Empathy and Soccer

Have you seen Tim Howard’s 90-foot goal? If you’re a fan of soccer you probably have, but just in case you haven’t you can see it here. Howard is an American goalie playing in England for Everton. What started out as a clearing shot flew the length of the field, took a fortuitous bounce and went into the goal of their opponent, Bolton.

But what’s interesting to me is Howard’s reaction. So many times in professional sports we see over-the-top reactions to the most routine plays (like sacking the quarterback or just making a decent tackle) but Howard approached the goal with something rarely seen in sports: empathy. Look at his reaction on the video and then read this quote from NPR:

Howard, an American, expressed some sympathy for his competitor.

“I really feel for Adam Bogadan but those things happen and you have to move on from it,” said Howard, according to the BBC . “I’m disappointed from a goalkeeper’s standpoint and you never want to see that happen. … It’s ugly, not very nice and can be embarrassing.”

As a goalie Howard knew what it felt like to be embarrassed by an unexpected (or even expected) goal. There was no celebration. He truly “acted like he’d been there before” even though he probably hasn’t. He felt the pain of the Bolton goalie and you can literally see that pain on his face.

Knowing what someone else is feeling is not necessary to sympathy but it is to empathy. That is the value of trials in our life. Once was have properly resolved (and I cannot over-stress the importance of that point) the bad things that happen to us we can use that experience to help others. Then the trial becomes a blessing, both to us and to the person we are helping.

Who knew you could learn a lesson in empathy from soccer? I like the sport even more now!

In Tune

I’ve made a decision to try and use more hymns this year at church. That may sound like backward thinking but it’s more a response to what I feel from the congregation. My job is to minister to them and so the music has to touch them at some level. For the majority of my people that resonance comes from hymns.

So, this Sunday we’ll be singing one of my favorites: Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. The first verse says, “Come Thou Fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing Thy praise…” That phrase, tune my heart, is thought provoking to me. Tuning is an art of absolutes. It begins with a standard: A440. All tones have a rating of Hz as it applies to how they move the air and create sound. A440 (440 Hz) is the standard for beginning the tuning process, with all other pitches being relative to it.

For us to be “in tune” with God we must subscribe to His standard. Everything in our lives, all of our tones must be relative to His absolute. Of course any guitar player will tell you that there are “alternative” tunings for their instrument but in using those alternatives they remove themselves from unity with the absolute. Look around you today and you will find many “alternative lifestyles” which may seem at the surface to be in tune but are in reality far removed from our Creator’s wavelength.

So, are you in tune? And if so, what are you in tune with? Is it your own version or is it a unity with the absolute?

You can’t always get what you want

But if you try some times…

I was at the movies this morning (Sherlock Holmes and the Game of Shadows… pretty good) and a commercial came on for the Arizona Interfaith Movement. I am traditionally pretty specific about what it takes to get to heaven (hey, don’t blame me. Jesus said it) but at the same time my interest was piqued by the AZIFM’s “Golden Rule” presentation. (If you haven’t seen it, have a look here) While it depresses me to see so many well-intentioned yet misguided souls out there I am amazed by just how much better life would be if we could adhere to that simple standard no matter what our faith, or even if we have no faith at all. (The secular version, taken from Aristotle, says, “We should conduct ourselves toward others as we would have them act toward us.”)

I will continue to believe and know that Jesus is the only way to heaven. That belief probably disqualifies me from most if not all interfaith movements. But I applaud the efforts of a group that just simply wants us to treat each other right no matter what we believe. What I want is for everyone to believe in Christ and live under His lordship. But you can’t always get what you want. In the mean time this seems like a good start:

• Christianity: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” — Jesus: The Bible, Luke 6:31.
• Buddhism: “Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.” — Udana-Varga 5:18.
• Confucianism: “Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.” — Analects 15:23.
• Hinduism: “This is the sum of duty: Do naught unto others which would cause you pain if done to you.” — Mahabharata 5:1517.
• Islam: “No one of you is a believer until you desire for another that which you desire for yourself.” – The Sunnah (from the Hadith), published 1975.
• Jainism: “A man should wander about treating all creatures as he himself would be treated.” — Sutrakritanga 1.11.33.
• Jewish: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” — Leviticus 19:18.
• Native American: “Respect for all life is the foundation.” — The Great Law of Peace.
• Sikhism: “Don’t create hatred with anyone, as God is within everyone.” — Guru Arjan Devji, Siri Guru Granth Saghib.
• Sufhism: “You must see in the heart of another the temple of God.” — Hazrat Inayay Khan: The Art of Being.
• Taoism: “I am good to the man who is good to me; likewise, I am also good to the bad man.” Tao Te Ching.

Joseph’s testimony

Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. (Matt. 1:19)

This time of the year we hear the Christmas story and usually the emphasis falls to Mary and her faith and obedience. We do think about Joseph, but usually just in the context of his patience and ultimate obedience because of a dream. But look carefully at what Matthew 1:19 says. It says Joseph – embarrassed, humiliated, and betrayed by an unfaithful fiance’ (at least to his thinking) – was a righteous man. The truth of Mary’s miraculous conception had not been revealed yet. As far as he knew he had been cheated. He had every right to have Mary killed. But because of his righteousness he elected to side with grace.

What is the worst thing that has been done to you this week? This month? This year? I would imagine for 99% of the people reading this it wasn’t nearly as bad as having you betrothed be unfaithful. Yet what is your reaction to the slight against you? Maybe it was as simple as someone cutting you off in traffic, or saying something untrue about you. But our first reaction is usually to lash back in anger or at least plot our revenge. Instead,  Joseph’s testimony says forgive and forget, or at the very least forgive. It’s no wonder God chose Him to be His Son’s earthly father. He already had the right attitude.

The New Living Translation says Joseph was “a good man.” Are you a “good” person? The truth will be told in how you react when mistreated. Will your testimony be like Joseph’s?

Joseph, her fiancé, was a good man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement

True contentment

There are times in my ministry that provide me with true contentment. One of those times is when I visit someone in the hospital, either pre-op, post-op or just because they’re sick.

Another of those times came tonight. Each year Mountain Valley has a Thanksgiving dinner the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. But we don’t spend money for food or decorations or entertainment for our regular attenders. Instead, our regular attenders – along with folks from other churches we’re “friends” with – come together to cook dinner for the neighborhood. It’s quite literally an open invitation. We put the sign out on the street and anyone who wants can come in and eat. I took a moment tonight to look out across the hall and I thought, “I don’t know 1/4 of the people in here… and that’s awesome!”

It’s not even about proselytizing. We don’t hand out information about the church or even speak during the dinner. It’s simply our adaptation of  James 1:27. “Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.” (NLT)

Would you like to find contentment in your life? You might think it’s about what you own or what you can accrue over your lifetime but true contentment is truly found in giving rather than receiving. I know that sounds trite but it is absolutely true, and the only way you’ll know that is to try. This is the perfect time of the year. Give it a whirl and see what happens.

The problem or the reaction?

I was driving back from Cottonwood to Prescott today on I-17. If you don’t know, that’s a 7% grade, uphill, and always provides and interesting situation or two. Today as I was driving along suddenly traffic in the left lane came to a screeching halt. (and I do mean screeching) Everything stopped for about 5 seconds and then it slowly started up again. I watched as the “wave” moved its way behind me creating a world-class traffic snarl. I drove on another 1/2 mile or so and found the issue. My first thought was that I had found the problem but then I thought it through. There was a Stevens Transport dry van in the right lane. He was crawling along doing about 15 miles per hour. He had his four-way blinkers on and was doing his best. As I said, my initial thought was, “There’s the problem” but that’s not true. The real problem was the inability of the cars around him to react to his presence in the lane. So they ran up on him doing 65-75 miles per hour and then suddenly had to slam on their brakes and swerve into the left lane… creating the aforementioned traffic jam.

Everyone has challenges. Everyone has problems. Some of us have more than others. But the difference – what makes us successful or un-successful, is our reaction to the problems. Almost any challenge can be beaten, but it requires a calm, thoughtful reaction. You may think that is impossible faced with your problem but it’s not. The peace of God is the source of that reaction. Without Him you will spend your life slamming on your brakes and swerving out into the other lane. With Him you can see far enough ahead to avoid most challenges and live with the calm assurance that if one “sneaks up” on you God is there to help.

No test or temptation that comes your way is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down; he’ll never let you be pushed past your limit; he’ll always be there to help you come through it. (1 Corinthians 10:13, the Message)

Are we a Christian nation?

There was a letter to the editor in our hometown paper recently which said “beyond any doubt we are a Christian nation.” I read the letter, and then I read the comments (in the online version) and I thought, “well, what do you think?” I’ve seen this argument over and over, and I always see the same errors in logic.

First, how do you define a “Christian nation?” Whether or not our founding fathers wanted the USA to be a Christian nation does not make it a Christian nation. We have definite plans for our lives. We study certain things and network in certain circles in an effort to pursue our plans and goals. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn’t. I was “founded” on the idea of being a full-time Christian recording artist. It hasn’t worked out. So, am I a recording artist because that was my original intent? No, I am a minister and worship leader. That’s where my life went. Is the USA a Christian nation simply because that may (or may not) be what our founding fathers intended? No, it is not. There may be other reasons to call this a Christian nation but original intent is not one of them.

What about the national motto, “In God We Trust?” The United States adopted the motto in 1956 although there had been rumblings about having it printed and minted on our money since 1861. Francis Scott Key alluded to it in the second (and never sung) verse of our national anthem: “And this be our motto: ‘In God is our trust.’” Doesn’t that make us a Christian nation? In a word: no. Does trusting God make us a Christian? In a word: no. Believing that His Son, Jesus Christ, was an acceptable sacrifice and died for our sins makes us a Christian, along with, but not exclusive of the kind of Godly living that would make our motto “In God We Trust.” And as an aside, I don’t believe this motto violates the constitution. The constitution says the government cannot promote on religion over another essentially creating a state or national religion. I truly believe the original intent was to protect us from being told how, when or where to worship. There was never any doubt about whom we were worshiping. Muslims would gladly agree with “In God We Trust.” So would Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons. Does that make them Christian groups? No, it doesn’t, and it doesn’t make us a Christian nation.

What about majority rule? According to the Pew Forum 78.4% of Americans consider themselves to be Christian. Of that percentage 74.2% identify themselves as Catholic or Protestant. That’s not just a majority but a super-majority. So if that overwhelming number are Christians we must be a Christian nation, right? Not so fast. Who makes the decisions? We are the general populace but do we really drive this car? No, not if you consider the national elections. The electoral college determines our president. It is entirely possible – just ask George Bush – to win the presidency and lose the popular vote. This is not a statement about Bush’s presidency but it should not be that way. That aside, our current decision-maker-in-chief is decidedly un-Christian. He was (and still is) quite coy about revealing his beliefs. What does God think about that? “You are like a light on a hill…” Matthew wrote.  Virtually every member of Congress has declared some religious affiliation. It’s difficult to get elected without one. But, a Christianity Today article says only about 21% of those Congress-people are overt in the religious beliefs. The Supreme Court is, to the great majority, Catholic with one sitting Protestant and one sitting Jew. Jesus said, “You will know them be their fruits.” I do not have the time, space or inclination to break down legislation over the past few years but I think no rational person could say it has been Christian in nature or intent. “You can’t legislate morality.” That’s the old saying, but I don’t believe it to be true. You can indeed legislate morality. You cannot legislate moral behavior.

We are a nation of mostly Christians. We are a nation of mostly Christians most of whom are flaccid, weak and impotent in their faith. It is the fault of the church that this nation has been on a downhill slide for years and will continue to move that direction. It is that fault of the church (the universal body of Christ) that we have the immense welfare state. It is the fault of the church that atheism has become vogue. It is the fault of the church that we cannot sing Christmas carols in our schools at Christmas.  But God has not abandoned the United States. God doesn’t abandon anyone. We simply need more vibrant, active, passionate believers in every aspect and office of life. Is that dominion theology? Absolutely not. It is a call to have a meaningful, effective majority in all the areas where a majority truly matters. Then perhaps we can be a Christian nation.

Isn’t it ironic?

Does anyone think it a bit ironic that this person would sing the praises of buying American because it’s “God’s country” but then abbreviate Jesus right out of the equation? I’ll be honest, I’ve abbreviated it before, but at least I’m consistent.

Rooting your Nook Color without voiding the warranty

You probably already know that you can root your Nook Color into a nice Android tablet. But, the major disadvantage of rooting is it voids your warranty. But fear no longer. You can root your Nook Color and have access to the Android Market without touching the native environment and thereby leaving your warranty intact. It’s done by booting directly from your microSD card. There are lots of places that will sell you a card with the OS loaded on it, but why buy something that’s intended to be free? Allow me to share the knowledge.

First, gather what you need:

• a microSD card, at least 8GB (the OS takes about 4GB and you want some space left)
• WinImage – you’ll use this make your card bootable. You can download it here
• The bootable card image. Download it here
• The latest stable build of Cyanogen Mod 7 (CM7) This is the Android OS. Download it here
• The latest Nook Color build of Google Apps/Android Market. Download it here
• The modified u-boot.bin for a boot menu. You can download it here
• A microSD card reader. You cannot do this with your card in the Nook and the Nook connected via USB
• An archiving program to open the archives you just downloaded. 7-Zip is free and you can get it here

Got all that? Ok, here we go.

First create a directory in your PC. Call it whatever you want, but for this article I’m calling it CM7.

• Put all the archives and files (Cyanogen Mod 7, Google Apps, the card image, u-boot.bin) in this directory.
• Unzip the card image archive. Don’t unzip the other archives. I would advise you to unzip it to the CM7 directory, but wherever you unzip it make note of the location.
• Insert your card in the card reader and make note of the drive designation. Keep in mind you’re going to format this card so everything currently on it will be lost forever
• Open WinImage. Select the Disk menu and then “Restore virtual hard disk image on physical drive…”
• You will be asked to select a physical drive. Select the microSD card. (I told you to remember the drive designation for the card.)

• Once you select the drive you will be asked to select the image. Navigate to where you unzipped the card image. You won’t see it initially, but change the file type to all files and there it will be.
• Select the image. WinImage will warn you one more time before it writes the image. Once you’ve written the image to the microSD card it should be called “boot” in Windows explorer. You know have a bootable card, but you’re not done yet.
• Now copy the Google Apps archive, the CM7 archive and u-boot.bin to the root directory on the microSD card. There is already a u-boot.bin on the card so either delete it or rename it to u-boot.sav.
• You’re done with the card. Safely eject it from the card reader.

Power your Nook Color completely off. Put the microSD card in the Nook and then turn it on. You’ll first be presented with the boot menu (”Press any key…”) Don’t press any keys. The Nook will boot to the card. You’ll see Tux the Linux penguin, and the Android OS will begin to install. This will take a few minutes and will stop at “flushing cache.” You may think it’s stuck there. It’s not. Just leave it be for a little while and it will power off.

Once it powers off go ahead and turn it on. Again you’ll see the boot menu, and then you’ll see the loading screen(s) for Android. It will take longer for it to load the first time but once it does you’ll be presented with the beautiful CM7 desktop. You’re practically done. All you have left is to register your Google account with the device. If you don’t have a Google account go ahead and create one. You’ll need it for the Android Market.

It took me a while to figure this stuff out. I hope I’ve made it easier for you. God bless.

A Passing Glance at Holiness

I have some unusual habits and one of them is this: From time to time I wake up with a sour stomach. I will get up and watch some television but if I continue to feel poorly I will take a walk and talk with God. Such a thing happened to me last night. While talking with God I asked Him, “just reveal to me what You’d have me know Lord.” And I continued to walk. As I past houses in the neighborhood I noticed details about the yard or the house itself that I hadn’t seen before. I’ve driven by those houses hundreds of times but I never saw because I was just passing by on my way somewhere. I said to God, “what should I make of this?” and here is what He told me:

He said, “this is how you treat personal holiness David. It is your desired destination, but along the way you have missed so many details. Some are small and some are large but they are the difference between a casual relationship with me and true holiness.”

I begin to make a mental list of what those missed details could be. Sadly it didn’t take long to come up with quite a few. They are the little things I do, or don’t do, while I am concentrating so greatly on the big things. I’ve been told not to “major on the minors” more than once but now I question the validity of that advice. By ignoring those tiny details I have cultivated a faith that is efficient, but not passionate. It is a faith that will carry me to heaven, but just barely. It is the least I can do, and it is why I find myself wondering frequently why I haven’t accomplished more in my life. Not that I am seeking worldly success. I don’t even have the motivation for that. Instead I find that more and more I am hard pressed to find any place in this world where I am making a difference.

All this simply because I haven’t been paying attention. I have given holiness a passing glance as I drive on my way to a “good life.” I have a moral center; it just seems right now to be the middle of nowhere. So, I must slow down. I must see the details. I must identify the little things I do (and don’t do) that stand between me and what God really wants me to be. Otherwise I’m sure I’ll find myself at the end of my days just barely skulking into eternity when I could have done so much more.