You couldn’t make this up…

Please forgive the bathroom humor – this is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen, and I orchestrated it with my own two hands. None of this in embellished. I have witnesses if you’d like to corroborate my story.

Long ago I worked in a small bank with 8 other people. The customer service representative, Rhonda, loved to play practical jokes on us all, especially the guys, so we were always on the lookout for revenge. One day it happened – unfolded rather. We couldn’t have foreseen the “shit storm” that would rain down on all of us that day.

The girls all went to lunch. My friend Kevin and I decided to put a snickers bar briefly in the microwave, then, when soft enough, sculpt it into a fuller expression of itself. We then placed it in the girls toilet, which was broken that day – there was only a tiny bit of water in the bottom of the bowl allowing the creatively formed snickers bar to bask gingerly upon the fine white porcelain. I added a little coffee and covered it with half a square of toilet paper.

It sat there for an hour or so. The elements seemed to meld together – the coffee, the melted chocolate, the water – it was perfectly convincing. As the girls pulled into the parking lot we sprayed Lysol brand air freshener throughout the office to spark things off.

“What in the world happened?” the girls sang out in unison as they were greeted with the scent of foul play. Rhonda, who hated it when we let non-customers in off of the street to use the bathroom, scolded us upon hearing that we had broken her cardinal rule. Cassie, now in the bathroom to investigate, screamed in horror.

The girls ran back to take a look. Kevin and I followed. The girls gathered around the potty like first responders to an auto accident. Kevin whispered to me “Grab that knife over there and cut it up.” As I moved toward the toilet, armed, announcing my intentions, the girls, now 100% convinced that this was no chocolate bar, screamed even louder and ran out into the lobby. This was my finest hour. I stabbed the snickers bar with the knife, removed if from the toilet, held it high, and gave chase.

Marissa, 4 months pregnant, took one look at me and began to throw up in her trash can as I paraded around the office holding high my scepter of power. My boss Blake, a somber and somewhat negative fellow, was laughing so hard he could neither see nor make a sound.

Rhonda was now standing outside of the building but poked her head in to see what would happen next. I approached her desk, lifted the impaled snack, and made a threatening gesture, suggesting strongly that I was about to slam the whole thing down onto her work station. She screamed (what I remember to be in slow motion) “Noooooooooo !!!!” The vein on the port side of her neck filled with blood.

As the now soaked and foamy snickers bar splashed hard upon Rhonda’s Office Depot calendar and everything else within a 10 foot radius, all the girls screamed. I guess it doesn’t reflect well upon me that they actually believed I would run around our office with what they thought that thing was on the end of my knife, but it doesn’t matter.

I don’t really remember what happened next. My mind, and my heart, were too full for anything else. It was a good day.

Let’s all be really mad and scared in 2016

When I’m angry I can’t think straight. I’m like most people – I feel cheated, like everything’s out of control. What consumes my mind is the person that wronged me and how I might get even. But life goes on and I have to make everyday decisions, sometimes really big ones. One of the most difficult things to do is to make good decisions when I’m angry. I’m really stupid when I’m mad. We all tend to be.

There are a lot of angry people in the U.S. A big chunk of our population is angry because marriage, by law, has been redefined. Another chunk is mad at the people who are mad about marriage being redefined. Some are upset because we’re not letting refugees into our country, others are angry at the people who think we should. Racism is still a big deal, and it seems that more people are seeking to arm themselves than ever before.

We’re also scared (fear and anger usually operate in tandem). Not only are we threatened by each other, there’s this large group of people that want nothing more than the destruction of our country. They’re not very well organized, at least not as organized as, say, the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, but they’re passionate and some of them live here in the U.S.

Right or wrong, We are a country full of angry, frightened people.

We also have a big decision to make in the coming year regarding our next president. I won’t offer any opinions about Donald Trump or his ability to lead us, but I will say the main reason he has a voice is because he’s playing into the fear and anger that is so thoroughly shagging our country.

I watch alot of WWII documentaries – it fascinates me how a guy like Hitler could come to power. Turns out that the allied nations of WWI required Germany to “pay” for all the damages caused in the war. This left Germany in a horrible economic state – poverty, unemployment, anger, fear. Hitler came in with an amazing knack for politics and used the dark emotions of the day as his primary platform. It worked. The Germans had their hero vindicator and were ready for war. One of the worst terrorists the world has ever seen came to power, and everyone cheered.

When leaders choose to exploit fear and anger, fear and anger become the leaders, and the places they lead us to are never good.

None of our candidates are addressing the fact that we’re pissed, that these emotions are volatile and if left unchecked will destroy so much of what we value as a country. What’s far worse is that so many of our presidential hopefuls are using fear and anger as a huge part of their platform. Even the Evangelical candidates, who are supposed to have peace and love at their life’s core, are exploiting the very things that are tearing us apart. It’s a sickening irony. Some Muslims read the Koran and see peace. Others read it and see war. It’s the same with Evangelicals and their Bibles.

But, in their defense, if you want to get elected, you have to embrace the strongest emotions of the largest constituency. So get ready for a very fine parade of anger, fear, and stupidity in 2016.

The Most Misunderstood Thing About Jesus

Jesus’ first miracle was one that would have made alot of religious folk angry.

He was at a party, a 1st century Jewish wedding to be exact, an event where people party – for many days. The wine had run out and Jesus’ mother pressed him to “do his thing” and fix this most heinous faux pas.

There are a million ways He could have done it, but He chose to make about 180 gallons of wine in 6 large containers used for a sacred Jewish cleansing ritual.

A modern analogue for this would be to walk into a Baptist church, fill the baptistry (a small swimming pool where folks are baptised) with wine and say, “Party on dudes.”

Jesus’ first miracle was to keep a party going. Why is He almost always portrayed as such as buzz kill?

You don’t have to go far to find someone who’ll tell you that Jesus wants nothing more than for you to control yourself, avoid sinning, and get your act together.

I’ve been a pastor for many moons now and can tell you that most American Evangelicals live under this very misguided piece of theology.

When I first got into this whole Jesus thing I had recently witnessed the shooting death of a good friend (long long story, I’ll post it here in the near future). I was torn up with PTSD, etc and didn’t see a way forward. My uber religious, very frisky girlfriend, who had just dumped me, had previously dragged me to church enough for me to think that maybe there was something behind the Jesus door. I had tried everything else, what the hell. I had a very powerful experience and began attending church on a regular basis. It was weird growing up Catholic then finding myself in the midst of this Evangelical wonderland. My early experiences were especially interesting.

A girl took me to church one time, a very large Dallas church. As we passed by the bookstore I asked if Jesus would be by to turn over the tables? She didn’t laugh. After the crackers and the tiny plastic cups of grape-juice were passed out, the offering plate came my way. “What’s this, the bill for lunch?” “Get it? The bill for lunch?” I thought it was hilarious, but obviously had a few things to learn about the culture.

At this new place, and within this new culture, the message was clear – we are all charged with spending our lives trying to get our act together. The Bible studies, the sermons, the small groups, all were focused primarily on rule following.

So, I spent the majority of my adult years believing that God wanted obedience first and foremost. He’s only happy when we’re doing what we’re supposed to. When we’re not, he’s shinin’ up the lightening bolts.

A few years later I was accepted to grad school where I would spend the next 4 years working on my Master’s degree (it was a 120+ hour program – not bragging, just didn’t want anyone thinking I’m a slacker. There’s other evidence for that).

A big chunk of my curriculum was focused on ancient Greek and Hebrew so that I could study the scriptures more in-depth. Our professors encouraged us, over and again, to not let our biases, our emotions, or our culture do the translating/interpreting.

We were to try our best to let the texts speak for themselves.

I was once instructed that, if I didn’t agree with widely held beliefs, that was ok. If I didn’t defend them well however, I’d get an F. Not bad for a conservative Christian Seminary that many would consider to be the mecca of all close-mindedness.

Jesus’ Main Message

A couple of years after I graduated I read a passage in the New Testament that I had read a thousand times. This time it hit me differently. In our Greek manuscripts it reads:

ἐγὼ ἦλθον ἵνα ζωὴν ἔχωσιν καὶ περισσὸν ἔχωσιν
I came so that they might have life, and have (it) overflowing.

Note that He didn’t say

I came so that they would all get their act together
I came so that they would think right things about me
I came so that they might learn to defend themselves from the evils of this world
I came so that they might find some people to harass, belittle, and marginalize
vote a certain way
hate the gays
avoid alcohol

By “life,” He wasn’t referring to the next life. There are plenty of scriptures where Jesus clearly refers to Heaven. This particular statement gives no evidence that he’s referring to anything other than life in the here and now.

This is something that He wants for you and I – today. Right now.

Jesus’ main message is life.

For me, in this moment, I decided to let this passage govern my thinking about God, Jesus, the Bible, and my life till the day I die. Whenever I run into confusion, fear, apathy, or general stupidity, this passage gets me back on track.

What’s even more interesting is the fact that everyone on the planet is desperately looking for life. Some of us are killing ourselves (and sometimes others) because we want LIFE.

What Jesus claimed to be devoted to giving to us, we’re all trying like hell to get. More intimacy, more significance, more fun, more laughter, more pleasure, more more more more more.

The entire world – dead, alive, and yet-to-be-born will always have at the core of it’s life the quest for life.

And here’s this not-so-attractive, unassuming, friend-to-whores-and-sinners, so-called Rabbi, claiming that the purpose for His very existence is the very thing we’re all clamoring for. He’s not going to give us a jet, or a mansion, or a hot wife. It’s not that these things are bad, they’re simply not what we’re looking for – they’re merely symptoms of deeper wants.

It’s a hell of a lot easier to be a rule-follower than it is to trust that Jesus has my best interest at heart, that He actually wants what I want (not the corrupted, selfish version of what I want, the good stuff that hangs out underneath all that).

Sadly, for most religious folk, everything revolves around the rules, which drives so much “death.” Jesus’ main message gets lost. It’s a truly miserable way to view God, yourself, other people, and the world you live in.

I dare you, place at the center of your understanding of God the fact that He wants you to suck the marrow out of your life (His way, not your way by the way) and read one of the Gospels (the book of John is my favorite). It’ll change your life.