Legacy?

In a class I am taking, I was asked to write about passing on or teaching my kids about living a life to leave a legacy. In doing that what values would I want to pass on. Here are my initial thoughts:

This is a starting point for the lessons and values that I hope will be passed on to my kids. The first is a caution about leaving a legacy. Understanding the long term impact of our daily choices is an important focus. However, one has to be cautious that the focus of that impact does not become skewed by trying to please others or the wrong the culture. The focus has to be rightly directed. So the first point might be that it’s not about you. Life is not about me. Life must be focused on God not on my selfishness. This is a constant battle especially in a Western culture that lives and dies by motto’s like “Have it your way” (Burger King). Life cannot always be lived your way. The second point might be that since it’s not about you, “Jesus said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”[1] This verse portrays the correct focus for my life. By focusing on God in all areas He will take care of laying out your legacy. For some that legacy may be a spotlight but for others a martyr or a missionary that finds one lost soul. A third point would be that freedom comes from knowing the truth and obeying that truth (John 8:31). A pastor once said that we know way more than what we are obedient to. Knowing and doing are two different things. One without the other provides head knowledge or blind action and combined they lead to heart change. Fourth would be for them to learn and understand their worldview and to make sure that world view align with the absolute truth of the Bible and is not relativism disguised in the many forms offered by the world – humanism, science, tolerance, etc. Last would be to be transformed by the renewing of your mind. The battle in life is over our thoughts. Keeping our thoughts in line with truth allows us to stay on the right track, keep the right focus, and have the right impact. That impact is the difference between living for the temporal and living for the eternal.
[1]The New King James Version. 1996, c1982 (Mt 22:37). Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

Bad Things Happen to Good People

One of my favorite verses has always been John 16:33 “In this world you will have trouble but take heart I have overcome the world”. Somehow people get the idea that nothing bad should happen to good people. This may be evidence of a faulty world view. The idea starts with the premise that people are ultimately good and that nature is ultimately good. If that premise holds true then good begets good and vice versa. Good choices lead to positive consequences and both people and nature will follow suit. The problem is that this concept does not appear to hold up in reality. One test of our worldviews is how it holds up in reality. However it is astounding how deeply we hold onto our beliefs even when they do not hold up in reality. Reality seems to suggest that bad things happen to good people even if they are deeply spiritual. Maybe if the belief that people and nature are ultimately good is incorrect, then we may not see it as injustice when bad things happen to good people. If the world is not good, then we can expect that bad things will happen. People will have accidents, people will do mean things to others, and natural disasters will occur. This seems to hold much truer to what we experience in reality. The truth is that we live in a sinful world.

The broader culture war, especially in the U.S., is around this concept. Some people in U.S. culture are holding to nature/people as good and think that, if the correct social constructs can be implemented, then a utopia can be created. This, in my opinion, is based on the concept that bad things should not happen to good people if only the correct scenario can be implemented.
As a counselor it is difficult to get people to examine their own belief system. When those beliefs are deeply held, often misunderstood, and supported by the culture around them but not based in reality, the battle to sort out lies from truth becomes all the more complex.

Courage (part 2)

Last Friday we saw the play “Into The Woods” by a local High School. Throughout the movie I could not help but think about courage. About half way through the play my seven year old son looked up and said “everyone in the woods has problems”. Even at age seven it is recognizable that we all have problems that we go through in life. The path changes; or as was said in the play “the path loses us”. We encounter giants. Relationships are difficult. Allowing children to grow up is difficult. We seek to escape into the woods in hopes of changing the reality of our daily life only to find that it creates confusion and our wishes are not what we thought they were. Life takes courage. We think that courage is for the heroes and forget that the fairy tale is really about us. So we resort to using deceit and following our emotions rather than truth. We compare ourselves to our neighbors and culture rather than an unchanging foundation for evaluating our lives. It is a spiritual battle; a battle to live life with courage.

Then Saturday afternoon I watched the movie “Click” and was again confronted with this week’s theme of courage. He lacks the courage to go through life. At one point in the movie he says that no matter what decision he makes, he disappoints someone. So he makes selfish decisions repeatedly. His wife even replies by saying that he should start disappointing the right people. For some reason, when faced with tough choices it seems that people are more comfortable disappointing those closest to them rather than those at work, school, or other less intimate relationships. Failure to be courageous often results in long term loses in our lives. The spiritual battle continues.

Courage

Courage is a difficult thing to muster because in order to do so we must let go of our fear. Fear of being involved. Fear of being rejected. Fear of being wrong. The child of fear, meaning that courage comes when we are able to move beyond or through our fears. This concept is often underestimated as we think about people’s “big” fears but what about the fear of conflict, for those of us who are peacemakers? That fear, if not confronted, creates its own problems as do all situations that require courage when it cannot be found. I see parents who fear upsetting their child or being wrong in parenting and instead of mustering courage they are left with the choice of being passive. They give in to the fear. Unfortunately, this may be especially true for today’s fathers. I believe there is a spiritual battle for men to reject passivity and take on responsibility. It takes courage to be a parent and enforce rules. However, our culture is now seeing the product of second and third generation fatherless (or absentee) parenting. I have the joy of watching as parents begin to face the fear and take the courage necessary to make changes. These are the fears that require incredible courage that as counselors we must remember are just as powerful and critical as diagnosable fears like agoraphobia.

Who's House?

When I enter someone else's house my focus changes from "me" to "them". I become more interested in being with that person or family. I become more interested in enjoying their company. I become more interested in how they want me to act in their house. Even when I'm extrememly comfortable in the other person's house, I respect that it is their house not mine. I think this may be what God is talking about when he asks us to enter His household. He wants us to become part of His family and to dwell in His house. But that means respecting that it is His house and not mine. It means obeying His rules, not making up my own. Oh, how difficult it is to give up my selfishness.

Giver or Taker?

Although my wife and kids state that I am a giver, I think I have a long way to go. We live in a culture that promotes selfishness with slogans like “have it your way” and “obey your thirst”. Our ability to delay gratification is very skewed. I asked a group of youth if they would prefer to have a microwaved steak for lunch or wait and have a slow smoked/cooked steak for dinner. All 24 stated that they would go ahead and have it for lunch. We are teaching today’s youth to be takers and not givers. The average attention span continues to decrease. “Relationships get in trouble when the people in those relationships focus more on what they can take than what they can give” (Dr. Zimmerman). Being a giver allows us to refocus our attention on others and often gives people a renewed perspective. This is similar to the concept of emotional banking. This is the idea that a person invests in the other person in the relationship and builds up a reserve that can then be withdrawn from later (social exchange theory). The nature of the counseling profession is to give and to invest in relationships in a professional manner. Of particular interest is Dr. Zimmerman’s concept of providing lasting care. I hope that when I counsel, clients walk away being empowered to have lasting care.