Summer 2012

I am writing this post earlier than intended as we are still 2 months away from the 1 year anniversary of this blog. But it seems that perhaps, as we once again transition from the academic year into the months of summer, this is an excellent time to take stock of where have come from and where we are presently. My year has been a transition from unemployed, to student, to self employed. And as I look back on last summer, I can't help but think that blogging and writing and creating last summer and throughout this year was an important step and good preparation for this summer's challenge of making money in video production. (As an aside if you are interested in my photographic or video services, please let me know... a website is pending.)

One of the themes of Regent this year has been the repeated phrase: "everything is gift." This provided some of the impetus for my last post on imagining gift economics. Regent's convocation student address approached similar themes reflecting on Peter's experience at Jesus' transfiguration. Educational experiences such as Regent or CBC were compared to being on that mountain... They are not places we work for and build, they are places we are brought to and moments we are given and it is good to be there... But it is neither possible set up camp there as Peter desired, or through hard work recreate or return to that time for that is not what brought you there to begin with. The truth is that how we get places is complex, filled with people, randomness, and factors beyond our control... theologically one might insert the word providence here... 

My only point here is one that I have found encouraging all year: what looks and feels like failure may be the foundation for unbelievable success. Sometimes the road to where you are going is different than anticipated, feels unrelated and is frustrating. Sometimes we find success through failure or through stagnation or through unemployment. Sometimes it's obvious how things are connected and we may feel vindicated or difficulty may feel redeemed; other times it does not appear obvious as to why particular events or experiences were part of a journey. And yet I believe the alchemy of these experiences is important in preparing and shaping us hopefully for the better, even when we are unaware or unable to articulate it. 

So I anticipate summer 2012 to be a gift, just as 2011 was, despite its unconventional nature. I certainly have hopes and ideas of what I want it to look like, but mostly I want to try and be open for the surprises, for the nice weather, for opportunities to work and opportunities to rest, opportunities to read and opportunities to write, to take picture and make pictures, to laugh and cry... I expect nothing less than the fullness of life in all its glory and sorrow for this is what we have been promised - and in the midst of it, I will attempt to trust that the joy, the boredom, the work, the stress, the rest, and the love are all shaping my soul into the gift that my life is intended to be for you. I will try and be a present in the present (Sorry. It was so perfectly cheesy that I couldn't deny it.).

“To be, or not to be…” - By Amy Ris

“If it’s meant to be, it will happen,” said the esthetician doing my nails this afternoon. I think this is probably the nicest sounding load of garbage I have ever heard. First of all, it doesn’t grammatically make sense. Globally, it doesn’t make sense in our world. Because what if “it” never happens? And “if it’s meant to be,” does that mean we simply sit back to watch and wait to see if we are one of the lucky ones who are meant-to-be-ers? And if we pour everything into making “it” happen ourselves, doesn’t that destroy the ethereal nature of the phrase “if it’s meant to be…”

For me, this phrase then leads into the discussion of how involved God is in our own, personal lives. Does he personally direct single people to find each other? Or do people find each other? And what about single people that don’t actually want to stay single? Can we simply say to them, “I guess it’s just not meant to be…”? How about a woman who can’t have kids even though it is her greatest heart’s desire? Is it simply just not “meant to be”?

And who are we to say what’s to be or not to be? That’s my question…

I am curious to know if you have ever said or heard this phrase and your own response to it within the context of faith and trust in God’s direction in our lives...

Duncan says the issue of how do we talk about these things with each other is as important as our theology...

Why is it so difficult to do these conversations well?

Turning 27...

Late last year, I was at a Sarah Slean concert and she assured the audience that 27 is a great year, but that you pay for it in year 28 and 29. When one is 27, adulthood has definitively set in and there is no escaping it, although perhaps it is the last year in which denial is quite socially acceptable. I find it difficult, as I believe we all do, to not compare myself to those around me in a variety of spheres and contexts. Some of my more famous fellow 1985 babies include: Lily Allen, Fefe Dobson, Zac Hanson, Kiera Knightly, Lady Sovereign, Frankie Muniz, Ashley Tisdale, T-Pain, and Madeline Zima. Other superstars like Miss Stefani Germanotta (Lady Gaga) are a year younger. While we could have a lively discussion regarding the degree of adulthood these celebrities have achieved, certainly their success and cultural influence is spectacular. Friends of mine own houses and are having babies... My parents had finished school, bought a house, and found the job my Dad continues to work at, given birth to me and were pregnant with my sister. These are examples of those who while less globally influential are discernably settled, rooted. I, however, seem to be stuck in the midst of the same existential crisis I have been in for the past at least 10 years, except 10 years ago I was more optimistic regarding the future. At 27, I am feeling both the desire and terror of settling... I am feeling distinctly exhausted with the uncertainty and transience of many peoples early and mid twenties.

Please let me be the first to be cynical regarding my own cynical out look. From any other perspective but my own, my own pathos is near inexplicable. I am married, I have travelled the world, I am currently enrolled in grad school and I have concession style popcorn machine, I live in Vancouver; life, by any reasonable external standard, is fantastic. Despite the often uncertain and unexpected series of events that have been the last decade of my life, they have been far from dull, uneventful or unproductive. However, from a young age I have had my eyes set on a world stage, and rather than making progress I find myself living everyday with angsty teenage uncertainty regarding what I want to be when I grow up. And here we are and I still don't really know or am too afraid to say or am afraid that the ongoing ambiguity determines me a failure regardless, doomed to be blown by the wind.

My eternally embarrassing confession of competing in figure skating up to the age of 16 never ceases to cause me discomfort. It is in this context of competition, my eyes always directed to national and international success, that I spent some of my most formative years. The height of my success was not a gold medal but qualifying for nationals (perhaps you can hear my disappointment). Anyway, I retired at 16 in order to more fully devote myself to school and art. My ambition for a world stage did not disappear, it merely shifted toward film and television. I have now spent 6+ years formally pursuing spirituality and theological education. But my vision/desire for global impact remains undeterred. On a side note, 4 years ago I recognized in myself a great longing to escape. This is mostly expressed in not wanting to live in North America. Despite and because of this I seem to have confined myself to the very context I both love and loathe, Vancouver.

Ambition is considered both a vice and virtue in modern society. I have mixed feelings about my own ambitions. Oh I could call them "hopes and dreams" and that would be far more acceptable but realistically it is the same. My desire to engage an audience is, perhaps, innate to my identity. There is not a time in my life that I can remember when some aspect of my time was not directed to this end in some fashion. And yet my young desire to perform and entertain has shifted to a desire to express and communicate. This blog succeeds in quenching some of that need. However, blogs and internet communication are often unsatisfying outlets, as they can feel like performing Shakespeare in the dark. Can anyone hear you? or see you? Does anyone care what about what you are doing or trying to do? These fears are somewhat alleviated here by group authorship...

My question, which perpetuates my own frustration and dissatisfaction is not: Do you care? or Can you see me? but, What am I doing? According to Dorothy Sayers I might be classified as an artist all energy and no idea... Although in reality I am exhausted and rarely energetic. I move amongst my own shadows of doubt looking for something... Perhaps we will have a child and I will find focus, perhaps I will be given an opportunity which will crystallize things, perhaps I will meet someone who will make things clear... But after 10 years of pursuing God for these things, learning to think, and discerning in community,  it is my conviction that we must learn to live in the shadowy reality of our own subjectivity. I must continue to step into the darkness by faith, because all is darkness. It is my hope to walk while holding hands with those I love. It is the deep torture of my soul to be weighed down with the call to speak and simultaneously deep uncertainty about what to say, or perhaps my uncertainty is a mask for inability to commit to a subject or perspective...

So I am most curious regarding your thoughts of ambition as a subject and its role in the Christian life...
How common is my sense of dissatisfaction? I perceive, perhaps wrongly, that many other people are much more content within life's mundane routines and much more capable of finding joy in the doldrums of the grind...
Is existential discomfort good or bad? Some might say that comfort and lack of personal tension should be considered a bad sign. 
Is the my decision thus far to confine myself to a context (e.g. Vancouver) that I do not particularly like, in order to attempt to work out my loathing of North America, reasonable or does it make more sense to run off somewhere and hopefully shatter my naive and romantic illusions regarding other parts of the world? This seems a common experience of many people.
Is my restlessness genetic, merely skipping a generation, and now simply expressed in the anxiety of my postmodern generation?
I apologize for what, perhaps, is far too personal a post for the public nature of this setting. 

Out on a limb...

Last week I went apple picking with my mum. There was an apple tree behind the community centre and my mum recruited me to go up and pick the apple which were perfectly ripe and very delicious. I have always liked climbing trees and throughout my life I have made my mum nervous on many occasions as I placed myself in precarious situations. However, last week she was egging me on... "There is lot just out and up a bit farther," she said. And so I found myself probably the farthest out on a limb I think I have ever been. I was careful, I was cautious but I also pushed myself to the very limit because that was the place I needed to be to get the good apples.

The line between madness and genius is thin. The line between success and failure is thin. The line between life and death is thin. The thing I find interesting is that we are notoriously bad and knowing where the line is... We are notoriously bad at evaluation in general. The drummer before Ringo Starr, quit the Beatles because he thought they were no good. Way too many people go on American Idol and think they are great. We try and evaluate results but which results are relevant? Einstein had early speech difficulties, Van Gogh had no success while alive. Our understanding of the present and the stories that history will tell are often different...

At the entrance to the temple at Delphi it said in Greek, "Know thyself." "Who am I?" is one of the ancient philosophical conundrums... The task to know one's self is exceedingly difficult as there is certainly no agreed upon method. Furthermore it is not a question to be answered by a single individual given we are relational beings, our identity is wrapped up in much beyond our own individual psyche. We like to talk about self esteem, and bad self esteem as someone who doesn't know them self. However, "bad" is a judgement we make from the outside based on our perceptions. We are likely to disagree just a strongly with an unrepentant serial killer who has really "good" self esteem.

The line between confidence and arrogance is thin. My father in law says that it is the difference between seeking impress rather than express. And yet I am sure we can all resonate with the experience of knowing someone who liked to express themselves just a little bit too much... I know people who seem to be very comfortable with who they are and they are very "real" but what this looks like is often abrasive or uncomfortable. They are either oblivious or disinterested how there self expression impacts those around them. People deal with it. I put up with it. I find myself often a combination of frustrated and jealous of these people. Frustrated because they can be like a grenade; jealous because they can get away saying and doing things that I cannot, with an earnestness that I would have to fake.

Expectations may well be the death of you...

I find myself farther and father out on the limb of life. My ability to evaluate whether the branch can hold me or not is negligible. Although past experience tells me that I'm ok. But of course past experience tells me I'm ok because one is ok until one is not, one is alive until one is dead, the branch is holding you until it snaps. Will it snap? or will you get a delicious apple?

How much risk is acceptable? How do you determine risk? How do you psychologically manage to get in your car every day knowing the statistics of traffic fatalities: 32, 708 people died in the US last year in a traffic accident.

Redemption of Solomon

Thinking about the blog today…manual labour provides the opportunity to let ones mind wander because it is mindless. However, rather than think about many different things I end up going over one thing many times. I think I am becoming more aware of my obsessive-compulsive side. Today I thought about the blog. I have not been posting much lately; life is busy when over 12 hours of my day are tied to getting to work, working and getting home. So contemplating this dilemma, I have decided to return to some of my previous work and share that with you.

The past two year I was a teaching assistant for a first year New Testament Survey course. For this, I created a series of devotionals to share. Over the next few weeks, I am going to share modified versions of those on this blog. These will be somewhat different from what I normally post, but hopefully they are informative and worthwhile to read. By “reusing” ideas for the next few weeks, I hope to be able to post more often even with my time restrictions. My second reason for sharing these is that they articulate some of my fundamental approaches to reading the text. Third, Duncan and I are working toward a mini series on Empire, a discussion initiated by the comments in the “Extremist Religion” blog. Some of my devotionals begin articulating and imaging empire, so are worth sharing as part of that bigger, ongoing, discussion.

Without further ado: Solomon

Begin by reflecting on the standards we (you and I) fail to live up to. It is probably not hard, your mind has probably jumped to some perceived standard. I don’t think it is a stretch for each of us to think of how we have failed to live up to standard set for us, as well as standards that we set up for ourselves.

We often fail. We know what it is to come up short. The feeling of disappointment, shame, guilt, are well known acquaintances if we are honest. This blog has been an outlet to perceived shortcomings in faith, employment, and social norms. Often I find myself wishing I better met the standards set for me. But this failure is our existence, so why am I bringing this up? Is this another guilt trip? Am I here to make you bring to mind things of the past? Is this a common Christianeese slap on the wrist? Maybe my purpose is to wallow a little while in the things that each of us wishes we would never need to return to or even think about again.

No. This is where we begin. This is a common convergence of our humanity. We begin here, often we return here. Failure to meet the standards is a place of existence. But, it is a place we do not wish to remain. Yet, even though I do not wish to remain with this feeling, I often feel stuck in this place.

Are you with me? Is the realization we do not meet the standards set before us a real experience? Is it true for you? For me it is.

Where does one go from here though? What are we to do with these feelings of failure, shame, guilt, and incompetence?

Solomon is where I find the possibility of solace. Turning to the person of Solomon to ponder together what it means to live after realizing our failure to reach the standards set before us.

The standard set before Solomon is presented in Deuteronomy 17:14-20.
The King
14 When you enter the land the LORD your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,” 15 be sure to appoint over you a king the LORD your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite. 16 The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the LORD has told you, “You are not to go back that way again.” 17 He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray. He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.
18 When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the Levitical priests. 19 It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the LORD his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees 20 and not consider himself better than his fellow Israelites and turn from the law to the right or to the left. Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel. (NIV)

Here we have the standard. The standard set to prevent Empire. But then we read of reality:
• Wives – 1 Kings 11:1-4
1 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. 2 They were from nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. 3 He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. 4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been.

• Large amounts of silver and gold – 1 Kings 10:14-17
14 The weight of the gold that Solomon received yearly was 666 talents,[e] 15 not including the revenues from merchants and traders and from all the Arabian kings and the governors of the territories.
16 King Solomon made two hundred large shields of hammered gold; six hundred shekels of gold went into each shield. 17 He also made three hundred small shields of hammered gold, with three minas of gold in each shield. The king put them in the Palace of the Forest of Lebanon.

• Horses – 1 Kings 10:26-29
26 Solomon accumulated chariots and horses; he had fourteen hundred chariots and twelve thousand horses, which he kept in the chariot cities and also with him in Jerusalem. 27 The king made silver as common in Jerusalem as stones, and cedar as plentiful as sycamore-fig trees in the foothills. 28 Solomon’s horses were imported from Egypt and from Kue—the royal merchants purchased them from Kue at the current price. 29 They imported a chariot from Egypt for six hundred shekels of silver, and a horse for a hundred and fifty. They also exported them to all the kings of the Hittites and of the Arameans.

• Law – 1 Kings 11:4-6
4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. 5 He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. 6 So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the LORD; he did not follow the LORD completely, as David his father had done.

If anyone did not meet the standards set out, it was Solomon. This is not how the majority of people think of Solomon, but Biblically he is not the role model of good behaviour. So here we are, the OT ends and the character of Solomon gets mixed reviews at best.

This, however, is not the end. The biblical narrative is not over. Jesus changes this, Luke 11:31 “The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the people of this generation and condemn them, for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom; and now something greater than Solomon is here.” – Jesus is the one greater than Solomon. Within the creativity of the biblical narrative, Jesus subverts the personhood of Solomon. From beyond time, past to future, future to past, redemption occurs for the character of Solomon. The character of Solomon has not been completed Biblically, he is not done, Solomon re-emerges and is completed in Christ. I love this part of Biblical study, somehow, beyond the life of the individual, literarily and beyond reason Christ alters the standards. From beyond time Christ comes and is sufficient for the standards.

Solomon, again, re-emerges in Acts. The tale is yet to be complete. In Acts the first great miracle is explained at Solomon’s colonnade (Acts 3:6-11). This action occurs at a location marked by the namesake of Israel’s empire. It is as if the kingdom that has arrived through Christ, which is a kingdom of healing, supersedes and replaces the abuse and harm done by Solomon. The Christ, and now Christ’s followers redeem the character of Solomon. The healing, signs, and wonders continue throughout Acts, and the people of the Kingdom continue to meet at Solomon’s colonnade (Acts 5:12).

So back to us. Do we really believe that? Is it a real possibility to live with an openness to being freed from the standards we fail to live up to? Do we truly live as though Christ is the one redeeming us? Do we actually believe that Christ is meeting and even exceeding the standards set before ourselves? Do we live in an openness to be redeemed from beyond time? Could we be redeemed by the actions of others many generations from now, just as the character of Solomon is redeemed by the early church? Because if we do, if we could live like this even a little it would undermine all the negative shame, guilt, and feelings of incompetence we experience when we do not meet standards.