John Fischer The Catch

Our street is built on a fairly sharp incline. As such, it is a popular place for skateboard activity. Especially with what Chandler calls “cruisers.” They are a little bigger than traditional skateboards and they have larger, softer wheels—more like roller skate wheels. They are quieter and smoother, especially since our street was resurfaced in the last few weeks.

Because of the incline, most boarders take the slalom approach so as not to gain too much speed. Except for one 15-year-old kid who lives around the corner from us, who has taken to going straight down the whole length of the street at a flat out attempt at maximum speed. He bends over with his hands behind his back, like a speed skater trying to cut through wind resistance. We are at the lower third of the street and by the time he passes us, I would say he is going at least 30 mph. He has an elaborate stopping technique that utilizes a gloved hand on the pavement as he pivots sideways and grinds to a stop. I swear he goes from 30 mph to 0 mph in about 3 feet!

So you can imagine my concern when Chandler announced he wanted to show Marti and I his new skateboard move and proceeded to race down part of our street to us displaying the aforementioned speed skating technique he had obviously seen demonstrated by our much more experienced neighborhood daredevil. As his speed increased, I began to wonder how he was going to stop. Little did I know he had never tried this before and hadn’t thought that far ahead. His method up until now was to simply jump off the board using his legs to keep up the pace he was going before he jumped, and then slow himself down from a run to a walk to a stop. What Chandler had failed to calculate was whether there was a point at which he legs simply could not catch up with the speed of his body.

I am at a point in my life where I need to learn some things I should have learned a long time ago. As such, I have found myself making excuses for the time it will take me to adjust, and thinking I have the rest of my life to work it out. Except then I realize the rest of my life is a lot shorter than it was 40 years ago. I don’t have time for a learning curve. No one around me, myself included, has time for “baby steps.” I feel very much like Chandler racing down our street, realizing I’ve got to hit the ground running but wondering if I can run fast enough to absorb the speed of my life right now.

Poor Chandler, he didn’t make it. His legs simply couldn’t keep up with the speed of his body. It was a good thing his mother was there so he didn’t have to be tough and act like losing a layer of skin on his elbow and shoulder didn’t hurt at all, not to mention the blow to his ego.

And me? Well you’ll know if I’m still around in the next few weeks whether I landed and stayed on my feet or not. Life is a challenge and God doesn’t do everything for us. Sometimes we’ve got to hit the ground running just to keep up.

One nice thing about writing a daily devotional is that I have 24 hours to fix something I may not have said clearly the first time. Like my last sentence yesterday, which confused a lot of you: “You won’t find Jesus at the extremes.” Like my wife wrote me: “Jesus is everywhere.” I clearly wasn’t making my point with a number of you, so I thought it best to revisit this.

Here’s what I didn’t mean: That Jesus was not extreme or radical. On the contrary, the gospel has always been radical. In fact, my faith was founded on the radical nature of the gospel. After all, you’re talking about one of the original radical ’70s Jesus Freaks here.

Here’s what I did mean: 1. Truth is made up of paradoxes in balance – apparent conflicting concepts that nonetheless stand side by side together as both need the other. I’m referring to things such as law and grace… free will and predestination… truth and beauty… These are actually the conflicts that make our faith rich with texture and complexity. Truth is not on one side or the other. It is both and. This is the balance of which I spoke.

And 2. I don’t think Jesus wants to have anything to do with the political ideologies that divide and separate us. Jesus refuses to be cast in conservative or liberal garb. He will not fit into our categories or fall into our extremes. So taking up faith means taking on something bigger than either extreme.

Our thoughts for today harken back to a Catch last week about pleasing and being pleasing [to] God. Quite often comments from readers can add a new insight or a different twist on things. This one comes, believe it or not, from an “American sister in China.” Yes, that’s right: China.

Remember all those cartoons about digging straight down through the earth and coming out the other end in China? I just checked that out on Chandler’s globe and that was a lie. You’d have to dig at a bit of an angle to come out in China. Straight down brings you out somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean between Australia and Madagascar. But that’s no fun. Who wants to dig that far only to find yourself in the bottom of an ocean!

Interesting how we don’t see or hear much about that joke any more. Maybe it’s because the Internet has shrunk our world to where nothing is more than a click away. Julia is a click away, and here is what she wrote:

You spoke of Father’s acceptance and being versus doing very well and I hope more people read this and start to grasp this. I feel it is one of the easiest ways for the enemy to disable us – to allow us to believe that we are being graded on performance – or to let us think that we are all off the hook of responsibility if the pendulum swings too far to the other side. It is always about balance, isn’t it? The Chinese speak of balance all of the time.

In this dramatically unbalanced world, it is one of the hardest things to comprehend. And yet, I have found, just being in Him brings balance to everything, including me wanting to please Him, because I am extremely thankful that I already am pleasing to Him.

She’s right. Truth always straddles a middle ground. You won’t find Jesus at the extremes.

It was almost a year ago to the day that I first discovered the Seminole Indians in Longview, Texas. No I didn’t discover the Seminole in Texas (they are from Florida), I was in Texas when I found out about them through a song written and recorded by country artist John Anderson and later covered by James Taylor. The song is called “Seminole Wind,” and it’s the Taylor cover that captured me. I will forever associate this song with this place because I played the song over and over again in my rental car as I circumnavigated eastern Texas.

The reason I’m writing about this today is because I am returning to Longview again this month to speak at LeTourneau University, and the power of association is so strong in music that as soon as I booked this event, the song started coming back in my mind. It’s a haunting melody about how “civilization” came to Florida and wiped out a native culture.

Progress came and took its toll,
And in the name of flood control,
They made their plans and they drained the land,
Now the ‘glades are going dry.

The song and Taylor’s arrangement is full of sadness and melancholy as it remembers what was lost, and in my mind’s eye, I see the pride and dignity of a race of people stripped of their homeland and way of life. It’s a deep loss that can never be returned.

And these thoughts lead me to a new appreciation for native people wherever they try to hold onto a piece of their identity. It’s all about giving all men and women the value and worth of being formed in God’s image, especially when that image is different from ours. For the sake of all people who have been displaced, we need to remember.

So blow, blow Seminole wind,
Blow like you’re never gonna blow again.
I’m calling to you like a long lost friend,
But I know who you are.
And blow, blow from the Okeechobee,
All the way up to Micanopy.
Blow across the home of the Seminole,
The alligator and the gar.

Knowing you are pleasing to God is one thing; pleasing Him is quite another. There’s this little matter of our behavior. I will always love our son, Chandler; I may not always like what he is doing. It’s all about being and doing.

Knowing we are pleasing to God is something that takes place at the core of one’s being. God loves who we are. He looks at us and is pleased with what He made. But knowing we are pleasing to God is not a free hall pass from responsibility. It does not sanction bad behavior.

We can be pleasing to God and still do things that are not pleasing to Him. That’s because being pleasing to God has to do with who we are, not what we do. One is being; the other is doing.

Ideally, one should lead to the other. Realizing we are pleasing to God should make us want to please Him in everything. And that’s where we want to end up with these thoughts today. We want to find out what pleases God and do it. We want to not be just hearers of the word but doers of it also.

After all, it’s only right that we should want to please Him when we realize that we already do, without doing anything.

If you’re anything like me, you are really good at beating yourself up on a regular basis. Most of us live with a lot of guilt. We were never good enough. Everything is our fault. This is because all our lives, we have learned acceptance based on performance. If we behave properly, we will be loved and accepted, but one mess-up and love is withdrawn. We are expected to do well, so we only hear about it when we don’t.

God loves us on a wholly different basis. With God, we begin with love and acceptance and we move out from there.

When John the Baptist baptized Jesus, a voice was heard from heaven as He came up out of the water, “This is my beloved Son, and I am fully pleased with Him” (Matthew 3:17). At this point in his ministry, Jesus has done nothing to prove Himself or earn his Father’s approval. No healings. No teachings. No disciples. His baptism signaled the beginning of his ministry, and yet we find God fully pleased with Him at this point. It was a given.

It is the same thing with us. God delights in us just as we are. You are pleasing to God already. Or to put it another way: God likes you. This may be hard to believe but it is true. You bring pleasure to God right now as you read this.

God’s love is extended freely through Christ’s death on the cross. It’s what Christ did that brings us into fellowship with God, not what we do. The things you do today will not cause God to like you or dislike you, they will grow out of knowing you already bring Him pleasure. And there is nothing you can do to alter that fact.

So take it. Bask in it. Yes, right now, without lifting a finger, God is pleased with you. He made you for this. He made you and He delights in you. This is where we start.

Our thought today comes courtesy of Lee, one of our readers. She related a story about a Christian who was being harassed for her beliefs by an atheist. After the atheist gave some compelling reasons for his disbelief in God, the Christian replied, “Good, we’re both believers then.” The atheist, quite shocked by that statement, asked the Christian what he meant by calling him a believer. The Christian went on to explain, “Look, since we both have strong reasons for our beliefs, why don’t we sit down and talk about them”.

Score one for the Christian. He managed to come up with a discussion-starter instead of a discussion stopper. Most, if not all, typical evangelical strategies end up stopping the show. We are full of answers, and we can’t wait to drop them like bombs on unsuspecting unbelievers. We are proud of answers that leave no room for ambiguity, but these “answers” are more of a hindrance to faith than a help. We are not in a contest; we are on a journey together, pointing towards Christ.

It’s the conversation we want, not the conclusion. Too much “end of discussion” in evangelical witnessing models. We don’t want the discussion to end; we want the discussion to go on. The discussion is the whole point. It is out of discussion that relationships are born, and it will be you, not the correct answers that will draw people to the Lord. Who wants to be right and all alone? Better to be not sure, but in good company, loving people and pointing them to Christ.

So therefore we want to become good at open-ended questions along with finding common ground. Questions that spark discussion. The one at the top of this page is a perfect example: “Since we both have strong reasons for our beliefs, why don’t we sit down and talk?” The common ground is that we all believe something; the invitation is to find out what that is.

Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13:2)

If every stranger you met were a potential angel, how would you treat strangers? Pretty well, I would guess. We typically treat people we know with a level of respect and honor. What this suggests is that we treat those we don’t know with the respect and honor you would give to an angel.This idea of entertaining angels harkens back to the Old Testament when Abraham entertained two strangers who turned out to be the angels who informed him that he and his wife, Sarah, would have their long-awaited son even in their old age. It has been said that Abraham kept the flaps up on all four sides of his tent so that he could spot travelers in all directions and offer them hospitality. Part of this was the custom, but the custom was driven in part by the anticipation of angels. Abraham probably entertained numerous strangers and travelers before two of them actually turned out to be angels.

I’m okay with angels. Believing in angels doesn’t make you weird. It doesn’t mean you are seeing things either. What if, in fact, we saw angels every day and didn’t know it? Angels in the Bible sometimes appear as bright, shining beings that strike fear into a person because of their extra-terrestrial nature, but sometimes they appear as normal human beings. They would be strangers because they would have taken on human form for a particular task—usually to deliver an important message or perhaps protect someone from danger. It’s kind of cool to think that you might pass a few angels today; and if you are friendly to strangers, you might even entertain one

If we were anticipating angels more, we would be more alert to those around us at all times. Might not be a bad way to live. Keep the flaps up on our tent, so the speak. Even if we never did know, we would live better and be better people.

It’s a conversation that allegedly took place between Abraham Lincoln and his best friend, Joshua Speed. Speed, upon finding Lincoln reading the Bible, laid a hand on his shoulder and remarked, “I am glad to see you profitably engaged.”

“I am profitably engaged,” was the affirming reply.

“Well, if you have recovered from your skepticism, I am sorry to say that I have not.”

“You are wrong, Speed,” said Lincoln, looking up from the pages of his Bible. “Take all of this book upon reason that you can, and the balance on faith, and you will die a happier and better man.”

I like this for numerous reasons.

1) It’s Abraham Lincoln, an obviously smart and great man who gave God respect, believed the Bible, and relied on Christ for strength to lead America through one of it’s most trying times.

2) It’s a great statement on the cooperation of reason and faith. Christianity is not unreasonable. It does not require blind or stupid faith. It requires a reasonable faith. That would be, as Lincoln described it, a faith that travels along with reason until reason can go no further, at which point faith goes the rest of the way alone. That says that faith is not antagonistic to reason, it’s just that reason alone isn’t enough.

3) Joshua Speed, who was Lincoln’s best friend, did not share Lincoln’s belief. This is a good example for us, because we tend to gravitate, especially with best friends, to people who support the same belief systems we hold. We might have acquaintances that are not believers, but rarely best friends. This account lists Speed as Lincoln’s best friend. I’d be curious as to whether Mr. Speed will be in heaven. It’s hard to imagine a long, close friendship with a man like Lincoln that wouldn’t have convinced Joshua Speed about the reality of all that Lincoln believed at some point.

At any rate, it’s a great example of the kind of friendships I believe we as Christians need to cultivate—relationships of mutual respect with unbelievers (or what I like to call: “not yet believers”).

Okay, it’s my turn at one of Marti’s rabbit trails.

It was the Fourth of July and Chandler was 10 months old – still small enough to carry in one of those front-loading baby packs where you walk around with the little tyke facing out, his back pressed to your chest and his arms and legs flailing. After finding our favorite restaurants full, we settled on a new place that had outside patio seating. Perfect, we thought. If Chandler becomes difficult it’s not as disruptive outside.

Our first surprise came when they didn’t have any highchairs. Odd. Glancing around the patio, we saw no other children so it wasn’t like they ran out. With so many people bringing children to restaurants these days, it seemed like more than an oversight; it seemed almost anti-children. For that reason, it didn’t help when Chandler started to become more and more unruly. Without a highchair, I had to keep him in his pack just to contain him, but that put him right where he could get his hands into my food at the table. I had the choice of letting him get into the food and make a mess all over both of us at the table or back away and let him scream. Whenever I tried the latter, I was aware of angry eyes our way.

It was then I noticed something about the people behind those eyes. “Do you notice anything different about the people in this place?” I whispered to Marti. She looked up and saw what I had just realized: Every table was occupied by a same-sex couple – every table, that is, except us and one couple who looked like farmers from Iowa. I caught him a few times looking desperately in our direction. “This is a gay restaurant,” Marti said under her breath.

Sure enough. The two guys who came in dressed like Richard Simmons in American flag tank tops and shorts sealed it. That explained the lack of highchairs and the perceived shortage of patience people seemed to have with Chandler.  One older couple seemed to look over our way quite a lot, making me more and more uncomfortable by the minute. Finally I explained to Marti that I had had it and was going to take Chandler and wait for her outside.

While we waited I could see that Marti had stopped on her way out to talk to the older gentlemen that I had assumed were exasperated with Chandler. As you can see, Marti’s commitment to equality and diversity is not anything she just picked up. This was 10 years ago.

When we finally joined up outside, I asked her what she was talking to those guys about.

“Well I went over to apologize for interrupting their dinner and they said, ‘Oh, not at all. In fact we are both retired physicians and for the last few years we have been treating bruised and battered children, 6,000 of them in all, and we were remarking how hearing a healthy baby cry was like music to our ears.'”

When we take on another, like the Muslims, as enemies we see that we take them on as lesser men and women and are, by God, proved wrong and end up paying respect to the enemies.