Author: Tim

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The Company Your Mind Keeps

Little kids are funny. They’re little sponges that soak up their surroundings and start mimicking the people they’re around.

It makes sense, of course. Kids who are learning to talk…well, talk like the people they’re around or the things they’re watching/listening to. You can learn a lot about how a kid’s parents speak and act just by listening to and watching the kids. Big heavy sighs with hands on hips means at least one of the parents probably has a flair for the dramatic. Others lean pretty heavily on a particular word (“basically,” “apparently,” etc.).

Our youngest daughter, when she was still early in her speaking ability, spoke a little slower and softer than her siblings. It was fun to take the time to listen to her though, because she’d use words kids her age normally didn’t. It was funny to hear this little girl, probably two or three years old, using big words for her age and slowly and deliberately saying things like “akshilly” and “not ness-a-cera-lee” (“actually” and “not necessarily”).

Years later I told this story to a coworker who had young kids. It turns out he and his wife had already taken it a step further. Their family lived out in the countryside where there weren’t many neighbors (and even fewer neighbors with kids that age). The parents were the kids’ main source of observing language in action. He and his wife would deliberately use words/phrases that aren’t normally found in everyday speech, just to see if their kids would start incorporating it into their vernacular. His question was answered when one day his son came inside and excitedly said something like “Daddy! We were down at the creek playing, and I picked up a rock, and lo and behold, there was a salamander underneath it!”

It’s a fun little story, but it’s important to remember that growing older doesn’t mean we graduate from being influenced by the things we surround ourselves with or immerse ourselves in. Whether consciously or not, those influences are changing what we are now, and shaping us into what we’re becoming. Your life moves in the direction of your strongest thoughts. Make sure the things you’re thinking about are worth dedicating your life to, because that’s ultimately what you’re moving toward.

Maybe it’s time to stop and consider: what are the top three things your mind spends time thinking about?

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Control That Narrative. That Way You Control the Story.

Seeing as we live in an age where information is not always what it seems, I think it’s important to spend some time addressing the way we allow our perception of things to be shaped.

Let’s start basic. If you want to keep up with world events, what’s your go-to method of finding information?

If you’re just looking for wavetop-level stuff, you might check out some of the major networks on TV. Think CNN, FoxNews, etc. Most basic major networks also offer evening or morning news shows. Maybe you want to skim through topics a little faster so you can pick and choose the stories that interest you; in that case you might take a look at news websites instead. If you’re more focused on inflammatory, attention-grabbing topics, and don’t really sweat getting the whole story, you might get your news from social media (and subsequently find yourself outraged at something or somebody).

Here’s the thing. These news outlets, whatever form they come in, have operating costs. They have to pay reporters, editors, producers, webmasters, pay for websites, studios, office space, etc. To cover those expenses, they have to make money somehow. Even if they have the purest of motives and want to be a completely objective news organization, pure hearts don’t pay the bills. They need to sell advertising space.

Now the rule in advertising, whether online, on TV, or in print, is that the more eyeballs view a product, the more valuable that advertising space is. News directors and producers, then, aim to present the news in such a way as to increase the number of people looking at, clicking on, or buying print copies of what’s being presented. That’s why you’ll see an interesting headline and click on it, read the story, and say “wait, that headline was completely misleading!”

Practically speaking, this means stories are going to get prioritized according to their potential to attract viewers. Objective reporting of important stories takes a back seat to ratings. Even if a story is important for the public to hear, it’s going to get mothballed if it’s a snoozefest. What kind of stories get top billing? 1. Things that can be portrayed in a way that causes you outrage (because if you’re outraged, you’re more likely to return and keep watching, which causes you more outrage). 2. Things that are juicy gossip dressed up as news. 3. Things that are salacious, obscene, or grossly indecent. (Funny how these usually involve politicians.) 4. Things that are inflammatory and divisive (with CNN and MS Now usually taking one side, while FoxNews takes the other…think border issues, biological males in female sports, climate change, enforcement of the law, and any kind of prejudice you can think of). 5. Any story that allows the media to continually show pictures or video of an attractive woman on the screen (if she’s somehow connected to a murder, a conspiracy, a kidnapping, some wrongdoing, or anything else deemed sufficient to keep showing pictures of her). 6. Bad news or stories that will shock you. Bad news draws people more than good news does. “If it bleeds, it leads.”

(As an aside, you can see why, if you spend a lot of time watching the news, you’ll probably become angry, depressed, or anxious.)

Notice what doesn’t get covered: the normal stuff that you might actually care about. Every now and then you’ll see a story of a complete stranger stepping in to help somebody, or some kind of pet/critter news, and that will warm your heart for about 15 seconds before they move on to something terrible. The news networks are very deliberate in what they show you. In reality the ideal news model is to present the facts of a story, maybe provide a little context, and let the viewer decide its significance. But no, networks will usually only present the portion of the story that supports the larger narrative they’re trying to advance, then give lots of conjecture and opinion from a panel of “experts,” and ultimately try to shape public opinion rather than merely inform the public. That’s not journalism. That’s using your platform as an information weapon.

Don’t believe me? Don’t you think it’s odd that news networks with global reach and correspondents everywhere can’t cover more than 5-8 major stories in an hour without repeating at least half of those topics from earlier in the day? Even on a 24-hour news cycle? No, the topic list is chosen very deliberately. A strange example of this is the mid-decade redistricting that’s been happening this year and last. If you believe what’s being reported, starting in 2025, Donald Trump began a political war by leading efforts to gerrymander or redistrict multiple states to favor Republicans in elections. What you won’t hear about is how the state of New York started it in 2024 to give Democrats an edge.

So what’s the best way to get news? Honestly, you’re probably going to need to consult multiple outlets. There are a lot of them, and they’ll often try to get a leg up on their competition by being the first to break a story. That’s all well and good, but when speed is your goal, something usually gets sacrificed. They may be the first ones to break the story, but it’s not always 100% correct. I wouldn’t treat a given organization as the consistent winner; they kind of take turns in their ability to do a good job getting everything right. Going back to the importance of ratings, though, they don’t need to get everything right; they just need you to tune in. There’s little incentive to go back and update or correct reporting on a story that broke hours or days ago and has been overshadowed by more recent stories. The result? You get an incomplete (or even incorrect) perception of a story, that inaccurate story anchors itself in your mind, and then by the time you get additional information on it that changes how you digest the information, the world has moved on from it and it’s no longer “news.”

So what’s this mean? It means you can’t trust any single outlet to keep you informed. “Give the facts and let the viewer decide” is not a realistic mantra anymore. Right-wing or left-wing, watching only one will brainwash you and rob your ability to think critically. Know what type of media you’re ingesting. Is it center-right? Center-left? Extreme right or left? I’d recommend staying away from the extremes and sticking with the ones that give the most facts and least opinion. Read the news online (not the social media version) rather than watch it on TV or streaming; you’ll save time and anxiety that way.

There’s a lot of information out there. Be aware of who you’re trusting to give it to you and how much stock you’re putting in it. Honestly, the local news is often more important than what you’ll see on the national networks, so be sure to spend some time keeping up with that, too. In the meantime, even if you disagree with your neighbors or other people in your community on issues you see on the news, they’re still your fellow Americans. It’s okay to agree to disagree. Show them kindness, help ‘em out when they need help, and if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all. Just because division is en vogue doesn’t mean you have to go along with it.

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Another Gift From the 1980s: “E.T.”

I got permission from my wife to tell this one. Actually, it was kinda her idea to relay this story.

The movie “E.T.” was a staple for kids in the 1980s. It’s a classic…a peaceful race of alien explorers land on Earth, but have to leave hastily and one of their own is marooned in a forest in California. Looking for assistance, this explorer makes contact with a local kid, who tries to help the alien (later called “E.T.”, short for “Extraterrestrial”) make contact with his own race before the bad-guy human scientists track him down and take him away. I saw this multiple times as a kid. I think I even watched it in one of my elementary school classes.

My wife, on the other hand, did NOT see it as a kid. In fact, even as an adult, when she saw previews for it she thought it was weird, a little off-putting, and she simply had no desire to see it because she thought the alien looked creepy. I didn’t necessarily have a burning desire to watch it as an adult, but when even the possibility of it came up as an option, either for the two of us to watch, or to show our kids, she had kind of a “hard pass” mentality, even when I’d say “aww, c’mon, it’s E.T.!” Nope.

Well, I guess it was years later when the two of us were just kind of surfing through Netflix looking for something to watch. A lot of times when you pause on a selection in Netflix, it will show you either a trailer for the movie or a clip from it. Well, E.T. made its way onto Netflix and I paused on it to see what it would show. It played a clip from the movie where the kid was about to reveal to his older brother that he’d been harboring an interplanetary refugee. To their complete surprise, their little sister unexpectedly burst into the room, came face-to-face with E.T., and started screaming in fear. This reaction freaked out E.T., who also started yelling in fear. The ensuing comedy as the two brothers tried to get things under control before their Mom found out got my wife laughing. The two of us ended up watching the movie right then and there, and soon after, the whole family watched it. It all happened because of one scene that shifted my wife’s perspective.

A lot of people who don’t believe in God picture Christians as intolerant, holier-than-thou hypocrites. In some cases, that stereotype is well-earned, but not nearly as much as they might think. None of us are perfect, and we’re not always the best at loving on people who think differently from us. Think about this, though. For every non-believer who’d rather not step inside a church, that’s someone who can be reached by a Christian simply listening to them and their story, and accepting them for who they are without trying to change everything about them.

It’s not our job to change people. God changes people. God meets people where they are. It’s our job to point those people to Him. One of the best ways to do it is by listening to people’s stories, getting to know them, and eventually having conversations with them (preferably in a place they feel comfortable and safe, which usually means outside of church). Having respectful discussions with them in non-threatening ways is a great method of getting them to shift their perspective enough to put a little more thought into why they believe what they believe. That opens the door for some of the big-picture questions that gets them really thinking about things they may have been avoiding.

And it all begins when your relationship with them allows you to start changing their perspective.

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So Many Sides to the Same Person

When I was in middle school I had this teacher named Mr. Levine (leh-veen). Mr. Levine was a retired Marine. To a seventh grader he was pretty intimidating; he obviously spent a good amount of time in the weight room, and he sounded like he had the type of voice that had been damaged from a lot of yelling while he was in the Corps. He had a big hairdo and a Magnum P.I. mustache. He even made it into a terrible Sylvester Stallone movie in some b-roll footage of an arm-wrestling tournament. He had a copy of the movie (“Over the Top”) in his desk that we were occasionally able to coax him into playing for us. (Who doesn’t love movies where a trucker gets to arm wrestle for custody of his son?) Mr. Levine taught me early American History in 8th grade and Civics in 9th grade.

Since I had him for two years, I got to know him pretty well, to the point where during one class project, I got paired with a dude and we did a skit where I acted as Mr. Levine, impersonating his mannerisms and saying some of the ridiculous things he was known for. The class was in stitches, my partner could barely get through his lines, and Mr. Levine took it pretty well when some lanky kid made fun of him to his face in front of the whole class. That was after I got to know him though. Before I had any interaction with Mr. Levine, I saw a different side of him.

Like a lot of middle schools, ours was filled with young teenagers whose brains were going through explosive growth spurts, and the medulla oblongata figured prominently in a lot of the dudes. As a result, there was a lot of aggression and rage leading to scuffles and even some downright fights with fists and legs flying.

On one occasion between classes, we were moving like cattle through the halls. I came around a corner and there were a couple of dudes wailing on each other in the middle of the hallway. I mean, they were going at it! While I would have loved to stop and watch, the crushing flow of humanity pushed me along, right past the spectacle. As I moved along, though, storming out of his classroom with wild eyes and flaring nostrils, stomped Mr. Levine. I guess somebody told him there was a wild fight in the hallway, and he was just the guy to break it up. As much as I wanted to see the fight, I would’ve loved even more to see what happened when Mr. Levine got his hands on those guys. Heaven help them. They probably didn’t even know what hit them. I can imagine him grabbing one by the scruff of the neck and picking the other one up by his belt and marching them right down to the office to start the paperwork for their suspension.

There were a number of sides to Mr. Levine that I got to know. In a classroom, he was engaging and funny, and he cared about his students. When he was a lunch monitor he moved all throughout the cafeteria making the rounds, he was quick with a joke but he didn’t tolerate any physical nonsense. When a fight broke out and he was nearby and able to lend a hand, you could see the barely-restrained wrath and zero hesitation to jump into the fray.

While I don’t want to make it seem like I think of Mr. Levine as a God-like force, it is kinda fun that he illustrates some of God’s numerous facets. God is described in scripture as being full of wrath, but also as being incredibly patient; he announces generous blessings and also demonstrates mercy to some Bible characters even as they come up with excuse after excuse not to follow the path He’s told them to follow. Jesus showed a divine level of kindness when his close followers insisted on doing dumb things or making outlandish claims. He also commiserated with grieving friends, looked past people’s arrogance and lying, and tolerated abuse from people who knew far less than He did but viewed themselves as superior.

You know, God has a lot of facets.

We often get stuck with one particular image of God the Father, God the Son, or even God the Holy Spirit. It’s important to remember not to put Him in a box, though. He’s got more depth and breadth than we can possibly comprehend. The next time you find yourself confining God’s character to one particular archetype, try to remember to open up that aperture a bit and allow yourself to accept that God doesn’t work according to your view of Him. You could find yourself dealing with any (or all) of the attributes listed above, or any number of others not named above.

Lord, You are indescribable and incomprehensible. Thank you for tolerating us in our weakness, our stubbornness, our short-sightedness, and all our other shortcomings. Thanks for the reminder of Your depth and breadth, and that You far exceed what our imaginations can envision when it comes to knowing You fully. Help us not get wrapped up in trying to understand You, but instead focus on trusting and relying on You. These things we ask in Your name, Amen.

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Has Artificial Intelligence Become the Boogeyman?

The topic of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been in the news a lot lately, forecasting doom and the end of humanity. While AI is undoubtedly something very powerful, this feels to me a lot like things are being conveyed in such a way as to convince me to panic. When that happens, it’s time to ask why.

Before we go any further, let’s just agree that there are already a handful of AI companies who stand at or near the top of the pyramid. Anthropic, OpenAI, Meta, Alphabet, etc. There are others, for sure, but these are some of the biggest names in American AI. Representatives from some of these very large companies have been coming out and saying “we need AI regulation, for sure, before this gets out of control.”

On the surface that sounds very responsible of them, doesn’t it? There’s actually a much more self-serving reason these big companies want regulation. Let’s illustrate it with a story.

Picture a Mom ‘n Pop pizza shop. They make great pizza…a neighborhood favorite. Their success is built on great recipes, great service, and a long track record of positive word-of-mouth referrals. After awhile some of the bigger pizza chains start moving into the neighborhood. The Mom n’ Pop pizzeria holds its own for awhile, but the competition is heating up.

Now this is unreasonable, but let’s assume some local politicians decide to regulate pizzerias. They create laws that say “any time you want to sell a pepperoni pizza, you have to make sure each slice has at least six slices of pepperoni on it.” Hmmm. Well, that’s a little intrusive, but okay. So Mom ‘n Pop’s pizzeria hears about this and decides they already do that most of the time, but just to make sure they don’t get into trouble, they start using smaller-diameter pepperoni slices so it’s easier to make sure each slice of pizza naturally gets enough pepperoni.

The politicians, who take campaign contributions from the bigger pizza chains, say “uh uh uh, not so fast.” Then they pass another regulation saying the pepperoni slices have to be at least a certain diameter. Then on top of that, they make another couple regulations governing the sourcing of the ingredients and the length of time you can retain hand-made dough before either using it or discarding it.

It isn’t long before Mom n’ Pop are paying more attention to the regulations than to delivering the quality products that have made them a neighborhood pillar for as long as most people can remember. Come to find out those big pizza chains are making contributions to the local politicians specifically so they can flatten the little guy. It’s the big pizza chains who can afford an entire compliance department solely focused on being familiar with the regulations and integrating them into their business processes. Those chains help write the local regulations. Those regulations become so onerous and burdensome that Mom n’ Pop eventually decide it’s no longer worth the effort. They close down earlier than they otherwise would have because their profit margins shrink, it’s no longer worth the hassle, and the anxiety wrapped up in all of this compliance now eclipses the joy they formerly got from being a neighborhood mainstay. The local pizzerias go out of business and the chains are all that’s left.

In my mind, that’s what’s happening with the topic of AI regulation. In the hands of a skilled user, AI can vastly increase the amount of work a single user can perform. So what if a skilled user in a small start-up company found a way to make AI better in some respect? There are untold numbers of angles this could come from, and it’s very hard to predict. It could help disrupt a trillion-dollar industry. That small start-up could quickly rise to the level of being able to compete with some of the big companies.

That’s not something the big companies want.

So if you’re one of those companies, currently leading (or near the front of) the pack, it’s in your best interest to get some regulations put into place…fast. You do that by hyping the fear factor. You’ll hear a lot more talk about Skynet and Terminator or War Games movies. When there’s enough momentum for regulations, guess which companies get to have input on how the regs are worded? That’s right, the ones at the front of the pack. They write the regulations in such a way that it’s nearly impossible for young start-ups to compete. Only the biggie companies are left with the resources to operate within the regulations and still drive innovation, even if it means the innovation occurs slower than in an unregulated environment.

So do we let companies (and AI) run wild and free? That’s probably not the answer, either. This is an amazing tool; we’re going to need our own advancements in AI in order to stay competitive on the global stage, so if we do impose regulations, they need to be biased toward avoiding the scenario described above, and maybe instead steer development toward what we want and away from what we want to avoid. (We want it to enhance our decision-making abilities and synthesis of information, not do our thinking for us.) We have to assume other countries out there will have fewer regulations and scruples than us, which will allow them to advance more rapidly than we do. How do we compete in that kind of environment? We need to aim for bounded chaos within which the field can naturally evolve.

And obviously, let’s not connect AI to any nuclear weapons. J It should absolutely be used to ingest and synthesize available information during very fluid and high-stress situations (like if we believe we are under nuclear attack), but AI should be used as a decision aid, with its findings quickly and easily able to be verified. It should NOT be given any sort of weapons autonomy, even if it can calculate consequences and courses of action in a fraction of the time any single human can. We have to assume our adversaries are going to use AI to the fullest potential in shortening the decision cycle, so we’re intentionally not competing if we fail to use any and all methods to rapidly synthesize large amounts of information. Let’s keep its role to augmenting our decision capacity, though, not replacing it.

Artificial Intelligence isn’t a bad thing on its own. It IS a game-changer, and we have to consider how we employ it, but I think the fear-mongering is a little much. In the coming weeks, keep an eye on which politicians are pressing for AI regulation. Those are likely the elected officials either preying on constituents’ fears or receiving campaign contributions from large tech companies.

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That’s What We Call an Unforced Error

Doubles tennis was the only sport I played in high school. After practicing for awhile you get a pretty good feel of the court’s dimensions, both on your side and on the far side. There were times I hit the ball from deep on my side and knew right away it was headed out of bounds and all I could do was hope the guy on the other side went for it. Other times it hit the wrong part of my racket and it was easy to tell it wasn’t even going to make it over the net.

After hitting around a good bit, you start to get a feel for how big your own side of the court is, too. You figure out where to stand when you’re playing baseline, when you’re playing net, and also when you’re on the forehand or backhand side of the court. You don’t want to venture too far toward the middle; straying from the edges left you vulnerable to an opponent blasting a well-placed shot down the side, right past you.

At one of our home matches, we had been playing our opponents long enough to get a feel for their style of play. They weren’t super precise in hitting the ball right on the line, and they didn’t often put a whole lot of zing on their shots. In this particular instance I was playing the baseline while my partner stayed up near the net.

One of the players on the opposite team lobbed a shot up high, over my partner’s head, and it was coming for the baseline. I backed up, growing increasingly confident that even though it would be close, it was going to land out of bounds. As it sailed increasingly deeper, I decided in my mind “yep, it’s going long.”

Of course, you don’t receive the point until it lands out of bounds, so I waited for it to come down from its ballistic trajectory. It picked up speed as it got closer, and I reached out my hand to catch it on the bounce back up. Sadly for me, my judgment proved to be fallible that day. The ball landed in the green (in bounds), but I had already made up my mind to catch the ball rather than play it. In a complete goober move, I watched the ball land in bounds, take a bounce, and then I caught it on the way back up, uttering an audible “awwwww!”

I had decided in my mind I was going to be right. By the time I recognized I was wrong, it was too late for me to do anything different. There are so many lessons like that in the Bible; you can read scripture, interpret it one way, then find out your interpretation wasn’t correct. In Jesus’ day, everybody looking forward to the Messiah’s arrival expected Him to be a conquering hero King who came to set His people free from oppression. Yes, that part is still to come, but the possibility that He’d show up two different times didn’t even occur to people. When some guy born to a poor family, who lived his life as a commoner, claimed to be the Messiah, I understand why so many people gave Him the brush-off. They took their eye off the ball, though. He fulfilled all the prophecies about where the Messiah would be born, how He’d die, and a variety of others. Just because they had made up their mind about what “right” looked like didn’t mean they had a complete understanding of how God had decided to write the script.

Another example of landing on the wrong interpretation: “God won’t give you more than you can handle” sounds very biblical, but Scripture never actually promises that. It comes from a distorted version of 1 Corinthians 10:13, which is about temptation, not suffering in general. I know Christians who have been overwhelmed and in over their heads multiple times. Paul actually describes being burdened “beyond our ability to endure” in 2 Corinthians 1:8-9, and says that experience taught them to rely on God rather than themselves. That’s the true takeaway: if you’re going to grow in the Lord and you’re not willingly relying on Him, He’ll arrange it so you unwillingly rely on him.

One more. Matthew 7:1 says “Do not judge.” If you take it literally, it sounds like you’re never supposed to make judgments about another person’s behavior. You have to take it in context though; a few verses later Jesus talks about removing the plank from your own eye so that you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye (Matt 7:5). The warning is against hypocritical/self-righteous judgment, not discernment itself. On the contrary; we’re to liberally use the brains and discernment God gave us. Compare “Do not judge” with John 7:24: “judge with right judgment.” Absolutely we’re to judge acceptable behavior from unacceptable, but that has no bearing on whether or not someone’s worthy of love and an attempt to reach them with the Gospel.

There are plenty more examples, but we’ll stop here. The point is that you shouldn’t make up your mind so firmly that you’re stuck being inflexible when God teaches you something new. The Bible’s big. We’ll probably need to read certain things a few times before really understanding them. Be open to the idea that God knows better than you do, but is willing to teach if you’re willing to learn.

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When God Says “Not That Way”

Not long ago I spent some time working in our church’s nursery. I’m talking the really little kids…from birth up to when they start walking steadily. Kids at this level spend a lot of time sitting on the floor, grabbing toys and shaking them, asking for snacks, crawling over to grab what somebody else has, etc. For me, it’s a fun age to work with.

It seems like every nursery at church has one of those box-shaped toys where you dump out a bunch of shapes, but then the lid has a bunch of differently shaped holes you try to put the shapes back through. At this age, it’s easy for the kids playing with this toy to get frustrated.

On this particular occasion a little guy was interested in the toy, so I dumped out the contents and showed him, using a shape or two, what was supposed to happen. He got the rough idea, but didn’t yet have the capacity to follow through. It struck me as a metaphor for how God will lead us toward something, but aside from Him we frequently don’t have the patience or the tools to see things through to the end.

With the little guy, I let him give it a try. The circle is the easiest one to make work, so I gave that one to him first. As you might guess, he didn’t use it on the circle hole, he just picked a different opening with a different shape and tried to make it work. When it didn’t go the way he wanted, he started trying to just smash it through. He didn’t even have the fine motor skills to line up the shape with its matching opening, so he resorted to brute force.

I gently guided his hand, still holding the shape, to the right spot. Together we even got the shape partway into the hole; all he needed to do was let go of it and it would fall into the box. I let go of his hand and watched to see what he’d do. To my gentle frustration, he pulled the shape all the way back out. Starting to see the picture, he then tried putting the shape back in the hole, but found himself still unable to do it and started smashing the shape on top of the box again.

It made me appreciate God’s patience with us. Whether it’s “I know you don’t have the tools for this yet but I’m introducing it to you anyway” or “you know, you’re really not getting this, even though you should by now,” He’s got so much patience with us. The patience isn’t limitless, but it’s usually pretty generous as long as we’re giving it an honest effort. On our end we often get frustrated and want to just start smashing things when they’re not working the way we want, but God’s often got a very specific way (and timeline by which) He wants us to get things done.

Try giving it some more patience, and learn to be okay having less control over the method, direction, and timing of everything. He doesn’t expect you to be an expert, or even proficient, at things right away, but if He’s charged you with some specific role, He’ll provide you with the tools and the opportunity to learn how to do the thing He’s asking you to do. Stick with it, don’t get frustrated and start smashing things, and celebrate even the small bits of progress you’re making.

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Rest in the Concept of Biblical Teamwork

There’s a parable in the book of John which indirectly talks about the value of teamwork in evangelism.

Bringing people to Christ is rarely something that’s done in one sitting. It’s impossible to tell ahead of time who will respond positively to the Gospel, so you have to cast a wide net, be persistent, and not get discouraged when you don’t see progress at the rate you’d like to.

I’ve heard evangelism compared to a frozen bough sagging under the weight of a winter snowstorm. Any snowflake by itself is not enough to make the branch break, but many snowflakes collectively add up to more weight than the branch can hold. Each snowflake represents an interaction with a Christian, a conversation about God, or maybe the “pebble in the shoe” that comes from philosophical questions raised in an unbeliever’s life. While some people simply never choose to believe despite large amounts of “snow” accumulating in their lives, the choice remains theirs, while the duty to keep adding flakes to it remains our responsibility.

John 4:35-38 talks about this evangelistic teamwork:

Do you not say, ‘There are still four months and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest! And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this the saying is true: ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labors.”

Teamwork is quite obviously part of the picture here. Maybe you’re sowing, reaping, or doing something in between. Are you actively participating in the sowing/growing/harvesting process? Are you adding individual flakes to various branches? God’s equipped you with talents and gifts for the purpose of bringing Him glory and pointing others to Him. Don’t let those gifts be wasted.

Lord, it’s hard, and it’s scary to be part of this process. It feels like there are so few workers dedicated to “the harvest.” Help me lean in when I feel You pushing me toward specific interactions. Whether I’m laying out the Gospel, having discussions that make unbelievers ponder the concept of intelligent design, or just listening to someone who needs an ear, help me to represent You well and point others to You in a way that honors You. Amen.

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The Cheese is Old and Moldy. Where is the Bathroom?

I was in 8th or 9th grade when I first took Spanish. When you’re first learning a new language, you’re memorizing a lot of vocabulary, learning sentence structure and gender agreement, and learning how to conjugate verbs. In my first year (Spanish I) there wasn’t a whole lot of emphasis on conversational skills. Our teacher that first year taught us the basics…we could all count to 20 or something like that, sing “happy birthday” in Spanish, ask where the bathroom was, and tell you that John/Juan is handsome and has a beard.

There was a lot more than that, of course, but the teacher was easily distracted. He was a nice enough guy, but he was dealing with a bunch of middle/high schoolers who didn’t really care what he was saying and didn’t always take him seriously. A lot of times he’d just end up telling us stories about his gang days (he didn’t seem like the gang type), singing weird off-key songs in Spanish, or generally rambling in ways that weren’t terribly helpful for learning. The homework from the book, though, helped reinforce the subject matter. We learned the rudimentary stuff from him, but got the actual instruction from the book if we took the time and put in the effort.

The next year we took Spanish II, and most of us had a different teacher. She was stone-faced, man. I had her for a few years, and even though she had a sense of humor, she hardly ever smiled. The first day I had class with her, the bell rang, she shut the door, then walked to a spot in the classroom we could all see and hear her. Without any introduction in English, she said “si me entiendes, levanta la mano.”

I was a little stunned at first, partly because of the drastic change in teaching style. Everybody sat there in confused silence, looking at each other. As I worked through it though, I was able to put together what she had said. “If…you understand me…raise your hand.” It took me a minute, and I figured it out. But when I looked around the room, nobody was raising their hands. With a little bit of a gulp, I slowly raised my hand, and I was the only one in the class to do it. She looked at me with what was probably a mix of disappointment at only one hand among so many being raised, with a mental note of “okay, so you’re the one setting the curve right now.”

I don’t know for sure, but I have my suspicions what she thought of the Spanish I teacher.

Not that I was a stellar Spanish student, but I picked up some stuff over those years in high school. I had two different teachers, plus the text books and the workbooks. When it comes to learning a new language, reading, writing, speaking, and hearing are four distinct skills you need to develop. These things all worked together to reinforce the same thing: being proficient in the language.

With regard to the Christian walk, there are different skills, disciplines, and practices that all work together to make you more “proficient” in your walk with Christ. Reading the Bible, hearing the sermons of a skilled Bible teacher, speaking prayers to the Lord, and immersing yourself in a culture where people practice their faith, if done consistently, will drive you toward a rich walk with God. Of course there are teachers who are more skilled than others, or who have styles that are more effective for one type of personality over another. If they’re exercising the gifts God’s given them, it’s all contributing in some way to a deeper understanding for somebody.

So stay in the Word, stay in prayer, stay in church, and make sure you’re using your spiritual gifts to do the Lord’s work. This engagement is how we help each other out in our Christian experience, strengthening not just our own walk, but each others’ in the process.

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Quick Hit: Out of the Mouths of Babes…But It’s Not What You Think

If you’ve got kids, you know mealtime can be funny, frustrating, and a whole other host of emotions.

A few years back we were having breaded shrimp for dinner. My son is well known for being pretty quick to eat whatever’s in front of him, whereas his younger sister can take much longer to clean her plate. My son gobbled up everything in front of him and then more or less hung around while the rest of us caught up to him.

My younger daughter mostly ate the sides before starting on the shrimp. Looking around at other peoples’ plates, she saw little leftover bits of shell. When she asked about it, we showed her how to pinch the tails so she could get the meat without eating the harder shell. As she started getting the hang of it, my son spoke up and said “wait, those shrimp had tails?” It turns out he had eaten everything, shell and all, for each of the shrimp on his plate.

Although my son probably wouldn’t like this tie-in, the book of Proverbs describes wisdom as something to be received through instruction. (Sorry buddy, don’t take offense…) “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice.” -Proverbs 12:15

Sometimes we’re simply unaware that either what we’re doing isn’t the best way to do it, or that we’re missing out on something other people have insight into. Don’t be so impressed with yourself you don’t even take the time to consider that you might be able to listen and learn from others. With a little humility, you can learn from even the people you’d least expect.

The next time someone offers you some insight, don’t be too quick to dismiss it, even if it’s something you already know. People who don’t think like you can often package profound truths in fun ways.