A mid-hoc surmise I surmise will be of some encouragement to current and future fellow parents of teenagers: Our relationships with our teenage children, especially those of the same sex as us, are likely to go through an extended span of thinness. That is, it’ll seem there is no relationship, that we’re just a chauffeur and a cook and a money tree. But don’t panic. Don’t press to hard. You know what to do. Just keep doing that and be patient. The kids’ll come around.
I dream of a world in which smartphones and laptops display the title of whatever you’re looking at on their backsides. This would have two societally salubrious effects:
- Serendipity might strike as we discover you’re reading a book I’ve also read or listening to an album I think is cool. Or at least you’re letting your stranger-neighbors know a little bit about you; a little uncertainty reduction goes a long way toward reducing stress.
- You’re less likely to take in junk.
Switching costs and triskaidekaphobia be damned: We ought to ditch the Gregorian calendar and replace it with a this (Scotian?) alternative:
- thirteen months of the exact same 28-day length,
- New Year’s Day as its own intercalary one-day week, and
- every leap year, a two-day New Year’s Week.
Accountants would be happy about this. Computer code would be simpler. And no one would have to remember “Thirty Days Hath September” any more.
Note to self: When you find yourself reflecting unhappily about your job being helping make truck bed covers when you wish automobiles had never been invented, remember that these words of Paul were addressed to slaves: “Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord” (Colossians 3:23). Whatever you do. And besides, DiamondBack is easily the best manufacturing company (and one of the best companies period) to work for in central Pennsylvania. Everything about working there pretty much couldn’t better.
He is a sure fool who gives up what he promised to keep to gain that which he will probably lose.
An elaborated 1 John 2:15-16 with some eye toward Ecclesiastes 11:9: Have desires of the flesh, but do not love those desires. Have desires of the eyes, but do not love those desires. Possess things, but do not love the pride of possession or estate.
Have desires of the flesh. Have desires of the eyes. Possess things. But do so lightly. Instead of loving them, love YHWH your god, and love your neighbor as yourself. 🧘♂️
Note to self: Discretize everything. It will maximize concentration, keep you from hurrying, and keep you from losing sight of God. 🧘♂️
The ideal birthday communication is neither the tired greeting card not the awkward phone call. The first is unremarkable; the second requires too much of the recipient. Instead, it’s a heartfelt voice message sent via text. 🎉
Saying “thank you for your patience” before the speaker knows his listener will give it is presumptuous. Better to say “I’m sorry.”
Do what you’re doing. Don’t worry about the rest.
a post-hoc contribution via WhatsApp to a house church discussion I missed:
Since the prompt last Saturday (“How do we do our part in cultivating the fruit God seeks?”) was mine but I wasn’t around to help discover answers, would you permit me nine sentences in reply?
Having been thoroughly convinced of God’s lovingkindness—well, as convinced as one can be about the thoughts of a typically invisible, inaudible spirit—I find myself frequently emphasizing the value of direct effort toward the exercise of emotional and relational virtues. In other words, I tend to see God’s good fruit as habits to practice rather than virtues to receive. Just as nothing succeeds at mastering a musical instrument more than practicing the musical instrument—not reading books about music, not talking to composers—nothing will succeed at developing love, joy, peace, patience, and the rest of them more than trying to think, speak, and act in love, joy, peace, patience, and the rest at every possible juncture.
Direct effort is better and more powerful than any other spiritual discipline toward the goal of bearing good fruit. And I mean this very situational, down-to-earth, “if this, then that,” habit-building sort of way.
At the same time, I know I’ll fail at this. The trick here is to keep trying—“a righteous person falls seven times and rises again” (Proverbs 24:16)—and not grow discouraged. Even just trying to think and act better is good, and as Bruce highlighted a couple of weeks ago, “Don’t become discouraged in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not become weary“ (Galatians 6:9).
When I am tempted to beat myself up for such failure, I call upon this quotation from Brother Lawrence (without going so far as to completely absolve myself of responsibility):
“When an occasion arose which required some virtue, he said to God, ‘Lord, I cannot do this unless You allow me.’ […] When he had failed in his duty, he simply confessed his fault, saying to God, ‘I could not possibly do otherwise, if You leave me to myself. It is You who must correct my failing, and mend what is amiss.‘ And after this, he gave himself no further uneasiness about his mistake.”
Energetic trying.
Hope the above is good for someone.
Remember: Jon Levenson says that the controlling metaphor in the Hebrew Bible for the relationship between Israel and YHWH is that of a suzerain and vassal or a king and subject and that love from the Israel side is therefore primarily expressed as glad, grateful obedience. When we say we’re going to love the Lord our God with our all hearts, minds, souls, and strengths, what we’re saying is we’re going to gladly obey Him with all of ourselves.
Just be grateful.
Do not talk about your hard feelings after 9 PM. Maybe not even after 8 PM.
For the joy!
By which I mean to answer questions such as: Why do anything? Why work? Why make music? 🧘🏻♂️
What do you want? 🧘🏻♂️
Step one in any anti-racist agenda: Refuse to speak in terms of race. Skin color? Pigment? Melanin? Yes. But “‘[r]ace’ itself is just a restatement and retrenchment of the problem” (Ta-Nehisi Coates).
Living unanxiously mindful of your own certain death is probably salutary. Living unanxiously mindful of the certain death of those you love might be even more so.
Become love plankton.
Distractions [in prayer] are nearly always your real wants breaking in on your prayer for edifying but bogus wants. If you are distracted, trace your distraction back to the real desires it comes from and pray about these. When you are praying for what you really want you will not be distracted.
— Herbert McCabe, as quoted by Philip Yancey
At the level of the individual, there is wisdom in my friend’s aversion to marriage, which she stated the other day as “I don’t know why people would want to get married.” I prefer to reword it as: “Don’t make a commitment you don’t think you can keep.” But at the level of society, there needs to be a complementary wisdom: Cultivate people who are capable of making lifelong commitments.
Telling someone they “have been” something is more empowering a way of truth-telling than telling them they “are” something. It leaves the future open for change.
My new motto is: “Live every day like it’s your last.” And no, that does not mean find a hospital, go there, find a room and lay down, eyes twitching…
— Sullivan
Let not your to-do list take the place of the Holy Spirit.
While walking with God through a nearby neighborhood in the wake of a few spats this morning with wife about housekeeping, it finally clicked: The housekeeping and homemaking is her work. It may even be helpful to compare the house to my computer and desktop workspace. Before I do any of the following again, it would be best to consider how it would make me feel if anyone came to my computer or desktop workspace and did the same:
- Leave items in places they shouldn’t be
- Move items that are not mine
- Change settings without asking
- Argue forcefully about the proper place or protocol for something
- Complainingly refuse to help when asked