Thoughts on Holiness

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Today at church, many in the band were on vacation, so we had an acoustic set. (I say “we”, though I am in no ways involved in the music, which is to everyone’s benefit.) One of the songs we sang was “Lord, I Need You” by Matt Maher. I had never heard the song before (which makes me running the lyrics on screen quite the adventure), and one line of the lyrics really caught my attention:

Holiness is Christ in me

As soon as I saw these lyrics, I scrambled for my journal and wrote them down. I’d never really thought of holiness this way: I grew up in a conservative Christian denomination in which holiness was functionally restricted to dress code and standards of appearance. Lip service was paid to the idea of inward holiness manifested in outward piety, but, anecdotally, outward standards WERE holiness. I’ve grown away from that, but I’ve never REALLY understood what holiness was. 

Then, the text was from Mark 10, and we came to the story of the rich young ruler (vv. 17-23). He approaches Jesus and asks what he can do to inherit eternal life. Jesus answers by quoting the Ten Commandments, to which the ruler replies, “Teacher, all of these I’ve kept from my youth."

I can sort of imagine what this scene looked like. In my mind, this young ruler was handsome and a hotshot in Jerusalem. He was well-dressed and well-groomed, and he had a winning smile. He grew up rich, inherited his father’s money, and was probably a pretty good kid, the most popular of the group. When he ran up to Jesus, he wasn’t being entirely forthright; maybe he was curious what Jesus would say, but he probably went to talk to Him because it was just the cool thing to do. I imagine that when he ran to Jesus and knelt down, he did it in front of a big crowd because he wanted everyone to see him and realize just how awesome he really was. So when Jesus told him to keep the commandments, his response was “Done. What’s next?"

Of course, we know that he couldn’t really have done all these things. He couldn’t have perfectly kept the commandments his entire life. Surely at some point he lied, or wasn’t entirely fair in a business dealing, or lusted after a woman, or hated someone in his heart so much that he wanted to kill them. But even if he hadn’t done any of these things, he failed the most important commandment, which we see next. 

After this young man told Jesus he’d kept the commandments his entire life, Jesus told him to sell everything he owned, give it to the poor, and become a disciple of Jesus. This, of course, proved to be too much for our rich young ruler. As the crowd stared, and this young man was faced with such an unrealistic commandment, he maybe stood up, indignant and angry, and stormed off. But I don’t think so. Maybe he was a little more earnest than he appears, and he was a little too proud of his piety, and when Jesus gave him that command - “sell ALL that you have” - our rich young friend realized one commandment that he hadn’t kept - “you shall not have any other gods above me.” There was a god in his life above God, and he chose, in that moment, which god he was serving. 

So what does this story have to do with holiness? Well, to anyone watching from the outside, all of the measures of religion were met. This man was very pious - he was thorough in his worship and traditions, he gave in the offerings and sacrifices, he avoided the unsavory elements and kept his reputation intact. But at the heart of the matter, he was an idolater. He worshipped his possessions more than God. His outward actions had no effect on his inward condition - despite his religiousness, he wasn’t serving God. 

Holiness is Christ in me. Holiness is Christ completing His perfect work in your heart, changing what you love and giving you a heart after His. And that’s what I want - true Holiness: Christ in me. 

I Just Want You To Know, It’s Gonna Be OK. | john pavlovitz →

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It’s alright to admit it to yourself, and to say it to someone else. In fact, doing so isn’t admitting defeat at all. It isn’t giving-up. It’s simply consenting, to fully feeling the reality of the despair and the pain of the moment.

As you do, just remember that you won’t feel like that forever.

John has quickly become one of my favorite bloggers. I won't lie, I got choked up reading this. 

What's Missing in Western Christianity? →

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John Pavlovitz:

We may feign some generic concern others; content to fire off half-hearted prayers or cut-and-pasted Scripture sound bytes. We might invest the briefest moments to attend to another’s needs if we can do so without sacrificing too much time or convenience, but if we’re honest with ourselves, we so often see those who are different or in want or in crisis, not with compassion, but with contempt or perhaps worse; indifference.

I was especially touched by this. Click through to read the entire post. 

Who the (redacted) is Casey Liss?

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I have an internet hero - podcaster, Twitter personality, and programmer, Casey Liss. I first discovered Casey when he joined two much more popular personalities, Marco Arment and John Siracusa, in a couple of new podcasts. I listened because I knew of Marco, but Casey quickly became my favorite of the three. John is a genius and savant, Marco is shrewd and brilliant, but I'm not a coder, so I don't always "get" them. Casey, while equally talented and brilliant, always struck me as more human. He's funny, affable, and has an "aw shucks" type of attitude that just makes him fun to listen to. Casey is the perpetual nice guy, always seems like he's in a good mood, and seems to rise above the trolls and stay positive. I follow him around when he does other podcasts, always listening to his guest spots, because he's just so much fun. 

One thing I love about Casey is that, while he has over 10,000 followers on Twitter, he does a great job of engaging with his audience. When I reply to other "famous" Twitter personalities, I don't count on getting a response (although Gruber has responded to a couple of my emails). But with Casey, as often as not, he tweets back to me. The podcasting world is a little weird, because I feel like I know Casey, but I know that I'm a total stranger to him. But when he answers my tweets, or laughs at a stupid joke, it means a lot to me. And it makes me a bigger fan. 

So why am I posting this weird, vaguely creepy tribute to another man on the internet? Well, a few months ago, Casey posted on his blog that, after many years and a couple of white BMWs worth of money, he and his wife, Erin, were finally pregnant. He's talked about it a couple times on his podcasts, and hearing his excitement was terrific. Today, Casey posted again - Erin had their baby, dubbed "Sprout" through the pregnancy. Congratulations to Casey and Erin, and welcome, Declan James, to the world. Your dad is a pretty cool guy, and he's going to be an amazing father. 

To find Casey online, you can visit him at:

Misemployment - YouTube →

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This was an interesting video. I remembered the anecdote of Steve Jobs talking to then-Pepsi CEO John Sculley, when attempting to convince him to join Apple: "Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?"

I've made this lament before to my wife, who works in health care: She makes a difference in people's lives, and I don't. I enjoy my work, most of the time, and I make a good living at it, but sometimes it feels so inconsequential and insignificant. Misemployment is a difficult problem. 

What’s So Bad About Gluten? →

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From the New Yorker:

Fad dieting is nothing new in America; it’s what we do instead of eating balanced, nutritiously wholesome meals. Scarsdale, Atkins, South Beach, Zone, flexitarian, pescatarian, and paleo have all been awarded their fifteen minutes of fame and then shoved aside for the next great diet. They are rarely effective for long. Some nutrition specialists say that the current preoccupation with gluten-free products reminds them of the national obsession with removing fats from foods in the late nineteen-eighties. “Low-fat” foods are often packed with sugar and calories to make up for the lack of fat. The same is true of many products that are advertised as “gluten-free.” (emphasis added)

The conclusion is interesting - maybe the problem is that we've started adding extra gluten to so many foods as a shortcut. I don't put a lot of faith in anecdotal evidence (I cut gluten and lost 30 pounds and then won the lottery!), but I know people who have gluten sensitivities who don't suffer from celiac disease. I've heard stories of folks who had apparent psychological disorders that were corrected by a gluten-free diet. Perhaps with gluten, as in all things, moderation is key. 

Daring Fireball: Retailers Are Disabling NFC to Block Apple Pay →

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John Gruber:

Think about what they’re doing. They’re turning off NFC payment systems — the whole thing — only because people were actually using them with Apple Pay. Apple Pay works so well that it even works with non-partner systems. These things have been installed for years and so few people used them, apparently, that these retailers would rather block everyone than allow Apple Pay to continue working. I can’t imagine a better validation of Apple Pay’s appeal.

And the reason they don’t want to allow Apple Pay is because Apple Pay doesn’t give them any personal information about the customer. It’s not about security — Apple Pay is far more secure than any credit/debit card system in the U.S. It’s not about money — Apple’s tiny slice of the transaction comes from the banks, not the merchants. It’s about data.

They’re doing this so they can pursue a system that is less secure (third-party apps don’t have access to the secure element where Apple Pay stores your credit card data, for one thing), less convenient (QR codes?), and not private.

Cutting off your nose to spite your face. 

 

 

 

What If We Could Weaponize Empathy? →

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"I expect you to act like a group of friends who care about each other, no matter how dumb some of us might be, no matter what political opinions some of us hold, no matter what games some of us like or dislike."

This is a principle I hope to espouse in all discussions, be it online or IRL. I haven't always done this well, but I want to. 

Google News Publisher Not Happy With New "In The News" Box →

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I think what amuses me is that people think Fox News, CNN, and the New York Times are "reliable."

Have you watched CNN coverage lately? They spend more time talking about pop culture than world news. It's a joke. Better reporting of real events (Ferguson, MO comes to mind) is coming from Twitter than the major news sources. 

Taking the fight for #transparency to court | Twitter Blogs →

From the Twitter blog:

It’s our belief that we are entitled under the First Amendment to respond to our users’ concerns and to the statements of U.S. government officials by providing information about the scope of U.S. government surveillance – including what types of legal process have not been received. We should be free to do this in a meaningful way, rather than in broad, inexact ranges.

Good for Twitter. 

Much Ado about Too Much to Do

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I work four jobs. I'm a substitute teacher, I drive for Lyft (use promo code BRADLEY861 for a free ride up to $25), I do this freelance writing thing from time to time, and I work part time as a supervisor at a new Carhartt retail store in Greenwood. The store manager has experience managing other retail stores, but I don't know if she's ever opened a new store before.

If you've never opened a store like this before, you can't really understand how big of an undertaking it is. When I was in high school, I helped open a new Circuit City store before the chain ultimately folded, and it was a difficult process. Everyone is new. Everyone is learning a new system. Everyone is learning how to use the computer system and the store policies and how things work, and there's no institutional knowledge to help newbies get along, because we're all newbies. It's not that different this time, and so much of the responsibilities fall on the store manager. She is inundated every time she steps into the store to pass judgement on dozens of small issues, executive decisions that don't really matter but are ultimately up to her. On top of that, she has many significant responsibilities to navigate that are above my pay grade. She can't delegate these tasks (and at any rate, I don't work often enough to be point on many of these projects).

When I work with her, I find that she gets caught in a common trap - she spends at least an hour each day telling me how busy she is and how insurmountable her workload is. I'm sympathetic because I know how difficult it is, but at the same time, I've been thinking about ways to get through the work. 

I don't know many people who aren't busy or don't feel overwhelmed by the many things that draw their attention, time, or resources. Me, for instance, I want to get out of debt, but the total balance due is sufficiently large that I find myself paralyzed by the idea. So I spend time bemoaning the situation in my journal, to my wife, and the squirrel who lives in my backyard (he's a great listener). Sometimes I ambitiously buy a Powerball ticket when the jackpot reaches the 200 million mark. I want to lose weight and become more physically fit so that I can do more things with my family, and I consider my little brother (he works out daily and runs triathlons for fun) and my best friend (a pastor planting a new church who has dropped a ton of weight and built enough muscle mass to help Jesus haul the cross up the hill) as examples of what I would like to achieve. However, when I consider the weight I have to lose, the abysmal physical condition I find myself in, and my general distaste for exercise, and then I look at what kind of shape they are in, I consider the goal a foolish dream and have another piece of bacon.  

The problem is, I focus on the enormity of the whole task, and I dismiss it as insurmountable. But folks don't get their way out of debt by winning the lottery or some other windfall. They do it by cutting costs, paying one bill down at a time, and then slowly but surely chipping away at the mountain of debt until they're free from the burden. My brother and my pastor friend didn't get into great shape overnight - they worked out daily, changed their diets (even when they didn't feel like it), and the changes started manifesting in how they felt and looked. 

What's your task? Break it down into two parts. Still too big? Break it down again. And again. Repeat this until the tasks are small enough for you to complete. Once you've accomplished one, move on to the next one. You might find that it gets easier, once you get started, to build on your success. There's momentum that will build behind you, and you can push through the hard/boring/emotionally difficult parts by the investments you've already made. 

What I want to tell my boss (though I probably won't) is that instead of telling me how busy she is and how difficult this whole process is, she needs to start with one thing and do it. Once that task is done, move on to the next one. And eventually, she'll be past it.  

Your daily clichè for this: The journey of a thousand miles starts with one step. So what are you waiting for? Start walking.