A Christian Worldview from Silicon Valley

WARNING - This post is about golf…sorta…and doing the wrong thing…mostly…and paying for it in the end.

How does a sinner’s mind work? I don’t know about yours, but I reluctantly share here how my mind works.

I was hanging out at the Samsung LPGA World Championships in Half Moon Bay hoping secretly that the preacher was eating his heart out because I can smooze with Lorena Ochoa, the world’s #1 and Annika Sorenstam #2, and…okay, the world’s top 20golfin’ girls.

Feeling pretty good about myself because I can do what others cannot is the first step a sinner takes. Call it pride, I suppose.

Hole number four is a long one - 481 yards par 5. The neat thing, I think, is that to the left there is a long stretch of overgrowth. I usually notice these things because when I play my golf balls are quite apt at finding such places.

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Matthew 25.31-45 is a powerful and challenging section of scripture. A question asked there is, “When did we see you a stanger and invite you in, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick, or in prison, and come to you?”And Jesus’ reply is this: “Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of mine, even the least of them, you did it to me.”

Here’s how you can do exactly that. (more…)

As an adult, I’ve learned to extract a lot more fun out of life than I ever did as a (boring) child. At almost every minute of the day, there is entertainment to be had, no matter whether a person is working, eating, talking, walking, or whatever. Don’t you agree?

One potentially amusing activity people naturally do with folks they like is called “mirroring.” As a way of establishing rapport, we imitate each other or respond in kind to a given statement or action. When I say, “Well, hello, Mr. B!” Bill, if he feels like playing along, will respond, “Well, hi, Mrs. M!” (We don’t imitate each other too exactly because that looks and feels like mockery, an expression of disdain.)

Sometimes people don’t want to engage in this verbal and behavioral play. Maybe they don’t like us, don’t get it, or can’t be bothered. When I visited Paris, France, several years ago, I would get radically different responses from waiters and shop clerks depending on whether I first engaged in light pleasantries (”Ca va?” “Ca va bien.” “Bien.”), or cut to the chase in my efficient American way (”Two baguettes, please.”) In the former scenario, whoever I dealt with would be warm and friendly for the rest of the interaction. In the latter, they would turn cold and taciturn, even brusque and rude.

God engages in this kind of play with us, where the initial kickoff occurred “in the beginning” when he created us “in his image.” He placed us in the best arena ever conceived, and explained the one rule of the game: “don’t eat from that tree.” It wasn’t long, though, before the beautiful symmetry was broken. By chapter 3 of the story, we had eaten from it, felt fear, sewn clothes, and hidden. Most of the rest of Scripture is devoted to showing how God tries over and over again to reestablish that early relationship of naked trust and delight. His all-hands-in appeal is made when he joins us in the physical form of Jesus, a form we recognize and relate to.

It’s a long, slow dance from where he started in making us like him to the incarnation when he made himself like us. But it’s all mirroring and all for the purpose of drawing us to him for life, for play, for fun and joy.

The question is do we have the will, wit, stamina, and spiritual discipline to respond in kind? How can we deliberately mirror God?

I think a lot about thinking. Or at least I think I do, although in thinking about that I know that my perspective may be just a little bit skewed. Part of the reason I think about thinking is that God has blessed me with a good mind, and on the journey of life I have discovered that having a good mind can overcome many other weaknesses — with which I have also been blessed.

I suppose that most any strength can do the same, so I don’t mean to elevate one gift over another, but I do want to share some things about thinking that may surprise you.

Many of us have heard stories of people with cancer, or some other potentially terminal illness, who “thought themselves well.” While such instances are rare, they have been documented. The “thinking healing” that always amazed me, though, was not life threatening at all — it was a cavity. The professional volleyball player who had the cavity was so shocked that she told her dentist he must be wrong. He responded by showing her the X-ray. She came back a week later to have the cavity repaired, but it was already gone. A new X-ray showed no signs of decay.

Athletes, actors, extraordinary business leaders, great wives (great husbands, too), and the very best Christians I know all practice the principles of positive thinking.

Conversely, the very reason many people don’t succeed in Christianity, in marriage, in sports, in business, and in life in general is that they think primarily in negative terms — what could go wrong?, who could be hurt?, how could I fail?, I’ll never be that good.

This is not some psycho-babble or pop-psychology, it is how we are made. The Bible says (Proverbs 23.7, KJV) “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he.” That is true for individuals, and it is also true for a church.

I’m positive.

P.S. The Bible also says, “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind…” (Romans 12.2). Imagine all of us doing that together!

 1. One of the preachers on your team returns home having been beaten.

2. Someone asks if they can borrow a room in your home to have a Bible study.

3. A village nearby doesn’t have any water and there is a breakout of severe diarrhea among the children.

4. You get word that another village has sold 20 of their children to a couple of men who say they can give the kids a better life.

5. You have a committee meeting to decide on the order of worship.

6. A baby gets dropped off at your doorstep.

7. A small group of ‘rookie’ preachers asks you to help them prepare for an upcoming sermon.

8. You have a lunch appointment to encourage a friend who is having trouble deciding what to do with his business.

9. You hear of a village where the children are going blind for lack of Vitamin A.

10. The church needs new carpet.

Which one will you do first? Why? Seriously…give it a try. I’ll tell you my answer if you tell me yours.

I’ve been to some amazing places on this earth, some of them highly populated and some of them extraordinarily devoid of population. Some of those places have been startlingly beautiful, some of them have contained great works of art, and some of them have been sculpted into great works of art. I consider it a blessing to both see and appreciate all of that.

But the greatest joys of life — at least for me — involve people. So I was just a little sad this afternoon as I said goodbye (temporarily, but for a while) to Sterling Stuckey and his amazing wife, Harriette, who, in passing through the Bay Area for a season, came into my life and the life of PACC and made us all better for it.

Sterling is, in some circles, kind of a famous fellow, I suppose. He might say, with a wry smile, “Oh, I don’t know about that.” But he had stopped by the church today to give me a copy of the manuscript for his latest book, African Culture and Melville’s Art, a work that will be published this year by Oxford University Press, and anyone who can get a book like that published by a major house, let alone write it, has got something going for him.

The book’s subtitle is The Creative Process in “Benito Cereno” and “Moby-Dick.” Probably not what one would call “light reading,” but I’m looking very much forward to it.

Why? Not because the title itself interests me, although it does interest me very much, but because of Sterling.

By many of the world’s standards, one might not think that Sterling and I would have much in common. But he showed up one day at PACC, and in fairly short order we learned we had three important things in common: we love creativity and the artists who created; we love to think; and we love God.

As time went on we found out that we disagreed on a few things, too, and that enriched our friendship as much as our agreements. (See “love to think,” above.) But my point is this: my life is richer because Sterling and Harriette passed this way. I hope and expect to see them again, and look forward to it.

In the meantime, my goal is simply this: to enrich the lives of those I meet, even in places where I’m just passing through.

I have a confession to make.

I don’t like to sing. All that smiling, joyfulness, emotions dancing in my heart and escaping from my mouth. Eeww!

I can read music, play an instrument or two, carry a tune, make a loud noise, even wake up the dead if I put my mind to it. But, it’s not my first love nor my last. It’s not even on the list. I just do it. Nike would want me for a commercial.

But then I was asked to take part in the musical - THE SON. I came kicking and screaming, solely because I love the church (not the building), I love the Son, I love my friend, Lewis.

I determined I’d do my best with the part I was given. Being type casted as Satan helped. I have natural inclinations that I could tap into. Grr! (more…)

The worldview from Silicon Valley and the surrounding environs hasn’t always been about technology and money. Sometimes it has been about love, flowers, and very often it has been about music.

A little over three weeks ago, one person who was influenced by and influential in the world of music — and in the world of Jesus — died.

He was Larry Norman, and some at the Palo Alto Church of Christ had a “one degree of separation” relationship with Norman without even knowing it — he was the discoverer, early mentor, and friend of Randy Stonehill, who performed at PACC on December 2, 2007.

Larry Norman was, by all accounts, an amazing and powerful force. According to an obituary in the Guardian, he claimed to have had the idea of Jesus Rock in 1956 when he was just nine years old, “when he was as excited by the sound of Elvis Presley as he was by the words of Jesus Christ.”

But it was about 10 years later when he actually began the revolution that became Christian Rock.Behind and beyond the music, however, was Larry’s genuine love for the Lord and heart for the lost. According to his Gospel Music Hall of Fame biography, he started The Vineyard Church, which met in his living room in Los Angeles on Wednesdays. It is now comprised of more than 600 churches. He also led Susan Perlman to Christ, and with Moishe Rosen she founded Jews for Jesus.

(For a look at Larry at work, with a reference to the aforementioned Randy Stonehill, watch this YouTube video. Randy’s own memories of Larry are posted here.)

The Huffington Post obit included this paragraph:

While Christian Rock is sometimes assailed as formulaic and derivative, Norman was anything but and his admirers included Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, The Pixies, Van Morrison, John Mellencamp and Sammy Davis, Jr. among others.

Among Norman’s amazing list of songs is one that many Christians know, I Wish We’d All Been Ready. Based on what I know of the life, work, and death of this incredible artist, he most definitely was.Here is what he dictated to his friend the day before he died:

I feel like a prize in a box of cracker jacks with God’s hand reaching down to pick me up. I have been under medical care for months. My wounds are getting bigger. I have trouble breathing. I am ready to fly home.

My brother Charles is right, I won’t be here much longer. I can’t do anything about it. My heart is too weak. I want to say goodbye to everyone. In the past you have generously supported me with prayer and finance and we will probably still need financial help.

My plan is to be buried in a simple pine box with some flowers inside. But still it will be costly because of funeral arrangement, transportation to the gravesite, entombment, coordination, legal papers etc. However money is not really what I need, I want to say I love you.I’d like to push back the darkness with my bravest effort. There will be a funeral posted here on the website, in case some of you want to attend. We are not sure of the date when I will die. Goodbye, farewell, we will meet again.

Goodbye, farewell, we’ll meet again
Somewhere beyond the sky.
I pray that you will stay with God
Goodbye, my friends, goodbye.

Larry

See you in heaven, Larry. Thanks for the music.

My sister’s house burned down, and I didn’t know it for a week.

I’d been camping-playing-hiking in Death Valley National Park with my son and his Boy Scout troop. We were having a sweet time out of cell phone range admiring God’s colorful handiwork on Artist’s Drive and Mosaic Canyon, golfing through salt formations, sniffing the Desert Gold flowers, tumbling down sand dunes, sliding over waterfall-polished stone, and checking out the dark night’s lunar eclipse and constellations. Meanwhile, my sister’s home was in ashes.

She lives with her family among people who are lost spiritually, socially, educationally, physically, and economically. Most of her community is illiterate. With no personal access to the religious literature that shapes their lives, they rely instead on the interpreted say-so of the local powerful person. Wife beating is an accepted and expected form of social behavior there, as is polygamy. Impoverished by a corrupt government, the people endure starvation and pain, unable at times to afford food or medication.

Although death is commonplace, these people are not apathetic about it. They work hard for the little they have. They make lots of babies, hoping a few will survive. They dance and sing, scraping up joy wherever they can. They have become friends with my sister, who doles out ibuprofen and vitamins to those who need it the most.

On Sunday, when they saw flames devouring my sister’s home, they rushed to help rescue her possessions. Many of them cried over her losses, and some even wailed and tossed dirt into the air to prove the depth of their sorrow. They returned hand-me-down clothing that my sister had previously passed on to them, and they shared food from their meager supplies.

The Old Testament book of Isaiah predicted what the messiah (God’s chosen one) would do in the “year of the Lord’s favor.” Besides preaching good news to the poor, binding up the brokenhearted, releasing prisoners from darkness, and comforting those who mourn, he would

bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.

It’s fascinating to me that while my sister has longed to help these people who are in desperate need, God has used her own newly humbled state to level the playing field between them. Now she can speak with them from a mutual sense of loss and need. Her need for the fundamental things is as great as any person’s, reflecting the deeper reality of their mutual need for grace.

In the coming weeks, months, years, I’ll be looking to see what beauty God will evoke from the ashes of a burned-up house and from the kindness of a malnourished community.

As we walked from the 10th green to the 11th tee, I asked my friend about his friend Pete. I had just met Pete a couple of hours earlier and liked him right away, but he was in one of the two foursomes behind us so I hadn’t had a chance to get to know him at all. Mostly I wondered if he was what we Christians call “a believer.”

My friend said that Pete was not a Christian, although he might think of himself as a Christian, that he was recently married, and that he was an excellent athlete and very competitive.

“Is there an opportunity to talk to him about his faith?” I wondered.

My friend thought about that and said he thought there probably would be an opportunity for that — or more specifically that Pete would be open to such a conversation — around the time that he and his wife started having children.

My friend, by the way, is a long-time and very mature Christian who has spoken to many people personally and publicly about their need for Jesus. So he wasn’t putting this off because of any sort of fear, but he was putting it off (at least for now) until a more opportune time.

I marveled at my friend’s patience, and told him so.

Most of us have a sense of urgency when it comes to this kind of thing and if someone doesn’t listen to us the first time, we keep after them and keep after them until we “get them in the water” or (too often) drive them away forever.

There is little question that patience (part of the fruit borne in us by God’s Spirit) is a good thing. And I don’t wonder whether or not I have it, I wonder where I should be using it. Perhaps with some patience, I’ll find out.