Coming Into Focus

I got new glasses yesterday and I love them/hate them. It’s only been a year since my prescription was updated, but the difference is profound. I had forgotten what it was like to see things clearly. I’d also forgotten what it was like go around feeling like you’re in a gigantic video game with bad graphics, thus the love/hate relationship. I have progressive lenses and they are wonderful, though the adjustment is tricky. When I first got them a few years back Lynn called me bobble-head because I was constantly moving my head up and down trying to find the correct focal point for various distances. The first prescription update wasn’t bad and I hardly noticed any change. But due to a couple of issues and a couple of birthdays the new prescription was a lot more powerful and these new glasses are rocking my world—literally. But, I can read interstate signs, again, and I can clearly read the down and distance graphics when I watch football on TV.  You don’t realize what you’re not seeing until everything suddenly come into focus.

As we reflect on the 14^th anniversary of the terrorist attack on America I’m thinking about the first Sunday after September 11^th. At that time we were only doing one contemporary service at 8:45 am in the gym, which seated around 275, though we had crammed in 300 folks a few times. There were 418 people in the 8:45 contemporary service that Sunday after 9/11. Folks were standing around the walls with others sitting on the floor. People wept openly as we displayed pictures of the tragedy on the screens and read verses from the Psalms and prayed for the families of those lost and for vision for our country as we sought a response to the violence. Likewise, churches across Knoxville and across the country were filled beyond capacity as folks feeling overwhelmed with helplessness wandered in for comfort and reassurance. It was encouraging and interesting to watch as un-churched, de-churched, and barely-churched folks had a moment where their need for something/Someone beyond themselves came into focus. While we expected higher-than-average attendance, we didn’t expect the scope of the response.

Then, when Sunday came, again, most of those visitors didn’t. Sadly, that was expected. The need for spiritual focus began to subside as the intensity of the anger and sadness prompted by the attacks eased. Moreover, the numbing replay of the attacks on the 24-hour news networks and the reality that there were people who hated Americans enough to commit such atrocities created a hardening of the heart in many folks. Life began to settle into a new normal and the awareness of a need for something transcendent blurred into the mundane patterns of daily living. I wonder about those folks, sometimes. Their need for God had been brought in to focus by a dramatic chain of events. I hope they found what their newly sharpened vision had allowed them to glimpse and they’re in church, somewhere.

While we are limited as to the influence we have with folks who aren’t in our church—beyond inviting them and being a good witness in the community, there is much we can do to help folks in our church avoid the spiritual blurring that daily living can induce. That’s why we are placing a renewed emphasis on discipleship though small group participation for fellowship and spiritual growth, mission, giving, and worship attendance. In much the same way that physical exercise allows us to enjoy more robust health and participate in life more fully, spiritual exercise, if you will, allows us to have a more robust relationship with God and more fully participate in his life in and among us. Plus, with a strong spiritual self we are prepared for whatever life brings. Then, when those difficult days come and our world is rocking on it’s axis, we don’t have to go wandering and wondering if there is a God who cares. We will know the assurance of his presence even before the first wave of trouble comes our way.

Not many of us can stop a terrorist attack. Each one of us can be ready for whatever may attack our sense of peace in a world that grows more difficult understand with each news cycle. Reach for God every day, in a prayer, in a devotion, in a song, or any other activity that helps us be mindful of his abiding presence. Don’t just come to church, BE the church. Grow, serve, give. Then, we’ll be ready to take on whatever comes and, just as important, we’ll be ready to reach out to someone else who may not yet know God but who knows you. Perhaps you can lead them through the transition from blurry to clarity and be there for that moment of amazing grace when God starts coming into focus.

God bless you and God bless America,

Larry

Laser-like Anger

I received a text from Lauren (our older daughter) in Chattanooga yesterday to say that there was an active shooter somewhere but they were all safe. She was locked in her office, Ambrose was in lock down at his preschool, and Brian was working in Dalton, Georgia. I immediately went to my news sources for all the information I could find. As the tragic events unfolded my immediate reaction was one of thanksgiving to know that these people that I love so desperately were okay. Then, upon learning that four Marines had been killed and at least one policeman had been injured I was overwhelmed with sorrow for their families who were receiving news that the people they loved so desperately were not okay.

As my heart oscillated between the warmth of thankfulness and the ache of sorrow I read for the first time the name of the suspected gunman: Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez. Then, I learned he was a Muslim and my heart shifted dramatically from thankfulness and sorrow to full-on rage. My unchecked imagination started an anger-fueled game of connect the dots, any dots, make them up, if necessary, but connect the dots that reveal the image of another one of "those people." As the full weight of what happened in Chattanooga yesterday bore down, the thankfulness for the safety of my kin grew more profound. Similarly, my sorrow for those whose lives were tragically and irrevocably redirected deepened. And…here’s where my typing slows down…my anger toward this person (at this point it was still “these people’) responsible for this nightmare burned with a searing glow.

May I please be honest? I feel like a leaf in a whirlwind of emotion with no sense of where I’ll come out. I’m struggling to reconcile all of these responses with Jesus who is Lord of all of life and, I sense, is patiently waiting for me to land somewhere. I’m confident he is thankful for lives that were spared. No doubt he weeps with the families who are beginning to wrap their heads and hearts around their loss.

But what about the anger? Jesus got angry, right? Sure he did. In Matthew 23 he called the Jewish leaders names and shamed them for corrupting the Law of Moses. In John 2 he got boiling mad at those Jews who were co-opting the temple for their own purposes and ran them off. Yes indeed, he was furious with those Jews. Except…wait…he was a…Jew. The unavoidable reality is that he loved the Jewish people. In Luke 19 he cried over Jerusalem because he wanted the best for them. Yet, he did get angry with certain Jewish individuals who were acting out of their own blurred vision of their faith and harming innocent people in the process. Yes, Jesus had moments of intense anger, but it was always directed toward specific people who were mistreating people simply because they wanted their way, which, of course, was not His way.

At this point I now sense the place where Jesus is pointing for me to land. It’s a place where anger is specified and justified, a place where anger can at least be safely parked and diffused or at best be redeemed through reflection and action. Though I have a tendency to not think or speak badly about the dead, I am now reconciled with my anger at Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez, and that’s important. Because we know who killed those Marines, even if we don’t yet know exactly why, I can direct my anger toward the person responsible and away from people with similar names, religious affiliations, and physical appearances who aren’t. Muslims didn’t kill those Marines. A 24-year-old man, perhaps with a blurred vision of his faith, killed them. I’m angry with him and any others who may have contributed to his radicalization, if that turns out to be the case. And as I sort through thankfulness for the safety of my family and sorrow for the families who grieve, I will work on sorrow for the family of Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez who seem to be as shocked by what happened as everyone else. By directing my anger toward a specific person who bears culpability I direct it away from a group of people who don’t. And while I can’t do anything to undo the tragedy that has taken place, I can do something about tragically hating someone because of my implied guilt due to tangential association.

That’s where I’ve landed and it was a bumpy landing. Frankly, I’m still sort of twitching in the breeze, waiting to see if it’s anywhere near where Jesus was pointing. I hope so. I don’t want him to be angry with me. Again.

Prayers for Chattanooga. Prayers for grieving families. Prayers of thanksgiving that it wasn't worse. Prayers for laser-like anger that can be redemptive in the the hands of our Savior who understands how we feel and not a random spray of anger that wipes out groups of people who are likely just as angry.  

Blessings,

Larry