesting we do away with law. Law is an absolute necessity in order for people to live together in community. I’m just saying we can’t put hope in the law to change people’s behavior. The only thing that will change behavior is a change of heart. And changing hearts is God’s business. And that is what we should be about as God’s people. Putting people in touch with God through Christ.

It takes a changed heart to want to do the right thing.

CORRECTION: I stand to be corrected in regards to my closing remarks in yesterday’s Catch about no one caring about the Republican primaries. It was irresponsible and simply not true.
CANCELLATION: There will be no teleconference Bible study tonight due to John & Marti’s scheduling conflicts. We will resume next Wednesday.   

Evangelical Christians are mentioned every day now on the front page of most every newspaper in the nation. This should be very exciting – an opportunity for everyone to hear about the good news of Jesus Christ. Surely this means that the world is hearing how we love one another, since this is how Jesus said they would know we are following Him.

And they must be finding out about how quick we are to embrace those around us who are different, because, in essence we know we are all the same – sinners in need of a savior. What an opportunity to show the world how the first and worst sinner is always us – how if God can love us, He can love anybody. How there is no sin outside the capacity of His grace. How we would welcome anyone into our homes, our churches, our neighborhoods. How God is not counting up everyone’s sins any longer because they have all been laid on Jesus, making us announcers and administrators of a gospel of reconciliation. God is not mad anymore. God’s arms are not folded; they are wide open.

And what an opportunity to show the world how every single person is endowed as a unique creation of God, and in possession of immense value. How that means they are manifesting a facet of the nature of God that no one else can display. How something in us leads us as evangelical Christians to bow in the presence of every person we meet as we acknowledge the presence of the eternal in our neighbor as something truly sacred.

And what an opportunity to watch evil being returned with good, to watch enemies being loved instead of hated, to watch someone turn the other cheek, go the extra mile, offer their coat when someone tries to steal their shirt. What an incredible opportunity, since we’re getting all this attention, to show the world what Jesus is like… to be kind, tender-hearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ has forgiven us.

If even one of these many things could come across, it might be worth all this attention. But what a shame it would truly be if the only thing the world finds out about evangelical Christians from the front page and the nightly television news is what candidate we are going to vote for in the Republican primaries that no one really cares about anyway.

So here I am in Rochester, New York, getting ready for bed when I realize it’s Sunday night and I don’t have a Catch yet for tomorrow. I don’t know what I was thinking. I’ve had a nice conversation with my sister, emailed a few folks, talked to Marti and realized it was after midnight, of course that’s just after 9 p.m. on my clock, but the morning is still going to come sooner than I expect. So I think I will tell you what am I going to tell eighteen hundred students tomorrow at a Christian college whose chapel theme for the semester is “COMMUNITY: UNITY AND DIVERSITY.”

I’m going to tell them that our Christian community has become far too isolated from the world. That we run from diversity because it makes us too uncomfortable and that our Christian community has become far too homogeneous and “cliquish.” Our community has lots of unity, but for all the wrong reasons – because we have in our community only those who agree with us. It’s one of the requirements for belonging to this group.

And yet there is a world we live in that is a community as well, and unfortunately Christians have not been a part of this wider community for some time. We have gotten comfortable with being labeled as conservative evangelicals, and as having a political agenda that in many ways runs counter to the world community that surrounds us. We have built walls around us and are proud about our separation from the world. Yet this is not the separation Jesus talked about. He talked about being separated by the truth in our hearts, while still living in community with the world around us. And how many Christians purpose to live in community with the world? Not enough.

It’s time we realize that as Christians, the world we live in is part of our community too. This is, in fact, where the diversity comes from, and that the thing that makes us part of this community is that we are human.

Christians have been running from the world community – running from our own humanity – for as long as I can remember, and it is time to stop running, turn around and embrace our neighbor for the beauty of who he/she is and who we all are, because we are all the same. We are all sinners who need Jesus. We are made, like everyone else, in the image of God. People in the world, therefore, are not our projects to convert, or our enemies to defeat, but our fellow-human beings to love.

It’s time to take up our place as Christians in the world. It’s time to get involved in the world community. It’s time to knock down some walls.

That’s what I’m going to tell them, or something like that. Now it’s time to go to bed.