Care for the Weak

Those of us who follow Jesus know that we live by grace. The reality is that all of us, Christian, agnostic, and atheist, are people who do wrong. No matter how hard we try, we regularly miscommunicate, hurt other people, are prejudiced toward certain people, are driven by sexual motives, selfish motives, and greedy motives. Such is the message of Romans 3:23 and 24 (For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins). Most of us do not need the Bible to tell us that we are people who do wrong, and we certainly see bad behaviour in others. So, those of us who follow Jesus are thankful that we can live by faith and that God looks graciously upon us through what Jesus has accomplished on the cross and forgives us for the ways in which we regularly do wrong.

Sometimes we are tempted to take this loving, gracious, forgiveness too freely and we Christians have been known to be some of the most hurtful and unkind people on the planet. We might recognize our wrong and ask for God’s grace in the quietness of our homes or church buildings, but the ramifications of our hurtfulness extend out from us like the aftershock of a major earthquake. Tucked into one of the lesser-known books of the New Testament of the Bible are these words.

Brothers and sisters, we urge you to warn those who are lazy. Encourage those who are timid. Take tender care of those who are weak. Be patient with everyone.

See that no one pays back evil for evil, but always try to do good to each other and to all people.

Always be joyful. Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.

1 Thessalonians 5:14-18

They are a fitting reminder to us that God calls us to continue to be good and winsome people. We are to be industrious, appropriately bold, those who stand up for the weak, patient with others, paying back good for evil done to us, paying forward goodness to all people, joyful, spiritual, and thankful. In these words, there is no call to angry protest when our rights are repressed; but there is a call to stand up for the rights of others who are poor and repressed. None of this is easy! We have just said that we are “people who do wrong.” It is not easy for us to put aside our own feelings of hurt to correct the hurt that has been done to others. In this world where individual rights trump community rights and everyone wants their voice to be heard, living a life that honours the poor, the oppressed, and the weak will change the world. Jesus has asked us if we will join him in doing our best to live this way. He offers us grace when we fail.

Am I Being Offensive?

I have been thinking a lot about how Christians can speak of their faith in a pluralistic culture that views truth-claims as suspect. Some Christians would say that if we are not offending anyone we are merely being “nice Canadians” who want to stay on good terms with everyone. These Christians believe that we are supposed to offend others with our faith and our approach to life. They will quote passages of the Bible that speak of us being hated because we follow Jesus and say, “There, get out and offend others because that is what is supposed to happen!” (See especially Matthew 5:11.)

Let’s take a closer look at this. First, the message of Jesus Christ is offensive. (So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense. 1 Corinthians 1:23) Jesus came into the world proclaiming that he is “the way, the truth, the life.” He said that no one can get to God except through him (John 14:6). Those are bold, offensive statements in the culture of his day and in our culture today. The good news, or gospel, of Jesus Christ is offensive exactly because it challenges us to follow the ways of Jesus (justice, truth, and love) rather than our own ways. It takes ourselves off of the throne of our lives and puts Jesus squarely in control. So yes, the message of Jesus will offend.

Secondly, even though the message will offend, we need not be offensive. It is Jesus and his message that offends, not us. Because we believe an offensive message, we must, all the more, seek to be gracious, loving, humble, and truthful. It is not good for me to say that others are sinners in the eyes of Jesus without also speaking the truth that I too am a sinner who fails daily to live up to putting Jesus on the throne of my life. We need to humbly recognize that living by the truth of God is difficult and that all of us struggle to put aside our own desires and place the values of Jesus foremost in our lives.

Thirdly, as Wendell Berry said in The Jefferson Lecture and Other Essays, “We cannot know the whole truth, which belongs to God alone, but our task nevertheless is to seek to know what is true.” There must be a recognition in our lives that, although we are seeking to know what is true, we do not yet know the whole truth. We must recognize that our understanding of Jesus, and the way he is explained in the Bible, is incomplete. We must choose, like others to whom we speak, to seek an ever more complete understanding of Jesus.

When we come to others with sensitivity, love, and humility, the gospel will indeed still offend, but it will be Jesus who offends and not us. Jesus came into the world full of grace and truth; we must seek to do the same.

Leadership Humility

There are many great definitions of leadership, but one of my favourites is this simple one by the little known Arnold H. Glasow. “A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit.” Leadership must certainly be measured by degrees of humility. The woman or man who does not recognize the contributions of followers or does not recognize that their own success was built upon the foundations of others before them, is no leader. Leadership is experimentation, taking chances, using best guesses, following hunches, and trusting in higher powers. How can one revel in oneself when a particular hunch pays off? Great leaders practise great gratitude.

We have all known those who profess to be leaders while seeking to find a place to lay the blame. They are all too willing to point at their staff or their superiors, “throwing them under the bus.” Leaders will seek to make others successful and will redirect fault: they will either recognize fault with a “buck stops with me” mentality or seek to learn from the problem and move on without pointing at anyone.

Certainly, it is okay to take a share of the credit, but it is a whole team that moves an organization forward. When there is significant recognition, the pseudo-leader is like a “black hole” of credit, allowing nothing to escape absorption, whereas the accolades will quickly reflect off a true leader’s convex surface to shine back on others.

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's

CBC news online featured a video of Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum, New York, presenting a new statue to the public. I am sure it is quite an honour to have a wax figure made in your likeness but it does bring to mind a number of questions. How do they decide who to immortalize? What do they do when they run out of room for current statues? Where do they put the ones they no longer want to display? How long does fame last at Madame Tussaud’s?

Of course, Steve Taylor, had the quintessential song that makes all of the questions irrelevant and causes us to consider concepts of fame, infamy, the fleeting nature of celebrity, and genuine significance. Read through the following lyrics and see if you can even recognize the names of 1984 celebrities. How many of these would still have significance in our current culture?

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud’s

(Words and music by Steve Taylor; 1984)

(Listen while you read)

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
The queen is losing face
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
A national disgrace

It's the middle of the night at the London shrine
Could have been the janitor, could have been divine
Someone said the thermostat never did work
Now we've got the temperature going berserk

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
The queen is losing face
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
A national disgrace

Celebrities, statesmen, history's elite
They're dripping in the hallways, they're starting to secrete
They're pouring out the pores, they're shrinking on the spot
Someone take a photograph--get 'em while they're hot

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
The president looks alarmed
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
A general's been disarmed

Feverish at Fleet Street--story of the year
"Get the Facts--House of Wax Photo Souvenir"
"Shameful" Says the Times, "Maybe Done By Vandals"
Panic on Wall Street--put your stock in candles

I thought I heard a ghost say
"Had my hands in my pockets on the Judgment Day
Nobody told me there's fire in the hole
Had the world by the tail but I lost my soul"

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
A rock and roll hotel
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
They're blending very well

Elvis and the Beatles have seen a better day Better off to burn out than to melt away
Dylan may be fillin' the puddle they designed
Is it gonna take a miracle to make up his mind?

Athletes on the floor; Meltdown, They're running out the door

Bad boy McEnroe couldn't keep his cool
Now he's with the rest of 'em, wading in the pool
"Howard Hughes--Billionaire" says the written guide
Pity that his assets have all been liquefied

"Celebrity status only got in the way
Had my hands in my pockets on the Judgment Day
You can't take it with you--there's fire in the hole
Had the world by the tail but I lost my soul"

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
The queen is losing face
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
A national disgrace

Down in the dungeon--the Chamber of Horrors
Look at all the criminals soften to the cores
They're mixing with the head of state floating down the lane
Good, bad, there they go down the same drain

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
(It really is a pity you know)
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
(A lot of bees gave their all for this)
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's
Meltdown at Madame Tussaud's

Meditation for a New Day

I have not read much of John Calvin, but it is worthwhile to meditate upon these words:

This is the wondrous exchange [mirifica commutatio] made by his boundless goodness. Having become with us the Son of Man, he has made us with himself sons of God. By his own descent to the earth he has prepared our ascent to heaven. Having received our mortality, he has bestowed on us his immortality. Having undertaken our weakness, he has made us strong in his strength. Having submitted to our poverty, he has transferred to us his riches. Having taken upon himself the burden of unrighteousness with which we were oppressed, he has clothed us with his righteousness.- John Calvin in Institutes of the Christian Religion.

 May we all experience this wondrous exchange.

Two Prayers

Two prayers caught my attention today. One is a contemporary prayer from Scot McKnight who prays:

Grant us, O Lord,
To trust in you with all our hearts.
For as you always resist the proud who confide in their own strength, so you never forsake those who make their boast of your mercy.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
Amen.1

The other is an ancient prayer of the early church:

"Κύριε Ἰησοῦ Χριστέ, Υἱὲ τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἐλέησόν με τὸν ἁμαρτωλόν."
"Lord Jesus, Christ, have mercy on me, the sinner."2

These two prayers ground me and keep me from focusing on my happiness, my rights, and my abilities. May they be a similar correction for us all.

1 http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2014/09/07/grant-us-o-lord/

2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_Prayer

The Harvard Grant Study

In the fall of 2008, journalist and author, Joshua Wolf Shenk was given the rare privilege to spend a month reading the results of a 70 year longitudinal study of mental and physical well-being known as the "Grant Study." Prior to this, the files had been kept locked up to all but a few researchers. The subjects of this study were 268 male students at Harvard. They had been sophomores in 1937 when the study began, so in 2009, those that were still alive, were in their late 80s. The chief curator for the study, the psychiatrist George Vaillant, kept the work going through the years by raising funds, creating the surveys to which the men responded, and publishing books on the findings. Shenk's article, "What Makes Us Happy?," was published in The Atlantic  on June 1, 2009 and can be seen in its online version here. Shenk admits that it is difficult to separate the interpretation of results from the persona of George Vaillant whose own psychological and physical development occurred while he watched 268 lives unfold.

By the time the Grant Study men had entered retirement, Vaillant, who had then been following them for a quarter century, had identified seven major factors that predict healthy aging, both physically and psychologically. Employing mature adaptations was one. The others were education, stable marriage, not smoking, not abusing alcohol, some exercise, and healthy weight. Of the 106 Harvard men who had five or six of these factors in their favor at age 50, half ended up at 80 as what Vaillant called “happy-well” and only 7.5 percent as “sad-sick.” Meanwhile, of the men who had three or fewer of the health factors at age 50, none ended up “happy-well” at 80. Even if they had been in adequate physical shape at 50, the men who had three or fewer protective factors were three times as likely to be dead at 80 as those with four or more factors."1

Vaillant and Shenk say that some factors don't matter very much. For example, cholesterol levels at age 50, and social ease at 20-something. The influence of both diminish over time and have little affect by age 70.  “If you follow lives long enough, the risk factors for healthy life adjustment change. There is an age to watch your cholesterol and an age to ignore it.”2 "Regular exercise in college predicted late-life mental health better than it did physical health. . . . pessimists seemed to suffer physically in comparison with optimists, perhaps because they’re less likely to connect with others or care for themselves."3

Vaillant asserts that “Alcoholism is a disorder of great destructive power”4 and abuse of alcohol was the most likely predictor of unhappiness. We didn't need a longitudinal study of Harvard men to tell us this; everyone has one or two friends or relatives pointing toward this truth.

Of course, happiness scientists have come up with all kinds of straightforward, and actionable, findings: that money does little to make us happier once our basic needs are met; that marriage and faith lead to happiness (or it could be that happy people are more likely to be married and spiritual) . . . . "You can say a lot of general things from these data that you could never say before . . . . But many of them are relatively shallow. People who go to church report more joy. But if you ask why, we don’t know."5

Vaillant admitted to Shenk that even with the benefit of the study, he is not a model of adult development. Perhaps the key to a good life is

not rules to follow, nor problems to avoid, but an engaged humility, an earnest acceptance of life’s pains and promises. In his efforts to manifest this spirit, George Vaillant is, if not a model, then certainly a practiced guide. For all his love of science and its conclusions, he returns to stories and their questions.6

Happiness is notoriously hard to quantify, and "a good life" is a subjective term. We should not be surprised that even George Vaillant cannot be the source for a Facebook status or inspirational poster that will forever state the secret of the good life.

More recently, another article entitled, "What Makes Us Happy, Revisited: A new look at the famous Harvard study of what makes people thrive" written by Scott Stossel was published in The Atlantic (April 24, 2013 and available here [you can also see a similar article in the Huffington Post; many people have been linking to this article on Facebook pages]). This latest article, a quick sound-bite suitable for sharing on social media, does not tell the stories of any of the men in the study, and instead offers short quotes from Vaillant and Shenk outside of the broader context of their wrestle with the reams of data. It attempts to sum up the 70 year study in five memorable words: "Happiness is love. Full stop.”7

But, is that a fair summary? Even if we could determine action points from these words, would this explain the majority of scenarios? A few of the stories from the Grant Study would suggest  more complex systems.

Most of the subjects of the Grant Study remain anonymous. A few have willingly identified themselves and it is now known that John F. Kennedy was a Grant Study man.8

Kennedy—the heir to ruthless, ambitious privilege; the philanderer of “Camelot”; the paragon of casual wit and physical vigor who, backstage, suffered from debilitating illness—is no one’s idea of “normal.” And that’s the point. The study began in the spirit of laying lives out on a microscope slide. But it turned out that the lives were too big, too weird, too full of subtleties and contradictions to fit any easy conception of “successful living.” [They] had gone looking for binary conclusions—yeses and nos, dos and don’ts. But the enduring lessons would be paradoxical, not only on the substance of the men’s lives . . . but also with respect to method: if it was to come to life, this cleaver-sharp science project would need the rounding influence of storytelling.9

In our social media age, we often look for binary conclusions; or at least a clever line that we can use as a status update on Facebook. Perhaps we should be looking at the stories of people's lives rather than snippets of data. Perhaps we need a biographical approach. What story does each life tell? What story will each of our lives tell? To whom will our story point? Will it be an example of one who lived a "happy life," or a story of sacrifice and love for others?


1 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
2 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
3 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
4 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
5 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
6 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
7 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/05/thanks-mom/309287/
8 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true
9 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/?single_page=true

Works cited:
Gregoire, Carolyn. "The 75 Year Study That Found The Secrets To A Fulfilling Life." The Huffington Post. August 11, 2013. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/11/how-this-harvard-psycholo_n_3727229.html (accessed July 4, 2014).
Shenk, Joshua Wolf. "What Makes Us Happy?" The Atlantic. June 1, 2009. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/06/what-makes-us-happy/307439/ (accessed July 4, 2014).
Stossell, Scott. "What Makes Us Happy Revisited: A new look at the famous Harvard study of what makes people thrive." The Atlantic. April 24, 2013. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/05/thanks-mom/309287/ (accessed July 4, 2014).

Spiritual Exercise

Spiritual exercise for today. Read 1 Corinthians 9:11, 2 Corinthians 11:21-30, and Philippians 2:5-11 (they are quoted here in the New Living Translation) and then consider these questions. "To what am I entitled?" "In what can I boast?" "What privileges am I willing to give up?"

1 Corinthians 9:11
Since we have planted spiritual seed among you, aren’t we entitled to a harvest of physical food and drink? 

2 Corinthians 11:21-30
But whatever they dare to boast about—I’m talking like a fool again—I dare to boast about it, too. Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they descendants of Abraham? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? I know I sound like a madman, but I have served him far more! I have worked harder, been put in prison more often, been whipped times without number, and faced death again and again. Five different times the Jewish leaders gave me thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. Once I spent a whole night and a day adrift at sea. I have traveled on many long journeys. I have faced danger from rivers and from robbers. I have faced danger from my own people, the Jews, as well as from the Gentiles. I have faced danger in the cities, in the deserts, and on the seas. And I have faced danger from men who claim to be believers but are not. I have worked hard and long, enduring many sleepless nights. I have been hungry and thirsty and have often gone without food. I have shivered in the cold, without enough clothing to keep me warm. Then, besides all this, I have the daily burden of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak without my feeling that weakness? Who is led astray, and I do not burn with anger? If I must boast, I would rather boast about the things that show how weak I am.

Philippians 2:5-11
You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.
Though he was God,
    he did not think of equality with God
    as something to cling to.
Instead, he gave up his divine privileges;
    he took the humble position of a slave
    and was born as a human being.
When he appeared in human form,
    he humbled himself in obedience to God
    and died a criminal’s death on a cross.
Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor
    and gave him the name above all other names,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

"To what am I entitled?" "In what can I boast?" "What privileges am I willing to give up?"

Grace Changes Us

Another quote from Flannery O'Conner is instructive in her understanding of life.

There is a question whether faith can or is supposed to be emotionally satisfying. I must say that the thought of everyone lolling about in an emotionally satisfying faith is repugnant to me. I believe that we are ultimately directed Godward but that this journey is often impeded by emotion.1

O'Conner knew of suffering; she was diagnosed with Lupus when she was 26 years old and died from complications of the disease at 39 years of age. Her novels tell stories of people who are changed by difficult circumstances in life.

However grotesque the setting, she tried to portray her characters as they might be touched by divine grace. This ruled out a sentimental understanding of the stories' violence, as of her own illness. O'Connor wrote: "Grace changes us and change is painful."2

1 Flannery O'Conner in a letter to Betty Hester, September 6, 1955. http://theamericanreader.com/6-september-1955-flannery-oconnor/
2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flannery_O'Connor

The Brothers K

I just finished reading a novel by David James Duncan entitled The Brothers K. If I were to do a review of the book I would, among other things, speak of the evocative language the author uses in many chapters. The opening scene in chapter one is particularly good; also the scene outside the pulp mill one foggy morning is incredibly touching and emotional. I might also speak of the unevenness of the writing because there is a whole section in which the author purposely uses poor grammar and weak logic to portray the emotions of some of the brothers (the technique did not really work for me). Overall, the book is very good and the parallels to Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamozov, are present but subtle enough to leave the reader wanting to explore the themes to a greater extent. At certain points I found I wanted to read Dostoevsky in one hand and Duncan in the other hand to compare the characters.

Having said that I will not give a complete review of the book, what I would like to do is draw our attention to one section in which the author explores concepts of giving, trust, faith, and salvation. The book has many themes worthy of exploring but one of the more significant is the nature of the spirituality of Laura "Mama" and Hugh "Papa" Chance. Laura Chance is an extremely devoted Seventh Day Adventist Christian who is very severe and legalistic in her faith. In most of her life she speaks her mind in no uncertain terms and says that some in her family are destined for heaven and some are destined for a fiery hell, unless they change their ways and become members of the Adventist Church. At one point she sets up a system of merit and rewards in which the faithful church attendees are cared for with meals, laundry, and cleaning while those in the family who do not attend are left to fend for themselves. There is a reason for her hardness; but we do not get to know the reason until the final scenes of the book. Hugh Chance, on the other hand, is not a religious person; unless one counts his devotion to baseball. Laura "knows" that her baseball pitching, beer drinking, chain-smoking husband is destined for hell. She continues to love her husband, although her actions do not show it, and shows greater tenderness toward him in the months leading up to his death. The following excerpt is taken from a time when Hugh has died of cancer and, against Adventist theology and Laura's wishes, but in compliance with Hugh's demands, his body has been cremated.

He'd left it to Mama to select his container, and she'd chosen – of all things – the same blue ceramic jewelry box in which she used to keep her Sabbath tithes and offerings. It gave me a turn to see it, full of powdered Papa on our dinnertable there. But once my intestines swung back around, it began to feel about perfect. Because what is an offering really? What can human beings actually give to God? What can they give to each other even? And what sorts of receptacles can contain these gifts? Work camps and insane asylums, Indian trains and church pews, bullpens and little blue boxes . . . Who belongs in what? When do they belong there? Who truly gives what to whom? These were questions we were all struggling to answer not in words, but with our lives. And all her life Laura Chance had placed ten percent of all she'd earned in this same blue box before offering it – in full faith that it would be accepted – to her Lord. So now, just as faithfully, she'd placed a hundred percent of her husband in the same box. That was her answer to the questions. And I'm hard put to think of another that would do greater honor to her husband, her Lord or her little blue box.1

As a final "offering," Laura Chance "offered up" Hugh Chance in a blue box trusting that God would know what to do with him. We sense a softening of her fierce legalism and perhaps a willingness to admit that she did not have all of the answers and that God still held some mystery for her. There is much we can learn from the Chance family and I encourage discerning readers to consider the lessons inhabiting this work.


1 Duncan, David James. The Brothers K. New York: Random House Inc., 2005 (originally published in 1992), p. 620, 621.

Grace and Works

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:8-10.

In many circles, it seems we read one sentence or the other of this passage. We seem to struggle to hold the two together at the same time. We either hang our spiritual weight upon grace by faith or we emphasize good works. Today, the words leap off of the page at me and it seems clear that we need to hang on every word of God. Yes, it is by grace we have been saved, through faith - and this is not from ourselves, it is the gift of God; and yes, as we are saved, we become a renewed creation, created for doing good works. There are good works to be done because God has prepared good works (in advance) for us to do. He is just waiting for each of us to respond to the free gift so that we can get on with what we have been created to do. As a new creation in Christ, we have things to do. We can now get on with the things that are waiting to be done. It is usually quite easy to see what needs to be done. There are plenty of good works that God has prepared.

We are his hands we are his voice
We are the ones who must make a choice
If it isn't now, tell me when
And if it isn't you, then tell me
Who will save the children. - Randy Stonehill "Who Will Save The Children."

I get so distracted by my bigger schemes
Show me the importance of the simple things
Like a word, a seed, a thorn, a nail, and a cup of cold water.
You know the number of my days
So come paint your pictures on the canvass in my head
Come write your wisdom on my heart
Teach me the power of a moment. - Chris Rice "The Power of a Moment."

What good works can I do today? Not as a means of achieving salvation; but doing the things I was re-created to do.

Imaginative Meditations

Meditations upon
Matthew 26:7-16, Mark 14:3-11, John 12:1-8, and Luke7:36-50.

In these descriptions of four very similar events, we see that John emphasizes the fact that Mary was at the feet of Jesus. On the other hand, Matthew and Mark emphasize the anointing of Jesus' head as with the anointing of a king. Most scholars agree that Luke describes a different event with a different woman. I can imagine a conversation between Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in heaven.

Matthew says to John, "Hey I really like what you did with your account of Mary anointing Jesus."

"Oh yeah, thanks, you know how it is, inspiration of the Holy Spirit."

Mark chimes in with, "Yeah, John, but you really emphasized the bit about Mary always being at the feet of Jesus. I wish I had thought of that. We all saw her anoint his head but you also brought out her humility in stooping down, anointing his feet, and wiping them with her hair."

John replies, "Yeah, I guess that is how I always saw her. She was at Jesus' feet when he was teaching. She fell at his feet when he came to raise Lazarus. And then she poured perfume on his feet and made quite a spectacle of herself with her long hair."

At which point, Luke breaks into the conversation and says, "Yeah, she looked a lot like that other woman who wiped Jesus' feet with her tears. I mentioned her in my gospel record, you know."

Matthew, Mark, and John chuckle at the doctor and Mark says, "Yeah, good connection Luke."

John adds, "All those feelings of unworthiness and sorrow wrapped up in both of those events."

Matthew looks over at the Holy Spirit and says, "Wow, talk about divine inspiration!"

To A Mouse

On many a January 25 I have quoted from Robert Burns' "To A Louse (On Seeing One On A Lady's Bonnet, At Church)." The final stanza, the most well known from the poem, is full of insight into humanity.

O wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An' foolish notion:
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,
An' ev'n devotion!

Yes, if only we could see ourselves as others see us.

But today, on the 252nd anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns, it seems somehow more appropriate to quote from "To A Mouse (On turning her up in her nest with the plough, November 1785)." I won't quote the entire poem. Those who wish to read it in its entirety can readily find it elsewhere with a translation into more common English. But let us pause for a moment and listen to the last two stanzas.

But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy!

Still thou are blest, compared wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But och! I backward cast my e'e,
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!

Certainly, in this poem, Burns has captured many of our human fears. The best laid plans of mice and men often do go astray. Yet, in the midst of this we catch a note of hope. For the same God who cares for mice and sparrows cares for you and me. Raise a toast to Scotland's Bard: Robert Burns.

The Light Yoke

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." - Matthew 11:28-30 (New International Version)

In an article entitled The Light Yoke, Jedd Medefind speaks of how easy it is for us to exchange the light burden offered by Jesus for the heavy burdens of this world. While the article is brilliant and I encourage you to read it in its entirety one part spoke particularly clearly to me.

For me, the yoke of choice has always centred on the desire to be respected. Although perhaps a perfectly fine objective in its proper place, wanting to be admired can so quickly grow into a weight that bites down into my shoulders. It can turn a moment of appropriate celebration into puffed-up pride, or a small setback into insecurity. It can remake God-honouring work into a self-centred and onerous burden.*

I have always said that I would rather be "famous" than "rich" and so I can relate just a little too well to Mr. Medefind's yoke of choice. The article refers to other burdens of choice to which readers will relate. Perhaps today is a day for each of us to again lay down the yoke of this world and put on the yoke of Jesus.

*Medefind, Jedd. "The Light Yoke." Comment: Equipping and Connecting the Next Generation of Christian Leaders, 12 31, 2010.

Humility

I have been all things unholy. If God can work through me, he can work through anyone. - Francis of Assisi

Above all the grace and the gifts that Christ gives to his beloved is that of overcoming self. - Francis of Assisi