We all marry the wrong people, because we are all sinners. We all bring baggage into the marriage. Sadly, sometimes the baggage is too much for the marriage to survive--even when the two people have good intentions towards one another. Is there a view of marriage which gives the two people the best chance for survival of the marriage?
Opposites attract which begins as a good thing. Your heart gets the pitter-patters, because you have come across someone who is innately different from you--yet they desire to be with you--even desire, supposedly, to spend the rest of their life with you. This provides the intoxicating elixir called romantic love. This is a good thing. But for this romantic love, the human race would die out.
Yet, this state of intoxication doesn't last long. The differences which were charming become tiresome and even the basis for disagreements and, many times, profound contempt for one another. Take me and Debbie in our early marriage as examples. I was organized--Debbie was not. I highly valued truth--Debbie not so much. Debbie is very relational--I was not. Debbie has great empathy--me not so much. So, you can well imagine that we had disputes. I valued having an orderly home and life over relationships with people. This led to many, many conflicts over topics ranging from housekeeping, bill paying, parenting, to picking a church. Our differences almost led to divorce. This is the bad part.
Once you reach the bad times, the question is whether the bad times will continue to get worse (leading to divorce) or whether there will be redemption. In order for there to be redemption, the differences must be seen not as issues to overcome, but as blessings.
Over time, I have come to appreciate Debbie's relational nature. Thanks to Debbie, I finally have a relationship with my mother that I never dreamed possible.
Over time, Debbie has come to appreciate my organizational skills. This has made our home more of a refuge from the disorganization of the world.
Over tine, I have come to appreciate Debbie's empathy. This empathy has caused me to be empathetic towards myself, which has quieted the voices of suicide and depression. Empathy towards myself has led to deeper relationships at work and in our neighborhood.
Over time, Debbie has come to appreciate the truth. Speaking the truth allows us to deal with heart issues that we swept under the rug for years.
So, "opposites attract" seems to be a genetic and/or Divinely appointed means of building stronger and stronger marriages.
Friday, October 31, 2014
Saturday, October 18, 2014
Religious Psychology, "The Road," and My Father
Paul Zahl, quoting Aldous Huxley, says that we all need a religious psychologist. But I was brought up Baptist. I was told, over and over, that the proclamation of the Word is what I most needed. For once, the Baptists were actually right. When the Word is rightly proclaimed, it pierces our hearts and changes our perspective on God, on people, and allows us to love more. This piercing of the heart is where the psychology comes in. Indeed, St. Paul may have been the first person to understand and write extensively about psychology. "Why do I do the things I shouldn't do, and leave undone the things that I ought to do."
When we view Christianity as an interpretive lens for life, it becomes a true psychology--a freeing word--a means for "getting through the day"--because "nobody gets out of this life alive." (Axl) One of the most helpful interpretive principals taught first by St. Paul, but really honed by Luther, is the principal that the Word first speaks Law, but then this is followed by Grace. The Law exposes our sin, and Grace tells us that God is, nevertheless, on our side. God is on our side even when we repeat sins--just look at the stories of Abraham, King David, King Solomon, and Samson.
This Law/Grace modality, which is a profoundly and uniquely Christian view, of interpreting life finally allowed me to deal with the life and death of my father.
My father was 47 when I was born. He was probably a little old to be starting a family, but he wasn't willing to have children until he was able to provide for us. My sister was born two years later. My father grew up woefully poor on a struggling red dirt farm in northern Tuscaloosa County during the Great Depression. It irks me to hear people compare our recent economic issues with the Great Depression. No one in the US went hungry this last time, while millions were woefully destitute--suffering and dying from hunger and sickness--during the Great Depression. Even the poorest in our country had cars, cell phones, flat screen TVs, and food galore this last time. This is why my father waited so long to have children.
When my father died, in 1997, I was busy with my law career, with two young children, and our third child had just been born five days before my father passed away. I wasn't there for him when he died--I thought that I was too busy to spend the time with him that he would have enjoyed. I was a self-centered prick. I was trying to make my way in the world, and it was extremely stressful. Two of the attorneys that I worked mostly with had psychological problems which only exaggerated my own psychological problems. This led, in part, to suicidal tendencies on my part, and on the part of another attorney who worked for one of them. So, I wasn't there for my father when he died.
Then I read "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy. My pastor and I were discussing McCarthy the other nite, and I told him that my lens for understanding the book was the Law/Grace dichotomy. I told him that this caused me, and causes me, to weep whenever I read the ending of the book. So, whenever I feel myself becoming hard-hearted or disconnected from my wife, I just read the ending of the book again.
He said: "Tell me." After I finished, he said: "Wow, I've never read it that way before, but you're absolutely right." I'm not looking for pats on the head--I'm telling you his comments to bring home the efficacy of the Law/Grace lens.
The book is about the journey of a father and son through a post-apocalyptic world. The tale is so very, very dark that I've never read the entire book again and can't watch the movie. This is the Law portion of the book--the portion of the book which exposes the sinfulness of man, the difficulties of this world, and the ever-present certainty of death. Indeed, McCarthy always brings these truths to the forefront in his books.
"He walked out in the gray light and stood and he saw for a brief moment the absolute truth of the world. The cold relentless circling of the intestate earth. Darkness implacable. The blind dogs of the sun in their running. The crushing black vacuum of the universe. And somewhere two hunted animals trembling like ground-foxes in their cover. Borrowed time and borrowed world and borrowed eyes with which to sorrow it.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
Then, you get to the end and the father dies, seemingly leaving his son alone. The boy leaves his dead father on the beach, not sure of what to do--and utterly, completely alone. When he gets to the road, he finds he's not alone. Is this person going to eat him, kill him, rape him--we've seen all of these things in the book. No, this man reflects Grace. For this man is armed to the teeth--which is what was needed to survive. He could offer greater safety to the boy than his father ever could. He helps the son bury his father. What's more, the man had a wife and child, and the boy had been yearning for companionship with another child, even subjecting he and his father to potential dangers to try and find a child for a friend. The fact that the book is so dark only serves to make the light at the end that much greater. The wife, the boy's new mother, holds him and speaks to him:
“The woman when she saw him put her arms around him and held him. Oh, she said, I am so glad to see you. She would talk to him sometimes about God. He tried to talk to God but the best thing was to talk to his father and he did talk to him and he didn't forget. The woman said that was all right. She said that the breath of God was his breath yet though it pass from man to man through all of time.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
And McCarthy even expressly reflects upon the light. Throughout the book, the father has a constant rejoinder to the son that they are "carrying the fire." In this landscape where men have become the worst of mankind (cannibals, sodomists, etc.), the boy and his father had rejected that. They were carrying the fire of what was good in man. At the end of the book, the father tells the son, as his dying words, that he is leaving his son behind to "carry the fire." The father then goes on ahead--to prepare a way--"for in my Father's house, there are many rooms. If it were not true, I would have told you so."
“You have to carry the fire."
I don't know how to."
Yes, you do."
Is the fire real? The fire?"
Yes it is."
Where is it? I don't know where it is."
Yes you do. It's inside you. It always was there. I can see it.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
The word of Grace to me was that the father had done his job--he had walked beside his son in this life, and he was "going on ahead." The father was satisfied at having done his job. He wasn't looking for praise or affirmation from his son--he knew that he would hear "well done, good and faithful servant" soon enough. These are certainly the words that my father heard when he passed away. This gives me comfort--that, notwithstanding my abject failure at being a son--my father passed knowing that he had done his job, that he "had carried the fire." The amazing good news is that he passed that along to me. Now, I "love to tell the story, the old old story, of Jesus and His love."
Praise be to Christ.
When we view Christianity as an interpretive lens for life, it becomes a true psychology--a freeing word--a means for "getting through the day"--because "nobody gets out of this life alive." (Axl) One of the most helpful interpretive principals taught first by St. Paul, but really honed by Luther, is the principal that the Word first speaks Law, but then this is followed by Grace. The Law exposes our sin, and Grace tells us that God is, nevertheless, on our side. God is on our side even when we repeat sins--just look at the stories of Abraham, King David, King Solomon, and Samson.
This Law/Grace modality, which is a profoundly and uniquely Christian view, of interpreting life finally allowed me to deal with the life and death of my father.
My father was 47 when I was born. He was probably a little old to be starting a family, but he wasn't willing to have children until he was able to provide for us. My sister was born two years later. My father grew up woefully poor on a struggling red dirt farm in northern Tuscaloosa County during the Great Depression. It irks me to hear people compare our recent economic issues with the Great Depression. No one in the US went hungry this last time, while millions were woefully destitute--suffering and dying from hunger and sickness--during the Great Depression. Even the poorest in our country had cars, cell phones, flat screen TVs, and food galore this last time. This is why my father waited so long to have children.
When my father died, in 1997, I was busy with my law career, with two young children, and our third child had just been born five days before my father passed away. I wasn't there for him when he died--I thought that I was too busy to spend the time with him that he would have enjoyed. I was a self-centered prick. I was trying to make my way in the world, and it was extremely stressful. Two of the attorneys that I worked mostly with had psychological problems which only exaggerated my own psychological problems. This led, in part, to suicidal tendencies on my part, and on the part of another attorney who worked for one of them. So, I wasn't there for my father when he died.
Then I read "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy. My pastor and I were discussing McCarthy the other nite, and I told him that my lens for understanding the book was the Law/Grace dichotomy. I told him that this caused me, and causes me, to weep whenever I read the ending of the book. So, whenever I feel myself becoming hard-hearted or disconnected from my wife, I just read the ending of the book again.
He said: "Tell me." After I finished, he said: "Wow, I've never read it that way before, but you're absolutely right." I'm not looking for pats on the head--I'm telling you his comments to bring home the efficacy of the Law/Grace lens.
The book is about the journey of a father and son through a post-apocalyptic world. The tale is so very, very dark that I've never read the entire book again and can't watch the movie. This is the Law portion of the book--the portion of the book which exposes the sinfulness of man, the difficulties of this world, and the ever-present certainty of death. Indeed, McCarthy always brings these truths to the forefront in his books.
"He walked out in the gray light and stood and he saw for a brief moment the absolute truth of the world. The cold relentless circling of the intestate earth. Darkness implacable. The blind dogs of the sun in their running. The crushing black vacuum of the universe. And somewhere two hunted animals trembling like ground-foxes in their cover. Borrowed time and borrowed world and borrowed eyes with which to sorrow it.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
Then, you get to the end and the father dies, seemingly leaving his son alone. The boy leaves his dead father on the beach, not sure of what to do--and utterly, completely alone. When he gets to the road, he finds he's not alone. Is this person going to eat him, kill him, rape him--we've seen all of these things in the book. No, this man reflects Grace. For this man is armed to the teeth--which is what was needed to survive. He could offer greater safety to the boy than his father ever could. He helps the son bury his father. What's more, the man had a wife and child, and the boy had been yearning for companionship with another child, even subjecting he and his father to potential dangers to try and find a child for a friend. The fact that the book is so dark only serves to make the light at the end that much greater. The wife, the boy's new mother, holds him and speaks to him:
“The woman when she saw him put her arms around him and held him. Oh, she said, I am so glad to see you. She would talk to him sometimes about God. He tried to talk to God but the best thing was to talk to his father and he did talk to him and he didn't forget. The woman said that was all right. She said that the breath of God was his breath yet though it pass from man to man through all of time.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
And McCarthy even expressly reflects upon the light. Throughout the book, the father has a constant rejoinder to the son that they are "carrying the fire." In this landscape where men have become the worst of mankind (cannibals, sodomists, etc.), the boy and his father had rejected that. They were carrying the fire of what was good in man. At the end of the book, the father tells the son, as his dying words, that he is leaving his son behind to "carry the fire." The father then goes on ahead--to prepare a way--"for in my Father's house, there are many rooms. If it were not true, I would have told you so."
“You have to carry the fire."
I don't know how to."
Yes, you do."
Is the fire real? The fire?"
Yes it is."
Where is it? I don't know where it is."
Yes you do. It's inside you. It always was there. I can see it.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
The word of Grace to me was that the father had done his job--he had walked beside his son in this life, and he was "going on ahead." The father was satisfied at having done his job. He wasn't looking for praise or affirmation from his son--he knew that he would hear "well done, good and faithful servant" soon enough. These are certainly the words that my father heard when he passed away. This gives me comfort--that, notwithstanding my abject failure at being a son--my father passed knowing that he had done his job, that he "had carried the fire." The amazing good news is that he passed that along to me. Now, I "love to tell the story, the old old story, of Jesus and His love."
Praise be to Christ.
Sunday, October 12, 2014
Abreaction in South Park (Lorde's "Royals" and Randy)
I regularly watch South Park with my sons. It helps keep me current on the culture and news (I just can't watch Fox or CNN any more--they're both so jaundiced), and more importantly it allows me to laugh with my sons.
In "The Cissy," Matt and Trey once again make fun of political correctness. This time it's in the context of transgender rights. At the end of the episode, thought, the writers are sympathetic to those at whose expense they give us humor. They also make fun of "Autotune"--in this day and age, it seems true that you don't have to have a good voice to make it in the world of pop music. But underneath decrying political correctness and the absurdity of our idolization of pop music stars lies a different word, a different voice--the word and voice of Grace.
I didn't realize the magnitude of the word of Grace that Sharon spoke to Randy until I looked into Lorde's music this morning. Lorde's music directly refutes and exposes the absurdity of our culture's obsession with success (Maybach's and Cristal) and celebrity status (who we treat like "Royals").
As I watched the video "Royals," I was struck with tears of joy and wonder. Why did Matt and Trey choose Randy to be Lorde? Why not one of the kids? Why not one of the other parents? Why Randy? (A writer from Spin Magazine has determined that Randy is Lorde, and is going to expose him. He decides not to, because he is struck by the humanity of Lorde's/Randy's music. In this day and age, does any reporter ever make such a decision?)
It helps to understand Randy's identity. He's a geologist--not a very sexy or high-paying job. He's been married to Sharon for a long time. His son Stan is a good kid, but nerdy, not one of the "popular kids." His daughter, Shelly, is always screaming (and I do mean screaming): "Leave me alone Dad. Stop nagging me all the time...You don't even understand me." Randy is a typical middle-aged, middle class man--a group of people that seem to be given no respect any more, by anyone! Anyone, that is, except Matt and Trey.
Matt and Trey actually laud Lorde's music (despite the Autotune)--Sharon says that those who reject her music have lost touch with "being human." Lorde's music says that it's okay to live mundane lives--one's of little worldly success. In fact, one gets the distinct impression that she's saying that such people are actually the "Royals." So having Randy be Lorde is simply genius--it's a word of respite to the least-liked, and least understood, group in America--middle-aged men. It's certainly that way in God's kingdom. He didn't come for the rich, successful, those venerated by the world. He came for those oppressed by or simply ignored by the world. Jesus came for folks like Randy. Randy is the true "Royal" in God's economy of things--in God's kingdom.
In "The Cissy," Matt and Trey once again make fun of political correctness. This time it's in the context of transgender rights. At the end of the episode, thought, the writers are sympathetic to those at whose expense they give us humor. They also make fun of "Autotune"--in this day and age, it seems true that you don't have to have a good voice to make it in the world of pop music. But underneath decrying political correctness and the absurdity of our idolization of pop music stars lies a different word, a different voice--the word and voice of Grace.
I didn't realize the magnitude of the word of Grace that Sharon spoke to Randy until I looked into Lorde's music this morning. Lorde's music directly refutes and exposes the absurdity of our culture's obsession with success (Maybach's and Cristal) and celebrity status (who we treat like "Royals").
As I watched the video "Royals," I was struck with tears of joy and wonder. Why did Matt and Trey choose Randy to be Lorde? Why not one of the kids? Why not one of the other parents? Why Randy? (A writer from Spin Magazine has determined that Randy is Lorde, and is going to expose him. He decides not to, because he is struck by the humanity of Lorde's/Randy's music. In this day and age, does any reporter ever make such a decision?)
It helps to understand Randy's identity. He's a geologist--not a very sexy or high-paying job. He's been married to Sharon for a long time. His son Stan is a good kid, but nerdy, not one of the "popular kids." His daughter, Shelly, is always screaming (and I do mean screaming): "Leave me alone Dad. Stop nagging me all the time...You don't even understand me." Randy is a typical middle-aged, middle class man--a group of people that seem to be given no respect any more, by anyone! Anyone, that is, except Matt and Trey.
Matt and Trey actually laud Lorde's music (despite the Autotune)--Sharon says that those who reject her music have lost touch with "being human." Lorde's music says that it's okay to live mundane lives--one's of little worldly success. In fact, one gets the distinct impression that she's saying that such people are actually the "Royals." So having Randy be Lorde is simply genius--it's a word of respite to the least-liked, and least understood, group in America--middle-aged men. It's certainly that way in God's kingdom. He didn't come for the rich, successful, those venerated by the world. He came for those oppressed by or simply ignored by the world. Jesus came for folks like Randy. Randy is the true "Royal" in God's economy of things--in God's kingdom.
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