Gilligan was right

   I, like many people from my generation, loved to watch the re-runs of Gilligan's Island.  A show that was only on TV for 3 years seemed to live on forever in re-run-world.  Everyday when I came home from school (about 3:30) Gilligan would teach us a new lesson about living in harmony with others.  The island was a microcosm of our real world.  Represented by Scipper (authority), Gilligan (working class), Mary Ann (midwest values), Ginger (Hollywood), the Howls (upper class) and the Professor (educated class).  These people struggled through countless (and sometimes weird escapades) to show us how we can all get along and survive.  They taught us, friendship, money doesn't matter, fame isn't what it's cracked up to be, trust, support in bad times, being okay with who you are, not to be jealous and much more.

   One lesson I remember well was their lesson on why we don't need to no what the other person is thinking.  In this episode, Gilligan happens across some seeds that give people the power to read other people's thoughts.  By the end of the show everyone is angry with each other as they hear everything they never heard before.  (see below) Gilligan sees the problem and knows the only solution is to burn the plant that makes the seeds.

    Keeping ones thoughts to themselves is a gift we often don't appreciate either.  We sometime's think that being able to read another person's thoughts would be a wonderful power to have (mostly save us the energy of moving our lips), but in reality it's more dangerous than you can imagine.  Gilligan shows us that while we can have these thoughts, as long as they don't turn into actions we can live with each other in harmony.  In short, 

THOUGHTS DO NOT EQUATE WITH ACTIONS

   We can have ill thoughts about another person, but unless those thoughts translate into some perceivable action,  they don't really exist (except of course to God who sees all).  

   Today, we willing let others read our minds on a daily basis.  We do this not with magic seeds, but with social media as we spill out our thoughts constantly.   We post videos, comments and pictures  on every subject imaginable (politics, sports, work, fitness, relaxation, social issues, religion etc), and let everyone around us know what we THINK.  If people LIKE our comment or reply with positive comments we feel accepted and empowered.  But if people leave negative comments  (or people you think should at least LIKE don't respond) we feel anger and vilified. If repeated, we might change the persons relationship to us on social-media to "acquaintance" or "blocked".   It might even cause us to physically remove them from our lives by ignoring them or avoiding them in person.  

   Personally, I think the social media experiment has been an utter failure.  It has caused us to migrate into smaller and smaller circles rather than become closer to each other.  We say things to each other on Facebook we would never say to them in person.  We also have replaced a physical contact with a person (verbal over the phone or in person) with a "LIKE" or a "Have a nice day!" comment.  We think that pressing a LIKE/SEND button equates to being there for the person physically.  Our friends and family sitting right next to us are yearning for help and support all the while we are online sending "our thoughts and prayers" to people we barely know. 

   The answer to the problem comes from Gilligan.  First, we need to burn our mind-reading-seed-bush by deleting our Facebook accounts, Twitter accounts and other social media.  But after we have done that we need to ask for forgiveness and go back to being REAL FRIENDS.  

   

My Wonderful Detour

   We hardly ever look at a DETOUR sign with joy.  A detour means our plans are going to have to be put on hold for a little longer as it will inevitably take more time to get to our destination than previously planned.  It often means getting off the 75 mph Interstate highway and getting on the 45 mph side road full of stop signs and slow traffic.  Unless you are on your way to an event you would rather not go to (such as a meeting with your in-laws) a detour is not your friend.

    I remember being in college at the University of Illinois in 1986 and interviewing for prospective companies.  Because my college had such a great engineering department (only ranked 2nd to MIT) most companies gladly came to our campus to do their initial interviews.  We had a lottery system at U of I where you put your name in for the companies you want to interview.  You were given 6 "cards" (2 A,  2 B and 2 C) and you used these cards to increase your odds of getting in.  So if it was a company you really cared about you would use an A card.  I reserved an A card for Intel that was scheduled to come to our campus in March.  I put my card in and the next week found out I was on the list.  I studied Intel all week to get ready.  They were the one company I really wanted to work for.  Then I was told Intel was not coming at all. They were not hiring in 1986 at all but instead were laying off as they got out of the DRAM business and refocused on the microprocessor business instead.

   I was depressed.

   I did end up getting two job offers that spring.  The first offer was from Digital Corporation and the other was Data General.  Both jobs were in Massachusetts and were only minutes away from each other.  I took that job with Data General (DG) as they gave me a chance to work on computer design.   I remember being on the phone telling my mom of my decision.   I told her that I was still bummed that I never got my chance to interview with Intel (on the west coast).  My mom's words were so profound and so prophetic I remember them to this very day.

"Well I guess God must have something in store for you out in Massachusetts as that is your only choice!"

    Like a bright orange and black "DETOUR" sign looming ahead, God was pointing me to the east coast. There was no choice in the matter.  He was telling me: "You are going this way no matter what John!".   God knew what he was doing.   For one thing, I had a good friend who also took a job with DG as well and so I had a person to room with.  But God had more than that in mind when he sent me out there.

   About 2 weeks later after I moved to Framingham, I decided I needed to find a church.  My first attempt at find a Lutheran Church was unprofitable as I got lost trying to find a church listed in Hudson.  On my third week I decided to try a church listed in Acton.  It was only about 15 minutes away and I felt I should be able to find it as it was right off a major route.   I went to Mt. Calvary Lutheran church and instantly felt right at home.  But God had more in mind for me than just a roommate and a home church to support me.

   As I sat in the service I noticed a young lady with the most beautiful head of strawberry blonde hair a few rows ahead of me.  I could not see her face at all, but as I sat there at the end of the service I heard these words in my head.

"You're going to marry that girl someday"

   I still remember looking around a bit trying to see who said that or where that came from.  I met this lady at the end of the service and was instantly struck by her charm and beauty.  I thought for sure she had to have a boy-friend or fiance waiting in the wings.  Over the next year we became good friends and eventually started to date.  We had a whirl-wind romance that swept us both off our feet and we were married in April of 1989.

    Our first year of marriage was filled with ups and downs.  In June, I lost my mother at the age of 57 to bone cancer.  In October, Data General laid off 2000 people (out of 14,000) and I was without a job.   That layoff was another good thing that happened to me for if I had not been laid off I would have missed an event that forever changed our lives.  I was looking at the job ads in the newspaper when I saw Intel was coming to the Massachusetts to interview.  I faxed in my resume and instantly got a call for an interview the next morning.  I studied all day to get ready and did great.   That evening we got a call for me to come and do an on-site interview.  I went a few days later and by the end of the day I had 2 job offers and it was my call on which one I wanted.  Shauna and I prayed about it and all my other interviews back in Massachusetts dried up and yielded no other options.  We were off to California and by January 1st 1990 we were on a plane out west.

   I often call Shauna "My Wonderful Detour!", as my mom had so prophetically said, "God must have something in store for you out in Massachusetts".  However, in God's eyes this was never a detour.  This was his plan and his path.  My path and plan would have cut short his plan and purpose and I would never had met Shauna.  I am so thankful now God didn't let me go out west in 1986 but sent me the other way instead.

   We all have our dreams and plans in our lives.  It may be to get a certain job or own our own business.  As I watch my own kids now map out their own lives I tell them to relish the detours God puts in their lives.  The people they put in their lives that they would not have met had it not been for their change in direction.  A lot of the time, God lets us choose our path, but when it really matters I believe God steps in and gives us no other choice.  It may be an illness or a job loss. It may be a death in the family or loss of a good friend.  But one thing is for certain. Jesus says,

"Truly! I will be with you always! Even unto the end of the earth!"

   Of course, as they say, hindsight is 20-20.  It's easy to look back and see where God's detours were for our best.  It's not so easy when we are in the middle of it.  When I was laid off I was angry.  When Intel did not come to my college I was depressed. I felt I was being punished or not being listened to.  We cry out to God that we don't understand what he is doing.  It's like meeting a detour sign when you feel you are 10 minutes late already and this alternate path is going to put you even farther behind.  We feel resentful towards God in these moments. I am not saying that everyone gets back on the path they had originally planned on going.  Yes, for me, I did eventually get my dream job. But even if that had never happened my new path would have been better than to the one I had mapped out for myself.  Now when things don't go my way I just remember my mom's words

"I guess God has something in mind for you...."

I don't understand!

    We've all had those studies in school that we had to take that pushed our ability to understand the subject.  Subjects, that no matter how much we read the material, we can't seem to wrap our brains around.  For me, that subject was Quantum Physics.  I did well in my other studies in college.  I could handle Calculus, Newtonian Physics, Thermodynamics, Differential Equations, Chemistry, Statics, Dynamics with a little bit of effort, but when it came to Quantum Physics it was a whole different matter.  Essentially we were told at the beginning to put aside Newtonian Physics altogether because it didn't apply here.   Electrons were NOT round balls of mass moving around in space, but instead were particle-waves moving from one state to another.   No longer can you say the electron goes from point A to point B and arrives at time T because you don't know with any certainty where the electron really is and what it's momentum is.  Here we can only predict a probability that it will arrive and that is about as best as we can do.  No matter how hard I tried to "reason it through" I could not.  My professor told us to just take the course on FAITH that this is how the world works at the sub-atomic level.

   FAITH IN SCIENCE????

    Seems like this is an oxymoron.  Two things that have nothing to do with each other somehow had become intertwined.   But it was the only way forward for me to get through this class.   I took his advice and plowed through it resisting the whole time my desire to "figure it out" or "see what is happening".  (I managed an A- out of it).

    Our faith in Jesus is often much like Quantum Physics.   What does not make sense to us, makes sense to God in his kingdom.   To me, Jesus sounds a lot like my Quantum Physics professor as he tries and tries to get across to the people what God's Kingdom is like and how it works.  Words fail to fully express it.  He tries multiple parables to get it across to different people

Are you a farmer?         Listen to my story about a lost sheep
Are you a wife?             Listen to my story of the woman and the lost coin
Are you a merchant?     Listen to my story about the pearl of great price
Are you a land owner?  Listen to my story about the hidden treasure

It doesn't make sense!

    The problem for most of us in listening to these stories is we don't see the sense in it.  First in the story of the lost sheep, it's about 1 sheep that leaves the fold of 100 and the shepherd leaves the 99 for the 1 that is lost.  The numbers don't add up!  The ONE is worth more than the 99?  How?  Next, Jesus says, "He returns with joy!".    Over ONE sheep?  Why?  He has 99 that didn't get lost!

    In the Lost Coin story a woman carelessly loses a coin of great value.  Back then woman were the banks of the family and stored their wealth in a bag on a string around their neck.  Somehow a coin had rolled out of the bag and was now lost.  When she finds it after sweeping the floor she runs to her neighbors with joy yelling, "Rejoice with me! I have found my lost coin!".   You and I would not be so proud of our accomplishment.  It's like saying, "Rejoice with me! My 401K which was savaged by my foolish investments has returned back to its original value!". 

   In both the stories of the Pearl of Great Price and the Hidden Treasure, something of great value was somehow overlooked and found by a person who then must go and sell EVERYTHING he has to gain that property.  Who does he pay to?  He hasn't even had it appraised.  What if it's less than what he sold to gain it?

You have intrinsic value to God that you don't see

    In all the stories there is something of value to the owner.  A sheep.  A coin.  A pearl.  A treasure.  It doesn't matter what everyone else thinks.   He wants to obtain the item again and must spend time, energy and property to obtain it back.  I remember one time being confused about the story of the hidden treasure.  I had gotten the story backwards.  I thought the man was ME and the treasure was God's Kingdom and I should give all I have to obtain it.  But a good Lutheran pastor told me I had it backwards.  He told me, "John, YOU are the treasure in the story and GOD is the man who sells everything to obtain you".

    The issue here is that we don't see ourselves as a priceless treasure (maybe a stupid sheep... but not a pearl or chest full of gold coins).  Maybe when we are younger we might feel this way, but life has a way of tarnishing that treasure we see.   What we thought was gold was not gold.  Sins we thought we would never do we find ourselves committing.  We then perceive our value to diminish in God's eyes.  We then begin to think,  "Certainly I am not worth much now to him now!"

   But we need to understand that our value is not connected with what we do or not do.  In all the stories that value is assigned by the owner/finder. The items do nothing to find their way back to the person looking for them.  They are found by the person on their own.  Our value is not connected to our actions.  He created you and therefore you have value to him.  You, like the sheep/coin that gets lost, are bound by sin to fall away.  Your value, however, is greater than the cost it takes to retrieve the item and some ways the item is worth even more now to God than it was before.  God's accounting does not equate to our accounting on earth.  What looks like foolishness to us is wisdom to God.

The cost is paid back to himself.

   The final issue we have in understanding these stories is who the money/cost is paid back to?  Is it Satan?  Who?   The answer is to God himself.  Imagine a friend borrows you car and runs off the road and totals the vehicle (let's say for this story there is no insurance involved).  Your friend is without a job and has no way to pay you back.  You must therefore pay out of your own pocket to restore the car.  When you return with the new car you hand the keys to your friend and tell him to use it as long as he has need of it.  Why?  Because you value your friendship more than you value the car.  You LOVE your friend MORE than you love the money you lost.  Both in Economics and in Christianity we call this by the same name:  The Great Exchange.   In Economics, if I pay $5 for a gallon of milk to a store owner, both he and I walk away with more.  He valued my $5 more than the milk and is glad to take it.  I value the milk more than my $5 and I am glad to take it.  In God's world he sees our value as his creation as being greater than the cost of his Sons own life and gladly gives it for us.

St. Paul writes in Romans 8:32,

He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?

Faith is what you need

    Of course, all of our "analogies" fail at some point to fully compare to God's world.  We must, like myself when taking Quantum Physics, accept what we are told with FAITH and ACCEPT it as the TRUTH it really is.    The debt is paid.  The door is open.  You are loved by God.

Front doors do matter

  I just got done sweeping on the front entryway into our house and it got me to thinking.   We put a lot of importance on our front doorway.   First we spend money to make a nice flat and level concrete surface for our visitors to walk on because we don't want them to trip or get their feet muddy while coming to our house.   Some people even put solar powered lights to illuminate the entryway at night so it's easy to see.   We also put a light near the door so they can see where the door is and where we have put the doorbell for them to ring.   We put plants and flowers near the door as well to make their coming here pleasant.  We also put a seat near the door for older visitors to sit at while they wait for us to come to the door to greet them.

 

   Front doors do matter!

   Today, many say that there is more than ONE way to heaven.  All that matters is you are sincere in your beliefs and want to help others.  But Jesus says in  John 14:6

“I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

and in John 10:9 he also says,

I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture.

  My argument with the "All ways go to heaven" crowd is simply this:  "Why would God go through all the trouble of building a front door then?".    The issue is that all other "teachers or prophets" (such as Confucius, Buddha, Mohammad) just appear on the seen out of no where.  No prophecy to predict their coming.  No promises from God to keep.  No effort on God's part to prepare their coming.   Jesus, on the other hand, doesn't just pop on the scene to announce God's grace and forgiveness out of nowhere.  Instead, God works over thousands of years and his plan takes literally thousands of years and the pain, suffering and death of many of his servants to bring it all about.  Abraham is told to go live as a tent-dweller and wait for God to give him a son in his old age.  Joseph is sold into slavery to Egypt and suffers imprisonment for obeying God.  Moses leaves his lofty position as next in line of Pharaoh to lead his people out of Egypt.  Elijah is chased from town to town by worshipers of Baal and forced to live in the desert.   Jeremiah is thrown down a well for his denunciation of idol worship and ignoring God. Daniel is thrown in a lions den for praying to his God and not praying to the king.   If God was going to allow ANY route into heaven, then he wasted all his time and energy with sending his own Son Jesus to bear all of our sins.

   If we invite someone over we EXPECT  them to use the front door.  If they decide to use the window or the back door we would probably call the police to report an intruder.  If we used the same "all ways lead to heaven" argument, you would be confronted with policemen who would tell you that the intruder is just a visitor who chose to use an alternate means of entering your house and since there is no one acceptable way to enter a house there is nothing illegal about it.  You would argue that you DO care about how a person enters your house!

  God does care about how you enter too.

   In the story about the Wedding Feast, Jesus says that at the end there was found a man who was not wearing wedding clothes.  The King asks him, "Friend, why are you not wearing the wedding clothes I have provided?".   At this the man was speechless and he was thrown outside.  That is how those who come to God but want to have nothing with the forgiveness he has so graciously provided through Jesus his only Son who died on the cross for them.

Dealing with our "faults"

   In computers, errors are a constant source of problems.  Almost every part of a computer tries to detect and even fix errors as they occur.  Your hard-drive stores a value called a checksum on every 4K byte sector and whenever that sector is read, a checksum is computed and compared to the value stored.   If there is a mismatch, the computer might try to re-read the sector again to fix the error.  Your computer memory can have Error-Code-Correcting bits stored to not only detect a bit flip (0 becomes 1 or a 1 becomes 0) it can actually determine which bit is wrong and fix it on the fly.  When your computer sends or receives data over the internet, its data is checked and re-checked along the way to make sure it arrives unchanged from the source.

   But there is one place in a computer where errors are hard to detect and fix.  That place is the microprocessor.  Often referred to as the "brains" of the computer it can't see where it's going wrong. If it adds 1+1 and gets 3, then it will always add and get the same number.  The only way for it to detect a fault is to compare itself to another CPU running the same code in parallel with the idea that having two-heads is better than one.  But even if it does see a mismatch with the other CPU, it can't determine who is wrong and who is right.

   We as humans are like these microprocessors.  We know we are not perfect and we look to find someone to compare our lives to in order to stay on track.  It might be a sports figure like Tom Brady or a Hollywood actor like John Wayne.   But these people are as faulty as we are and we are always disappointed in the end. 

   In Psalm 19:12, King David writes:

   "Who can discern his errors?
    Forgive my hidden faults"

    I remember when a friend of mine suffered a mental breakdown from the struggles of life.  I had not seen him in many years and he came back to our company to work with us.  We could tell something was wrong with him and at first just ignored it.   After a few weeks though it became very apparent to all that he was not right in his head.  He was sending out long winded emails to various people about things that had nothing to do with work.  He wasn't coming into work but was working from home.  My boss sent me to go talk to him and see what was wrong.   I went to his place and it was like a scene out of the movies "A Beautiful Mind".  The walls of his apartment were covered with newspaper and magazine articles and the floor was cluttered with empty bottles of Coke and boxes of pizza and Chinese food.  I tried to get through to him that he needed help but he was convinced he was fine and in need of no help.  He was sure that everything was going to be fine once he solved this problem he was working on for our company.

  Our brains, like my friends, are so fouled up with sin we cannot even see our own faults.  We may even think that certain qualities we have are "good"  when in fact they are "bad" for us.   We have hidden our faults so well we can't even see them anymore.   But God does see them and he has pity on us.

   Jesus said to the crowds below him as he hung on the cross

  "Father!  Forgive them for they know not what they are doing!"

He was not just saying that to the Pharisees that had come to witness his death, but also about us as well.   We think we know so much these days and are convinced that it's GOD that has it all wrong and not us.   We are fine and everything will be better once we fix these few problems we have.

  So where are we left?   Who do we compare ourselves to?  How do we make sure we don't go too far away from where we should be?

Jesus has the answer:

 "I am the WAY, the TRUTH, and the LIFE.  

   No one comes to the Father except by me"

I highlight the word TRUTH here because he is who we are supposed to be.  He is the benchmark.  Of course we can never measure up and he knows that.  That is why he credits our lives with his righteousness and atones for us.

No Shortcuts

My son when he has about 8 or 9 would often ask when we were driving somewhere "Dad? Do you know a shortcut?"  To his question I would have to reply "No Derek. There are no shortcuts".   

We are all like my son Derek.  We look for short cuts in life to make our lives easier in some way.  Some people who are scared of marriage think that living together is a way to "short-cut" the process.  Marriage seems to long and difficult and we want a way to "try it out before buying".  But all too often this only worsens the relationship when they do decide to get married because they have developed bad habits that are not conducive to a good marriage.  Some people never even get to the alter at all and waste many years trying to convince the other to take that final step.  

Other people who get addicted to drugs see drugs as a way to "short-cut" the process to feeling good.   Our brains develop their own opiates internally but it takes a lot of hard work to produce them naturally.   A pill form is so much easier of a process and many go fall for it's false claim.  We look for short-cuts in our jobs and careers.   It could be lying to customers to gain sales or lying to our boss to gain their confidence. Eventually these lies catch up with us in the end. 

We also want shortcuts when it comes to our faith too.  Do I have to go to church?  Can't i just listen to the sermon when I have nothing better to do?  Do I have to give money to the church?  Can't i just tweet or give a Facebook share once and a while?  Do my kids really have to spend 2 years in confirmation?  Can't they just go on a weekend retreat and cover everything they need to know?  Do I have to forgive my brother or sister who sins against me?  Can't i just send them a text on their birthday or something?

In Matthew that when Jesus was about to be crucified they tried to give him wine mixed with gall which was a type of pain killer to help make him less resistant to them nailing him.  Jesus instead spits it out and refuses to drink it.   Here is Jesus being given a pain killer to help get him through it and he refuses to drink it.  One wonders what the soldiers thought when they saw this.  I hate pain so much I would be just the opposite here and drink as much as I could, but not our Savior.  No one was going to be able to point at him and say later, "He didn't feel a thing!".  He was determined to take all of our suffering on him.

Jesus never took a short-cut to saving us and we should never take short-cuts in our relationship with him or with each other.