Called, Part 2

Back before Christmas, I wrote a post about my sense of calling. It generated a lot of buzz, from church members and bloggers alike. Some people really seemed to “get it,” some were concerned for my mental health, and some were quick to … shall we say … “encourage” me to just get over it and do my job.

At the time of my writing it, I was in over my head in terms of trying to get done simply what needed to get done, and I had momentarily lost contact with the foundational sense of my calling to ministry. I asked several dear friends to again remind me of why it was exactly I was doing this pastor thing, and they did, and I’m okay now. Experiencing Christmas helped, too.

I just have one more thought to add. In the comments of that post, a couple of people mentioned “survival.” Adam wrote: “But I guess unless I want to move out to the forest, or really push the envelope of living in our society, i'll have to do what i'm not called to do to survive!” And Codepoke wrote: “The modern pastor's job is almost unsurvivable.” That got me to thinking a bit.

Seems to me that there must be a distinction between living out your calling and doing what is necessary to survive. See, I don’t want to “survive” as a pastor, I want to strive to realize my full potential, to flourish, to thrive. I guess survival mode means doing all the stuff because you have to do it, period. There’s nothing underneath in which to ground it, only survival itself. And that’s where I was a couple of weeks ago - just doing the bare minimum. It didn’t feel good, and it showed in my writing.

I know, I know – “Boo-hoo, Andy. Get over it!” Listen, I know people who have been forced into true survival mode by the vicissitudes of life, and it absolutely consumes them. I am not remotely trying to do any comparison thing, here.

So here’s where I am now. Having come through that little down-time a bit, I am in touch again with my calling to ministry, which means that I’m still doing all the stuff I ever did, but now there is some fertile soil in which it can take root, be grounded. It’s not that I’ll have to do what I’m not called to do just to survive. It’s more like my calling will undergird everything I do as a pastor. Even balance budgets and read forwarded emails!

God is good!

I Think It Says a Lot!

Here's my idea for a new personality inventory:
Were you more affected by the death of Gerald Ford or James Brown, and why?

Braeden James Bryan

Born December 24th, 2006
12:39 p.m.
8 lbs. 3 oz.
19 inches long

Everybody's doing great!

My sister Stephanie (Mom), my brother Brad (coach), my mom Caryl (grandma), my daughter Cori (cousin), and I all had a chance to hold him. He is ADORABLE!

Adam Mustoe's Christmas Reflection

Adam Mustoe has posted an incredible Christmas reflection that is definitely worth your time. Click here.

Called

I am not called to balance budgets.

I am not called to track contribution patterns.

I am not called to count heads in worship services.

I am not called to produce slick advertisements to hang on doorknobs.

I am not called to decide what kind of tile to put on the Fellowship Hall floor.

I am not called to cater to the nostalgic whims of the way things used to be.

I am not called to perpetuate the institutional status quo for no good reason.

I am not called to stroke the egos of pathological complainers.

I am not called to sit on committees that do nothing.

I am not called to read email forwards.

I am not called to reboot servers.

I am not called to fill out forms.



I am a pastor.

I am called to offer Christ to people.

I am called to proclaim the Gospel so that the reign of God will be realized on earth as it is in heaven.

I am called to serve people who are striving to pattern our lives after the example of Christ.

I am a pastor, and I am called.

Biblical Definition of Marriage?

I read it again today in the paper - the phrase "Biblical definition of marriage." This time, it was New Jersey Assemblyman Ronald Dancer, who said, "It's my personal belief, faith and religious practice that marriage has been defined in the Bible."

As many times as I have heard people say this, I have actually never heard anyone cite book, chapter, and verse in support. So that I might be better able to engage in conversation about this issue, will someone please give the the scripture citations to which people are referring when they say "Biblical definition of marriage"?

I'd be most appreciative.

Stranger Than Fiction - My Thoughts on the Movie

My wife and I saw “Stranger Than Fiction” over the weekend. We recommend it – great writing, sharp acting, and a storyline that really drew us in right from the start.

SPOILER ALERT - STOP READING THIS IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN IT YET AND DON’T WANT TO KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT.

I found this movie to be deeply Christological. Here’s my take. Harold Crick (Will Farrell) is the Christ figure, the one whose life begins to be narrated by an unseen voice, who represents the Holy Spirit. The voice encourages Harold to pursue his dreams, to begin living his life, an allusion to the incarnation. Harold is brought to life by the narrator, who is in fact an author writing a novel (Emma Thompson), as Jesus Christ is “brought to life” by the Holy Spirit. This author has an assistant who helps her write the story, and who I couldn’t help but think of as an angel. (I’m sure that had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that the part was being played by Queen Latifah.)

Harold falls in love with a baker named Ana Pascal (Maggie Gyllenhaal) in the process of auditing her bakery. (Harold’s real life job is as an IRA auditor.) I find it charming that, as he was digging into her life in order to find out what she had done wrong, his motivation was to prevent her from being punished. He said to her several times, “I just want to keep you out of jail.” Isn’t it also true that Jesus digs up our lives, bringing to the surface the things we do, in order to prevent us from being punished for our sins? "Miss Pascal" is at times a kind of Mary Magdalene/disciple figure in the story, and she is won over by Harold’s demonstrations of love, including a gift of “flours” and a heartfelt song. Of course, Ana also plays an active role in Harold’s decision to fully live his life, which happens as she offers him freshly baked cookies. It may be a glimpse of Jesus’ relationship with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, which is one of the most "fully human" moments of Jesus life.

In his incarnation, Harold seeks guidance from a professor (Dustin Hoffman), the all-knowing presence who ends up telling him that, in order to finish the story, he must die. Connected by the phrase “little did he know,” Harold comes to the professor again and again, as Jesus did in prayer to God the Creator. And there is even a “Gethsemane,” the scene at the swimming pool where Harold comes to the professor, who is working as a lifeguard, to ask if there is any other way that this might happen, or “if this cup might pass him by.” The professor replies that this story is the masterpiece of the author, and that there is no other way to finish the story except by dying, just as the story of salvation would not be complete without Jesus’ death. Harold then visits the author, telling her to go ahead and finish the novel, he accepts that it is the only way. “Not my will, but yours be done.”

The “crucifixion” scene is poignant, as the narrator is typing the ending to the story, tears streaming down her face with grief, and Harold walks to his bus stop. As she narrates the unavoidable conclusion, a boy (representing humanity?) falls off of his bike in front of the oncoming bus, Harold dashes into the street and pulls the boy out of the way, and is crushed in the way only the full impact of a city bus can crush a person. Harold dies to save the boy, as Jesus dies to save humanity. At that point, the audience is fully convinced that Harold is dead, and the story has reached its final, climactic moment.

But then the author visits the professor, carrying with her the final manuscript copy of her novel. Handing him the envelope, she says, “I think you will be happy with the new ending.” Harold’s “resurrection” finds him bandaged and bruised in a hospital room, but very much alive. The author says to the professor something like, “He was someone who knew he had to die to save another person, and he did it anyway. Someone like that is worth keeping alive, don’t you think?” Ana comes to the hospital room to find the stone rolled away, and falls into Harold’s arms in joy and relief at his being alive.

The title of this movie is “Stranger Than Fiction.” You know how the whole phrase goes, right? “The truth is stranger than fiction.” The Bible records that Jesus identifies himself as “The Truth.” And so, that’s the way I saw this movie. It’s the Gospel. And it might be summed up with the final words of the author: Someone like that is worth keeping alive, don’t you think?

John Wesley - Chapel Linebacker

A thoughtful addition to the Wesleyan/Calvinist conversation.

Hat tip to Adam.

Right, Wrong, and Gavin's Tattoo

(We’ve been having a really good conversation here and there in the Methoblogosphere about the idea of pluralism/doctrine/inclusivism/Gavin’s tattoo etc. It is thoughtful, respectful, and humorous at times, and has evoked some really good insights. Thanks, everyone, for engaging in this healthy conversation.)

What one believes is important. Doctrine is important. And a lot of theology is couched in propositional terminology. I agree with all of these statements.

What I have said in this conversation is that theology is more than merely a set of propositions, and that reducing theological conversation to a rudimentary comparison of proposition sets minimizes the mystery of God’s relationship with the world. Such thinking leads us inevitably into “I’m right and you’re wrong” territory, and that territory is not where I see Jesus calling us to live.

Let’s use John’s analogy of Gavin’s tattoo. He says that either

1) Gavin has a tattoo, or
2) Gavin does not have a tattoo.

One must be true, and both cannot be true, says John, and he asks if there is a third possibility. There is!

3) I saw something on Gavin’s body that looked to me to be a tattoo.

This statement is true, no question about it. (Unless the speaker is lying for some weird reason.) Statement 3 is a testimony or a witness in which the speaker is sharing from her or his own experience of seeing Gavin’s body and noting what appeared to be a tattoo there. However, let’s just say it turns out that Gavin has a large freckle on his body roughly in the shape of the UM cross and flame, had it since birth, doesn’t like to show it off to his friends, kind of embarrassed by it – whatever.

In this case, statement #3 would STILL BE TRUE, although statement #1 would not. See that? I witness to what I believe, to what I have seen and experienced, and that is that there appears to me to be a tattoo on Gavin’s body. That’s pretty much all I can say, unless I am Gavin himself, the tattoo artist, or Gavin’s doctor and can offer a more … um … “intimate” testimony that would either confirm or refute my witness.

I believe that Christ Jesus of Nazareth is God incarnate, sent on God’s gracious mission to save the world from sin and death, and that in his life, death, and resurrection, all creation, including me, is reconciled to God by grace through faith. These doctrines are vitally important to me, and to who I am as a child of God seeking to become the person God desires. But without the “I believe that…” in front of it, this statement may very well become a stumbling block, rather than an entry point. In fact, God alone can confirm (or refute) this testimony fully.

There are ideas that are “I believes” – there are ideas that are “you believes” – there are ideas that are “we believes.” When we talk about the “I believes” and the “you believes” one of the topics of conversation is how we developed these beliefs, or the theological method we use. (Writing my Credo at the end of my seminary time was deeply helpful for me in that I had to closely examine my theological method and ask myself, “Why do I believe this?”) This kind of conversation leads us into thoughtful, sometimes intense dialogue, as we critically engage our own perspectives and the perspectives of others who have their own set of “I believes” to talk about.

The goal of this crucial conversation is not to verify that one person is “right” and the other “wrong,” the goal is faithfulness. We are called to be faithful witnesses to the truth. We are not the truth ourselves, we are but witnesses to it. I’ll testify to everything that I believe, you give me your testimony, and then we’ll celebrate the “we believe” ideas and reason together about the other stuff, in a grace-filled, loving, respectful relationship with one another.

How does that sound?

Heads You're Right, Tails I'm Wrong

(This post was prompted by a discussion over at Locusts & Honey.)

There are some people for whom theology is a set of propositions to which one may subscribe. If you subscribe to one set of propositions, you are a Christian. If you subscribe to another, you are Jewish. If you subscribe to another, you are a Muslim. And so forth. Even agnosticism and atheism fit in nicely here, as the subscription to their own respective sets of propositions about God.

For a Christian who has this mindset, evangelism seems to be a rather rudimentary process of comparing sets of propositions and ascertaining which set is “right” and which set is “wrong,” and convincing people to subscribe to the “right” one. The “right” set of propositions is almost always the set held by the one doing the evangelizing, which makes the set of propositions held by the object of evangelism, by definition, “wrong.”

So, the evangelist starts off telling their target, “You are wrong; I am right. The only way for you to get right with God is to stop subscribing to your set of propositions, which are wrong, and adopt mine, which are right.”

I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound like the most effective way to spread the good news to me. In my humble opinion, it’s not even very faithful. It leaves no room for wonder, or doubt, or imagination. It is buttoned down, girdled, caged, boxed-in thinking that, when taken to its logical extreme, does not allow for a whole lot of movement of the Spirit. Plus it’s just no fun at all.

To start out, theology is more than a set of propositions. Peter Hodgson (I think) says that theology is a kind of “creative fiction,” or a poetic retelling of that which we know to be true about God. (I’m paraphrasing.) Dovetailing this idea, I see theology as the art of describing God and God’s relationship with creation. It is less scientific than imaginative. Reducing it to a mere set of propositions is like hanging color-by-number paintings in an art gallery.

Secondly, Jesus did not say to his followers, “Go therefore and compare sets of propositions with all nations, convincing them that their sets are wrong and yours is right. And lo, I will be with you (and only you) always, till the end of the age.” No, he said, “Go and make disciples.” It’s about relationships, not doctrines. Jesus seems to care a whole lot more about how we treat one another than about how we get other people to believe what we believe.

If you want to make a friend, you don’t try to convince them of how wrong their current friendships are and that they should abandon them in favor of being friends with you. You just treat them nice, show them some love, smile at them, help them out. If you want to introduce someone to Christ, you don’t recite orthodoxy at them and point out how wrong they are not to believe it. You just love them like Christ does.

Finally, it occurs to me that I don’t put as much stock in being right as some people do. There is a stagnancy to being right that is unappealing to me. If you’re right, there’s no room to grow. What, am I going to somehow get “righter” over time? Right and wrong are categories that do not often enter into my way of thinking.

It seems a little bit too deontological for me, too. I would much rather be considered faithful than right. My telos is faithfulness, and that guides my theological reflection in a way that being right never could. In that way, I am continually a work in progress/being perfected in love/in the process of becoming/working out my salvation with fear and trembling/emerging.

That’s what I think. But of course, I could be wrong.


Update: John has posted a response: click here.

Pope Coat: Update

Frank sent me a link to this full-lenght picture of the Pope Coat, which gives evidence that he is even super-flyer than we first suspected - Note the snazzy red shoes!

And by the way, here is another hypothesis on why he wasn't all bedecked in Papal Regalia when he landed: Maybe it has to do with Turkey being a secular country in which it is the practice of the priests to not wear their priesty stuff in public? Anyway, I heard that in an NPR story, and it is at least as good an idea as the one about his cross setting off the airport metal detector and being confiscated!

Pope Coat

When the Pope landed in Turkey, he was wearing a super-fly white coat. (I am SO putting it on my Christmas list.) However, Shawn noticed he was wearing no cross, at least not apparent to the casual observer. Question is - why?

Maybe he didn’t want to look overtly Christian, thinking he might offend (or offend again, perhaps) the Muslims in Turkey?

Maybe he has a travel outfit that is more scaled down and doesn’t include all the Pope paraphernalia?

Maybe he left his cross in the overhead bin by mistake?

Maybe the cross set off the airport security alarm and they made him take it off?

Later he had the full outfit on, but when he first landed he definitely had a kind of different look about him. Here in the lobby of Drury Inn in Columbia, a few of us attending the Residents in Ministry meeting have been speculating about the theological implications of the Pope’s wardrobe.

What do y’all think?

Ordination Papers: Stick a Fork In 'Em, They're Done!

See that enormous stack of paper?

Those two VHS video tapes?

That CD filled with my last couple of months' worth of sweat and toil?

That's the stuff I'll be turning in, God willing, tomorrow afternoon in Columbia at the Missouri Conference office as one of the final steps in the process toward being ordained an Elder in the United Methodist Church. And, get this now - it will be there three days EARLY! That'll be a first for me, let me tell you!

What an enormous relief! It's just a huge weight lifted off my back to have this released. It was a great process, really. I haven't had the opportunity to reflect deeply on my theology since seminary, and I was actually grateful for the opportunity. But nonetheless, it is a joy to have it done and away.

Next step = interviews. But there's some time to pass before I have to get too stressed out about those. One step at a time!

Tidbits

Last week was extremely busy - two ecumenical Thanksgiving services at one of which my dad was the preacher, trying to cram a week's worth of church work into three days, two people hospitalized to visit, travel to Columbia, MO for Thanksgiving, then back to KC for the weekend worship services. Needless to say, blog time was limited at best.

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What do you do with complainers? The people who will find something bad to say about just about anything that happens drive me absolutely bonkers! One of my axioms for ministry is "Everyone needs something about which to bitch," and that holds true. BUT the question still remains how to react when the complainers take the floor.
Currently, my philosophy is not to acknowledge their complaint at all unless they can make a well-reasoned and thoughtful argument in defense of their position. If they are just complaining, though, I basically just pretend they are my best friend in the world and smile an enormous smile and change the subject. Complainers are poisonous.
Maybe I should go to church here.

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ALL ORDINATION PAPERWORK IS DUE THIS FRIDAY!!! I think I'm in good shape, actually, with just a few bits and pieces to clean up. Of course, the Board of Ordained Ministry has scheduled a Residents In Ministry meeting this week - Tuesday noon through Wednesday noon - that will necessitate our all driving to the conference office in Columbia and back also, basically knocking two complete days out of our week. Timing is everything! Just out of Thanksgiving, Advent starting up, ordination paperwork due, be an effective pastor in your appointment, and, o yeah, by the way, spend two days away at a required meeting right in the middle of all that.

Not that I'm complaining, mind you ... ;)

A Life Lesson from Wesley

My son Wesley is sick. So today, I worked on my laptop at the kitchen table while he played quietly in the living room. While I was writing an article for the upcoming newsletter, Wes calls out from the living room, “Hey Dad, it’s kinda nice with just you and me in the house.”

Caught off-guard, I wasn’t sure what to say, exactly. It was so unashamedly honest, and so purely innocent. Here is a five-year-old boy who has to contend with a big sister who wants to be his mama hen all the time, a three-year-old foster sister whose preferred means of communication is whining and stomping at him, and a toddler foster brother who takes up a huge chunk of his parents’ attention. I mean, what’s a kid got to do to get a little undivided attention around here?

The answer seems to be, “Run a fever of one hundred one and stay home from school.” Come to think of it, his staying home from school sick was the first time he had been away from other kids for ... I honestly don't know how long. At home, church, school, dance, soccer - he is always with other kids. The only time he ever gets to be alone with me seems to be when he is home sick.

And in the middle of the misery of his high temperature, runny nose, aches and pains, and periodic sneezing fits, he pauses long enough to reflect on how things feel, and he finds it “kinda nice.” And not only does he find it “kinda nice,” he also takes the time to tell me that it feels “kinda nice.” What a good kid!

Thank you, Wesley, for being who you are. And thank you for reminding me to appreciate the quiet moments of life, when a dad and a son are just hanging around together, not doing much of anything. I promise not to wait until you are sick to make time to be together, just me and you. It feels kinda nice to me, too.

Two Hundred Fiftieth Post

This
is
EnterTheRainbow's
250th
post.

Thursday is Methoblog Day

Every Thursday, I'm signed on to be an editor of the Methoblog.
I'm still not quite sure what that means, but nonetheless, I have posted something over there. Go check it out, if you'd like.

Ordination Questions: A Few Suggestions?

In my quest for ordination, I have answered a whole lot of questions that were given to me by the Board of Ordained Ministry, some of which I have posted here. I still have a bunch to do, although it seems like I've been working on them forever.

The questions have covered all the doctrines of the church pretty much, but I have sometimes wondered, "Now why in the world are they asking me that?" as I have answered a question here and there. And on the flipside, I find myself formulating questions that they SHOULD be asking candidates for ordination, in my humble opinion.

Here are some that would be fun to answer for the board:

- What is the best way to be in ministry with a person for whom Christian Orthodoxy is a stumbling block in their relationship wth Christ?

- What's more important, making sure someone accepts Jesus as Lord or making sure someone has food in their belly and a warm place to sleep?

- List the top seventeen reasons to affirm the separation of church and state.

- Construct a theologically grounded argument to counter the assertion, "But we have never done it that way before."

- Pick a controversial social issue and write an essay arguing for the opposite of your own perspective on the issue.

- What will the Church look like fifty years from now?

At the very least, they would generate some productive conversations at the interview sessions.

How about you? Anyone reading this have any ideas for a question that everyone being ordained a pastor in the United Methodist Church ought to be asked? I know there are some Missouri BOOM members who check my blog out every now and then - what do you REALLY want to ask us? ; )

Ordination Questions: Quadrilateral and the Church

What a week.

I devoted two whole days this week (Monday and Tuesday) to ordination paperwork, and I am happy to say that I got a lot done. I’m still not completely finished, but I’m a lot further along than I was. I posted a couple of my answers below. I’d love your comments. More to come!

Theology and Doctrine:
4. The United Methodist church holds that Scripture, tradition, experience and reason are sources and norms for belief and practice but that the Bible is primary among them. What is your understanding of this theological position of the Church?

The four sources for Christian belief and practice are a metaphorical jazz combo, with Scripture as the solo instrument and tradition, reason, and experience as the rhythm section. To the tune of this combo, the church seeks to undertake our theological task, which the Book of Discipline indicates is “the testing, renewal, elaboration, and application of our doctrinal perspective in carrying out our calling ‘to spread scriptural holiness over these lands’” (¶ 104). The melody is played by the soloist, and is the recognizable essence of the tune, just as the Word of God is contained in Scripture as the primary resource for understanding God’s salvific mission in the world. The piano, bass, and drums that comprise the rhythm section are vital to the overall performance, and give an accompanying harmonic and rhythmic structure, or “groove,” for the soloist, just as tradition, experience, and reason provide the groove upon which our Biblical interpretation is done.
Specifically, the tradition of the church is a historical measuring system for testing the authenticity of our faith. This does not mean that we do it this way because we have always done it this way, but rather that we acknowledge the debt we owe to generations of faithful witnesses before us whose work for the sake of God’s mission has afforded us the opportunity to be where we are. But even a scriptural faith tested by the tradition may still be a dead faith if not enlivened by our own experience. In other words, faith has to be relevant, to make a real perceived difference in people’s lives. And finally, it has to make sense in a reasonable way. This does not discount the supernatural by any means; surely God is capable of working miracles in every moment. But there must be a kind of common sense rationality to the faith that is confirmed in its interaction with other spheres of the human endeavor.

…

6. Describe the nature and mission of the Church. What are its primary tasks today?
The church is a community called together by God to be an embodiment of God’s reign on earth and a herald of the good news of Christ Jesus. The church’s mission is to participate in God’s mission: to make disciples of Jesus Christ by proclaiming the gospel and living out the commandments to love God and neighbor, toward the end of realizing the reign of God on earth. The primary task of the church today is translation, namely, translation of the message of the gospel into a language that can be heard and understood by new generations of Christians. Of course, this has been the primary task of the church in every generation, but the sociological and cultural changes of the twentieth century have been more drastic than ever in history, including radical shifts in communication, transportation, and technological innovation, and these changes require hard work on the part of the church in order for it to continue to be relevant. Relevance is not important for its own sake, but for the sake of the gospel itself. Simply put, if the gospel of Jesus Christ is not translated into a language that is relevant, that people understand, then the church fails its mission.
Relevance is needed at all stages of church participation, which includes invitation, formation, and sending. As the church reaches out to engage and invite people into the community, it must do so in a way that will encourage participation and be enjoyable. As the church nurtures the spiritual formation of the congregation, people must experience real growth and transformation that impacts them tangibly. And as people are sent into the world to serve God by working for justice and peace, they ought to be making a real difference in the lives of the people they serve. One way to say this is that the church, in all it does, must “keep it real.” A healthy doctrine of incarnation means that a retreat into mystical, ephemeral, other-worldliness is incompatible with who God calls the church to be. The church is in the world, rolling up her sleeves and getting to work, digging into the messiness of real life.

This is NOT a Funny Post

Did anyone see October go by? Seriously, though, wasn’t it September just … like last week? I have got to slow down, or else I’ll be retired before I really get started.

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Please do not smile, and read this VERY SERIOUS column by Kansas City Star writer Lewis Diuguid. (You pronounce his name Do-Good. So yes, that means he is a left-wing opinion columnist named Do-Good. (Insert punchline here.))

Diuguid doesn’t want any more laughing. He thinks it detracts from the seriousness of the world’s situation. He wrote, “Laughter … deflates and diverts people’s attention from what should be a buildup of public outrage, causing folks to vote for change.” It “trivializes serious things” and “diminishes suffering.”

His column cites a study called “‘The ‘Daily Show’ Effect: Candidate Evaluations, Efficacy and American Youth.” This study proposes that young people in America are more cynical and negative about politics because we watch The Daily Show. Actually, I think young people in America watch The Daily Show because we are cynical and negative about politics. And furthermore, The Daily Show is thriving mostly because the American political scene is a joke, worthy of nothing much more than cynicism and negativity. Whatever, Diuguid then spins this study to try to prove his hypothesis that humor is deteriorating the level of public discourse in our society.

I usually agree with Mr. Diuguid, but not this time. If anything, we need MORE laughter in our public discourse. Like the soldiers in Iraq who responded to John Kerry’s recent stupid remark with a banner that read, “Halp us, Jon Carry. We R stuck hear in Irak.” Hilarious! Some people were “outraged” by Kerry’s remark – that’s their problem, bunch of fuddy-duddies. Laughing about it is a much healthier response.

Have you ever been in an emergency room and heard the banter among doctors, nurses, and staff? As a hospital chaplain a few years ago, I heard E.R. humor that most sensible Midwestern churchgoers would likely have deemed a smidge … umm … inappropriate, if not downright offensive. But when confronted with the nasty stuff they saw, the E.R. staff had a choice, either make jokes or go insane. Thankfully, they choose to laugh, and subsequently were better able to handle the stress so they could do their jobs.

When one takes oneself too seriously, a whole bunch of bad stuff starts to happen. One’s face gets all frowny and wrinkled, one’s shoulders start to hunch over, the acid produced in one’s stomach starts to eat away one’s stomach lining, and one ends up locked in a padded cell somewhere. Either that or becomes vice president of the United States. It is hard to imagine just how many problems we could fix if we would just agree to lighten up a little bit. Chill out! Relax! Don’t worry, be happy! And all that kind of stuff.

One other thing: I hereby decree that just typing “LOL” on your computer screen doesn’t count unless you actually Laugh Out Loud. Don’t abuse it, people, or else it will be taken away, probably by someone like Lewis Diuguid, who in my humble opinion is not doing anyone a bit of good by telling us to be more serious. As Dr. Seuss says, “From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere!”