Cooked Goose

Been a few years… Some different writing projects got me off the blogging. Whether or not it is objectively good, writing is still one of the best things I do. So, I thought I’d pick this back up, if for nothing else than to have a place to write. I’ll see where it goes.

Then I was reading Ecclesiastes. It is one of the best things ever written. If you haven’t recently, go give it a read. I had before this last time read Ecclesiastes at least a dozen times. And in all those times, never had I seen what struck me this time around. The central theme of Ecclesiastes is happiness. No joke. It really is.

The refrain that gets our attention is Vanity of vanities, all is vanity and chasing after the wind. Reading it, we think, “Okay, this book is a downer.” But we’re missing it if we do not couple it with the other recurring mantra in the book “… under the sun.” Everything isn’t meaningless. What is meaningless is everything under the sun or better way to say it might be: Everything in this world, in and of itself is without meaning. And responding to the impulse to run after them will have one feeling as hopeless as chasing after the wind.

If I can accept this as true, then the real point of Preacher’s message kicks in.

Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for God has already approved what you do.
Always be clothed in white, and always anoint your head with oil. Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love,
all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun—all your meaningless days.
For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun.
Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might …  Ecclesiastes 9:7-10

It is in the letting go of a life of transcendent glory in the mundane world that I can enjoy the beauty of living under the sun. When I reject that the things in this world can, if worked just so and so, be glorious, then the glory that exists somewhere other than under the sun can be infused into the human, the earthly. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.

God is not here. But he is real. And if you would believe him, he will fill a meaningless world with meaning, the dreariness with glory. So, go eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart … Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun – all your meaningless days for this is your (wonderful) lot in life.

So, believing that God was going to do this impossible thing, believing that he would get me to love him, I started to pray each day for a pure heart. A pure heart … meaning a heart not divided into multiple loves. A heart with one master, undivided, whole. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. 

Each morning as I prayed, I sat in that particularly overwhelming brand of doubt. It’s that doubt that comes over me when praying for someone’s healing. I dislike the feeling so much that eventually, I slip into that mindless, rambling prayer. It’s as if a self-preservation instinct kicks in. The subjecting my mind to talking rationally about the impossible eventually becomes too much. If I must, I’ll get in the room with it, but don’t make me wrestle with that beast. I’ll throw stuff at the impossible, averting my eyes, but don’t make me look at that thing.

What do you know of love anyway? A pure heart? A pure heart? Do you even know where your heart is?

Weeks of praying with no signs of movement, so I thought, “If I can’t get more of him in my heart, I can try to get other things out.” What were my idols? For what was I really living? For what do I grieve? Worry? What makes me happy?

My family. My kids. Success. Opinion of others. But if I’m honest, those things, less in and of themselves, but more as they relate to me. It’s me. The conclusion was that the small idols were pieces of a the great big idol — my life. What do I really want? I just want my life to work out. Lame, but it is that for which I’ve worked all along? My life.

Took the fight to two fronts, and was really getting my ass kicked on both.

That’s the thing I learned. Idolatry is a matter of the heart.

As I was coming to this realization, I thought about that wonderful parable about the Kingdom of God found in Matthew 13. “The Kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and in his JOY went and sold all he had and bought that field.” For what will I joyfully sell everything I have?

It made me think how different this man in Jesus’ parable was to the young man who approached Jesus seeking eternal life. When he confidently tells of his strict adherence to the Law of Moses, it says that Jesus loves him. He mercifully tells him, “You lack one thing: Go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” To this, it says the young man went away full of sorrow because he had great possessions.

I wondered, “What in the world did the guy find in the field?”

Then I realized that maybe what he found was what Jesus offers the rich young man, “… come, and follow me.” Maybe the treasure is Jesus.

When it was put to me that way, oh man, I knew the truth. “Lord, I don’t really want you.”

In the past, when reading the story of the rich, young ruler, I thought the key statement was, “How difficult it will be for those who are wealthy to enter the Kingdom of God … Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.” I know now that there are two weightier statements. The first is that Jesus loved him. The second is Jesus’ response to the astonishment of his disciples, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” Mark 10:23-27

I cannot joyfully give up my idols for him. And yet, he loves me. That’s crazy. And because he loves me, what is impossible with me is possible with God. I was convinced that God would stuff that camel through the eye of a needle. I believed that I would treasure him in my heart. Love him above all else.

Right around this time, I began to sense that all this was about joy.

I work to save myself.

So, what I found interesting was this: When told I wasn’t to do anything, the thing I most wanted to do was work. “Wanted” isn’t the right word. I felt most uneasy about not being able to work. It was the itch that begged to be scratched.

Once I had sufficiently experienced this oddity, the next piece was shown me.

In a conversation with a person who was at the time assigned to me as a professional mentor, this guy said something that made my compulsion with work less of an oddity than I’d initially surmised. Speaking of himself, he said, “I work to save myself.”

Instantly, the statement took me back to the basketball court in my backyard. As a thirteen year old, I spent hours upon hours on that court. Working. Working. Working to get better at something that I wasn’t good enough at. To be better. Better.

I remember coming in through the sliding glass door one night, drenched in sweat. My Dad was at the door. He asked, “What were you doing back there?” Not that he couldn’t see what I was doing. It was the right question. Indeed, what was I doing back there? To his keen eye, he saw me cross over from good hard work to something else. It must have looked strange to him to see me frantically playing against someone who wasn’t there. Chasing something, neither one of us could see.

I wonder what he would’ve said if I had told me, “I was out there trying to save myself Dad.” I get the feeling he would’ve known what I was talking about.

“… In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it …” Isaiah 30:15

A great quote on self-awareness.

“I learned early in my medical career that the doctor you should worry about isn’t the one who doesn’t know anything. It’s the one who doesn’t know as much as he thinks he does.

Not having the answers isn’t fatal if you at least have the self-awareness to know what you don’t know. ‘Often wrong, never in doubt’ is no way to go through life.”

Rany Jazayerli from “Teardown Artist” Grantland.com, July 15, 2015