love > tolerance

If you think love = tolerance, I feel sorry for your kids. Growing up, my parents and I had fundamental disagreements. I always thought I should be able to clean my room whenever I wanted to, date whoever I wanted to date, buy whatever I wanted to buy, etc. Classic teenage rebellion stuff. As I continued to age, I began to develop my own view points. I had my own views on politics - views my parents did not share. I began to develop my own views on parenting, finances, and all sorts of other things. The crazy thing was that even though my parents disagreed with me on some things, they still loved me. Even though we could have polar opposite perspectives on any given subject, we still landed in love. You see my parents did not tolerate everything I believe/said/did, but they loved me more than any other people ever possibly could. In doing this, they instilled in me this crazy idea: I can disagree with you and love you at the same time. I can tell you that you are wrong and still love you. I thank God everyday that love did not equal tolerance for my parents but instead looked more like love > tolerance. Had they not taught me this, I would be a completely different person or dead in a ditch somewhere. I would argue that to disagree and yet love someone is a DEEPER kind of love than to tolerate everything I say and placate me. A married couple who has many disagreements over an issue and yet still co-exist peaceably and lovingly have a deeper love than the couple who sweep things under the rug and "tolerate" each other by never disagreeing over anything. There is this erroneous lie in our culture that says love = tolerance. It's the idea that says you CANNOT disagree with someone and love them at the same time. Some have called this the "new tolerance". Perry Noble puts it like this: "People are screaming for 'tolerance;' however, tolerance has morphed into the idea that, 'if you believe EXACTLY what I believe then you are RIGHT, and ANYTHING you believe other than EXACTLY what I believe is wrong and hateful.' The irony of that argument is actually the intolerance of the argument itself." If you have your own viewpoint that disagrees with the liberals, it is called "hate speech". If you have your own viewpoint that disagrees with the conservatives, it is called "liberalism" or "heresy". The party that is wronged by the offensive opinion proceeds to label the other party and typify them as evil. This is actually a propaganda tactic - just as the Nazis made the Jews scapegoats for the problems of their society, many of those who claim to be "tolerant" have made "Religion" the scapegoat of our society. What is so ironic is that the people who preach tolerance in many cases are the most intolerant people. For example, Phil Robertson gives his opinion on what he believes to be Truth and he gets suspended by A & E. What is more intolerant?: A man who give his opinion on the issue of homosexuality, then says, "I love all of humanity" OR people who SUSPEND someone for giving their own opinion? Another example: Katy Perry, known for her ideas of tolerance, love, and liberalism banned her parents from coming to the Obama inauguration, saying: “'My parents are Republicans, and I’m not,' she told the magazine. 'They didn’t vote for Obama, but when I was asked to sing at the inauguration, they were like, ‘We can come.’ And I was like, ‘No, you can’t. I love you so much, but that — on principle.’ They understood, but I was like, ‘How dare you?’ in a way.'" Many preachers of tolerance and relativism are just as (and in some cases MORE) intolerant as those who preach an exclusive ideology or religious preference. There is hope though. This idea of "I disagree with you, but I love you" has been and can be done. I recently read this article (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/shane-l-windmeyer/dan-cathy-chick-fil-a_b_2564379.html) where Dan Cathy, the President and COO of Chik-fil-a who publicly opposed marriage equality and stirred up a great deal of controversy, invited LGBT Advocate Shane Windmeyer to be his personal guest at the Chik-fil-a Bowl in January of 2013. The article, written by Windmeyer, expresses his surprise and new-found respect for Dan Cathy. To the Christian: There is no greater than sign when it comes to God’s view of sin (James 2:10). We are inconsistent in our passion against certain sins. I wish we would be as passionate about divorce, adultery, divorce, pornography, social injustice, etc. as we are about homosexuality. God hates all of our sin (Romans 3:23). Thank God for His grace because our struggles are not our identities – Jesus is our identity (Galatians 2:20). May the Church be willing to be full of Grace and Truth – for that is how our Savior positioned Himself in society (John 1). I believe Jesus would have gay friends. And I believe those gay friends would know where Jesus stood on the subject as well. God showed us what love looks like – even though he hated and disagreed with our sin, He was willing to die for us. We can disagree with people and still love them. We do it in our families and stop there for some reason. Jesus invites us to do it with everybody. To the LGBT Advocate: I am so sorry for the way the Church has responded in the past. Please forgive us and allow us to introduce you to a God who loves you and cares about you deeply. However, please know that you are no better than those you deem "intolerant" when you label someone a religious bigot for expressing their opinions. True tolerance is where we both have our disagreements, but land on love for one another. Love > Tolerance

a den of lions

i am bent and broken
like a gentle reed in fields of wild wind,
and the harsh rain washes over,
forcing me to bend and break again

i am bent and broken
as a man trying to become a lover,
and this path has found me,
it beckons me to bend and break yet again.

for the heart is not made in the comfort of houses and shelters,
it is made for the riskiness of the open territories

it does not belong in the safety of our own hands,
but in the vulnerability of another's

it does not grow within a nest of protection
but in a den of lions.

i wanna be a real boy

I remember when I was a little boy, I loved the story of Pinocchio.

The story goes something like this:
Geppetto, a gentle and kind woodcarver, builds a marionette to be his substitute son and a benevolent fairy brings the toy to life. The puppet, named Pinnochio, is still not yet a real human boy but must earn the right to be one by exemplifying truthfulness, bravery, and selflessness.

And every-time the boy puppet lies, his nose grows.

I wonder what it would be like if everytime we messed up or sinned against God or someone, something happened on the outside of us; something happened externally to signify our internal struggle. something we couldn't help . . . like our nose growing. I wonder what it would be like if our bodies bore the repercussions of our mistakes so that everyone knew what we had done (sort of like the "Scarlett Letter").

What if everytime you thought a lustful thought
about somone who has not your spouse,
a giant "A" for adultery would start to appear on your forehead?

It is our human nature to fear exposure.
we fear people finding out about the things
we don't like about ourselves. the thought of
public humiliation terrifies us. we hate being open and vulnerable.

we fear showing people that we are a wooden puppet, longing to be a real person.
there is a desire deep within all of us that resonates with the words of Pinocchio: "I wanna be a real boy".

we even try to "fix" these problems on our own too.

we are so scared to show anyone the ugliness within us that we try to heal ourselves . . . by ourselves.
instead of admitting that we are broken, fake, and longing to be real . . . we resign ourselves to living a double life. We have one hand in the light while the other is in the dark, dealing with some secret sin.

our sins force us into a house of isolation and loneliness that we build with our own hands.
and there we dwell . . living lives of secrecy and always afraid that someone will discover what we really are like.
our relationships stay on the surface . . . we shy away from intimacy out of fear that someone will
see the reality of who we are and be disgusted by what they see.

so we live like wooden toys . . . fake poppets.
I don't know about you, but I wanna be a real boy.

And maybe the first step is just acknowledging that you're just a fake wooden toy.
Then, and only then, can the father begin to make you real.

the wrestling meadow

standing in in empty meadow alone, he didn't quite know why he was there.

at times while he was standing,
his knees trembled with exhaustion,
but he kept on standing.
at times he would stare into the milky white moon
until his vision was filled with its pasty brilliance,
then he would stare some more.

he didn't come here to converse with God or merely talk; this wasn't "circle time".

he was here to fight: there is no goal or purpose in his standing here but to bellow profanities, scream obscenities, and vent repressed emotion in whatever unhealthy way he can think of. He was so tired of composure and patience. His heart felt too big for his body. The ocean of his ever-changing emotions threatened to overwhelm him in a tidal wave of confusion and pain. With every fiber of his dilapidated being, he cursed whatever was out there. Ever since he could remember, he has constantly struggled with the concept of a loving God. It was hard to understand such a thing when the only love he ever got from his father was between verbal and physical abuse where he would encouragingly say: "maybe you can be more like your brother".

His wailing pierces the quiet dull night and even the creatures of the surrounding vacant forest turn their heads to listen for a moment.

where God to hear his haggard cries, surely they would not leave Him unmarked.
they must be like firebrands to His soul.
they must echo in his ears like a shattering glass and raging waterfalls.
or are they more like nails on a chalkboard?

never has he felt so close to truth, yet so utterly distant from it. with every epiphany and/or self-discovery comes yet another lingering doubt. he second guesses everything right down to his very existence.

the wind catches his loose clothing, causing it to billow over his skinny wretched form. the veins on his neck bulge as he sings a song of bitterness and confusion. oh how he has hated God for so long and cursed His existence . . . that is if He even does exist! Considering the state of the world and the pain that fills it, it is almost better for the sake of God's reputation if He didn't exist. Because if He does, he certainly has some explaining to do.

just as he was thinking about how stupid he must look yelling at the dead and noiseless night,
something inside him told him to be silent.

so he closed his mouth (which was still making some sort of noise) and let the silence of the earth overtake him.

his vision is blurry. his face is hot and flushed. tears are still spilling down onto his shirt.
and as he stands there alone, overwhelmed, and trembling in the vacant meadow,
he realizes that there are so many things he definitely does not believe in:

Santa, the Tooth Fairy, and UFO's immediately came to his mind . . . just to name a few.

but never would he come out to a meadow to yell or shout at any of them.
never would he participate in an organized protest against them.
never would he even attempt to try and "wrestle" with them like this.

he realizes, that more than anything else, he is just angry with God.
but that begs the question: how could he be angry with something that does not exist?
how could his heart be so restless over something that shouldn't matter if it doesn't exist?

and the finality of the moment came crashing down against his being.

he came out here to be . . . with Someone;
he came out here to yell . . . at Someone.
he came out here to wrestle . . . with Someone.
he came out here to be loved . . . by Someone.
all this time, he was really just waiting for whoever this Someone was to show up and do something . . . anything.

and as his body began to sway with the trees,
as his heart began to beat in rhythm with the crickets,
he heard himself cry out in unison with all of humanity his need for God.

and as the surrounding quietness began to thicken like slow-forming dough,
he found himself singing a song.
And the song was this:

"oh steady faith come,
let simple trust flow.

oh fast hope come,
like the four winds blow.

oh dear Love come,
come and shake the walls
of my soul."

and there, that very night in a desolate meadow,

he wasn't given a "sign". he wasn't even shown "proof". . .

he was shown Love.

you have been weighed, you have been measured, and you have been chosen.

i watched my best friend get married this last weekend.

it was a beautiful wedding, filled with so much rejoicing and excitement.
Mothers wept as joy intermingled with sadness gripped their hearts.
Fathers smiled sadly as they gave what was most precious to them away to someone else.
Children ran around and did what only children can do best: fill the silence with crying or baby gibberish.

one of my favorite memories from this past weekend was during the actual wedding,
my best friend and his wife to be were asked long before the wedding by
the pastor the question: why? Why did they want to marry each other? Both wrote out their responses and it was
read to those in attendance. The cool thing was that they had not heard each others responses
until the very moment they were read to the congregation.
For some reason, this part really stuck with me.

I cannot forget what my best friend said.
He talked about how he could begin by going through all the cliches and
attempt to express the beautiful complexity that is love. He called go on and
on about how beautiful his bride was . . . how she possessed all the qualities he
so greatly desired in a spouse. But he didn't do that. Instead, when asked
why he was going to marry this particular girl, his answer was this: "Because I choose her."
Apart from the emotional highs and lows of love . . . separate from the "honeymoon phase" of marriage . . .
at the heart of my friend's love for his wife lies a choice. He has chosen this one particular girl. He has
set her apart as his own and called her to be his and his alone. Because the emotions and feelings of love will not
always be there. Love is both the affection of the heart and intellect of the mind.

There will be times when emotions fail and what will stand alone
is the commitment that was made to love; the cognitive choice to love.

In the Greek language,the word used for the deepest most committed kind of
love is agape. One of the definitions for agape reads: "the power of spirit
that results in the choosing of one amongst thousands."
There is something about being chosen. something that changes us inside.
For someone to call you out and say: "You are mine. I want you.
I choose you to be mine. I choose you. its you I want. just you. only you."

humans love to choose and pick.
it communicates value and worth to the individual chosen.
When we were little we were chosen to play kickball.
We get chosen for awards and honors.
We get picked to be on the team.
We are chosen out of a select few to be a part of something.
We are chosen. And when we get chosen, we feel loved.

The higher the emotional and spiritual risk, the more important the choosing.
When there is more at stake . . . choices become the catalyst of human existence.
Our choices change the very course of our lives.
perhaps one of the most (if not the most) important choice one will make
in this life is choice of spouse: Marriage.

I hope that you will get to experience what it is like to be chosen out of many.
To have someone pick you out of the crowd and say, "I want you".
I pray that you will get to know what it is like to feel valued and loved through
the varying degrees of emotions that humans go through.
I hope that you have the wisdom to know when to choose someone and when not
to choose someone. I pray that when you do choose, you really choose.

Because when you are angry with the way they treated you,
when you are tired from work and kids,
when morning breath threatens to overwhelm your nostrils,
when you find yourself looking into a mirror and not liking the reflection,
when you are depressed because you lose sight of meaning,
when you don't want to go to that stupid party or
hang out with those weird people that you don't know that well . . .

you made a choice. A choice to love.
you chose a person. A person to direct and devote all your love toward always.
And when you are in the darkest parts of your life together with your spouse,
when you are in the thickets of confusion and angst,
it is the choice that you made long ago that will guide you back to the light.

some of us are really good at loving in the highs.
and that is great but the human heart needs more than that.
real love is when we love in the middle and lows of life too.

because sometimes the emotions and feelings will be there.
and sometimes they won't.
but the choice . . . the choice will remain.

the jesus list

if jesus is God in human flesh, then one can assume that jesus is what God looks like in human culture.
In other words, jesus illustrates for us what God would do if he walked this earth.

the Bible claims that for 33 years in human history . . . God walked this earth as a man named Jesus of Nazareth.
real time. real places. real events.

Now, I think most are aware of the Christian belief that Jesus was born, crucified, and resurrected. But what else did He do? What about all the years he spent on this earth as a human? To what did he devote his time?
Off the top of my head, I have attempted to compose a list of some of the things that God did on this earth as a human. This is my jesus list so far (feel free to add to it) :


-at an early age, he showed a thirst for truth and for His Creator.

-his parents got frustrated with him.

-he went to a lot of social gatherings.

-he performed miracles: always to meet a need of some sort; specifically, a physical need.

-he yelled at religious leaders. even insulted them and called them out.

-He picked out a group of men to be his closest friends. 3 in particular were closest to him.

-he spent a lot of time with people who had horrible reputations.

-he surrounded himself with destitute, broken, and needy people.

-he was so scared that he sweated blood.

-he promised salvation to a dying criminal.

-he lived in poverty and was homeless; he was more of a traveling wanderer than anything else.

-he depended on community.

-he wept. he glared. he exaggerated to get his point across.

-he did many things that were considered taboo by his culture.

-he loved to break down the socio-ethnic barriers of his culture; he transcended things like race and social status.

-he baffled religious geniuses and connected with the simple minded.

-he held little children and threatened those who hindered them from coming to him.

-he was deserted and misunderstood.

-he was betrayed by his closest friends.

-he constantly allowed himself to be interrupted by unimportant people.

-he took no political stance. on the contrary, he was subversively propagating a kingdom "not of this world".

-he enjoyed having meals with people.

-he would not let people call him "good" or give him praise.

-he was a story-teller.

-he performed radical love demonstrations.

-he prayed often.

-He often would go to be alone with God by himself.

-his accusers could not get any dirt on him and his oppressors could not find fault in him.

-he felt alone and vulnerable; forsaken by God.

and the list goes on and on and on.

jesus: he completely baffles me. and I love it.

he truly is unique.

out of all the people,
who have walked this earth;
out of all the kings, queens,
political leaders, activists,
emperors, peace-makers,
prophets; of all those who claimed
to know the way to Truth . . .

he is the only person that I would ever want to worship.

song of a song III.

she's ablaze in beauty.

and much like the eager child
who presses his tiny hands impatiently
upon glass walls to gaze at the desires of his heart,
I stand in wide-eyed wonder;
I can only stare in awe and admiration.

she's ablaze in beauty.

and quite like the skilled musician
whose notes ring in the air with elegance
and grace that cannot be seen,
my eyes treasure all the invisible loveliness of her heart.
her precious soul is adorned with unseen splendor.

she's ablaze in beauty.

and just as the lion, savage and fierce,
can be calmed by the patience of its tamer
so I am put at peace by her,
and my restless spirit is tamed by her love.

I am no longer searching in discontent and sadness,
for she has captured my wild heart
and filled it with the purest longing.

because she's the one who is ablaze in beauty,

and I am the one captivated by her radiance.