Aiming at Success

In a recent sermon I hinted at the terrible burden we place on our children when we say to them, “I just want you to be happy.”  Not that wishing happiness for them is a bad thing, but it needs to be said that happiness, like other blessings, comes as a by-product when we are focused on living out the life God calls us to live; being the person God created us to be.

It was Viktor Frankle, the death-camp survivor, who helped me see this.  In his landmark book, Man’s Search for Meaning he writes,

Don’t aim at success.  The more you aim at it and make it a target the more you are going to miss it.  For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued – it must ensue.  It only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself…  Happiness must happen and the same holds for success.  You have to let it happen by not caring about it.  Listen to what consciousness commands you to do: go out, carry it out to the best of your knowledge and then you will live to see that in the long run success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think about it.

Not long ago I was having a conversation with a colleague about ways to get our churches to grow.  We talked about programs and strategies, none of which seem to work with the effectiveness we hope.  It then dawned on us that putting effort towards growth, like aiming at success, is the wrong effort.  Perhaps the best way to “grow” the church is to focus instead on living out the call placed upon us to be the church that God created us to be, giving ourselves to causes much bigger than our own.  When we do that growth will ensue but only because we stopped thinking about it.

I don’t think it’s an accident that we have all been brought together in this place at this time.  I can’t believe that God would bring us together with all of our talents and resources, and that the ultimate thing that happens is that we all feel better about ourselves!  I have to believe that God brings us together to effect massive change in our community and in the world that ultimately leads people to looking at this congregation and saying, “Jesus is real.”

I give thanks for all of you who gather with a willingness to give to something much bigger than yourselves and carry out the call that has been placed upon our lives.  For as we do, success will follow, people will want to join us, and the world will be a better place for all.

Lessons from a Winless Career

Some of you have seen the new movie that recently came out about the De La Salle High School football program right here in Concord.  It’s called When the Game Stands Tall and brings to life the incredible winning streak that lasted over 12 years: 151 straight victories.  That is the longest winning streak in sports history – any sport and any level.  I haven’t seen the movie just yet, but I read the book, and I remembered how all along the way, as Coach Bob Ladouceur built his seemingly invincible national powerhouse, he emphasized purpose and significance rather than streaks and titles. These are important lessons for young people to learn, especially early in life.

My high school football experience taught me different lessons.  You see, I played for Concord High School and we were pretty much the exact opposite of De La Salle.  My junior year, with me as the starting quarterback, we were 0-10.  In fact, I don’t think we ever even had a lead that year.  There was one game that was close, and as the clock wound down we were only a couple points behind and marching toward the end zone – that is until I threw an interception that was run back for a touchdown, sealing yet another defeat.  I was a terrible quarterback on a horrible team.

I recently stumbled upon an article by a guy by the name of Josh Keefe entitled, “I Was the Worst High School Quarterback Ever.”  He explains that in his career he was 0-23 as the quarterback for a small high school in Maine.  His 0-23 record was actually part of a longer streak of 41 consecutive losses endured by his school. 

Like my time under center, Keefe acknowledges that all those losses were not all his fault.  Losing is a total team effort.  Like him, I didn’t have a lot of help either.  There were times when I would drop back to pass and there seemed to be defensive lineman waiting there to tackle me!  Josh says, “I avoided hulking lineman, pump-faking every other step and spinning away from would-be tacklers.  I played, essentially, like somebody avoiding the bulls in Pamplona.  And more often than not, the bulls ran me down.”  Sadly, that sounds eerily familiar.

While I can now look back on those days and my winless career and chuckle, I still feel a kind of low-grade, stomach-knotting despair when I think about all those losses.  While they don’t sting nearly as much as they once did, I can still feel those failures – and the feeling that I, personally, was a failure. 

But now, years later, occasionally blinded by nostalgia, I can’t help but wonder if maybe there was something to be gained from never winning.  In his article, Keefe offers this:

Life is a hopeless fight against loss and failure.  We are all going to die, as will all of our loved ones.  Getting beaten continuously on the football field, sometimes brutally so, illuminates this existential struggle.  It teaches you to find joy in what you’re doing, and the people you are doing it with, in spite of the inevitable outcome.

As a culture, we try to make every kid feel like a winner.  But I wonder if maybe we should also give every child a task that he or she will fail at again and again, along with teammates to fail with.  There are certainly valuable lessons to be learned – like the value of putting up a good fight and never quitting; or that trying and failing to achieve a long-shot dream is better than settling for a passionless life.  They might learn how to lose, which is a valuable skill that this life provides no shortage of opportunities to put into practice.  Sadly, though, very few people know how to do it well.

Looking back, I’m sort of proud of all the losing I did.  In the end I think it taught me more about life than winning ever could.

12 Ways to Practice Resurrection Now

If someone were to ask you, “What is the meaning of Easter?” how would you respond?  Not what happened, but what does it mean?  What does it mean for you?  Here. Now.  How does it impact the way you live your life?

A few years ago I asked that question to a number of my friends and colleagues.  The most common answer was something similar to this: Jesus died for our sins and overcame death and sin forever – for everyone, and that means we get to go to heaven someday. 

While that may be true, I wonder if Easter means something else.  Something different.  Bigger… not just somewhere down the road, but right now.  Today. 

Scott Colglazier, a Disciples minister in L.A., once said this about Easter:  “It’s all right if your starting place is two thousand years ago. But don’t linger there too long.  Easter is about what God is doing now. Right here. Right now. Today. An Easter of the past is not much of an Easter at all.”

We all long for resurrection in our lives in some way, shape or form.  For some of us it is in our marriage or our relationship with our kids.  For others it is longing for life after addiction or betrayal.  Some just want to live with the notion that tomorrow doesn’t have to be like yesterday.  Still others just want to truly believe that compassion matters and that God is acting in this world. 

This time each year we gather around the conviction that the world’s brokenness is not finally what is most real and true.  We gather around the conviction that God has not given up on the world, and that this world matters.

Each year we boldly claim that there has been a resurrection and there is a whole new creation bursting forth right here, right now, right in the middle of this one!  But seeing it and living into it takes practice. 

Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest and popular author and speaker, offers us 12 Ways to Practice Resurrection Now:

1.     Refuse to identify with negative, blaming, antagonistic, or fearful thoughts (you cannot stop ''having'' them).

2.     Apologize when you hurt another person or situation.

3.     Undo your mistakes by some positive action toward the offended person or situation.

4.     Do not indulge or believe your False Self-that which is concocted by your mind and society's expectations.

5.     Choose your True Self-your radical union with God-as often as possible throughout the day.

6.     Always seek to change yourself before trying to change others.

7.     Choose as much as possible to serve rather than be served.

8.     Whenever possible, seek the common good over your mere private good.

9.     Give preference to those in pain, excluded, or disabled in any way.

10.  Seek just systems and policies over mere charity.

11.  Make sure your medium is the same as your message.

12.  Never doubt that it is all about love in the end.

I’m always moved by these words from Peter Gomes, former professor and chaplain at Harvard Divinity School, and one of the finest preachers of our generation: "Easter is not just about Jesus; it is about you.  He has already claimed his new life; now is your chance to claim yours!"

He is risen.  Hallelujah and Amen.

Peaks and Pits

Back in my youth ministry days I developed a tradition of including within each youth group gathering something that we called “Peaks and Pits.”  Each week we would go around the room and each person would share their peak – their high point of the last week; and then their pit – the worst moments of the past few days.  I discovered it was a great way of building community.  It invited the young people to share with their peers, in a safe and loving environment, what was happening in their lives so that we could enter into both their joy and their pain.  It allowed us to care for one another in a rather profound way.   “Weep with those who weep, rejoice with those who rejoice,” as the Apostle Paul put it.

I have to confess that this idea wasn’t original with me.  In fact, this exercise is commonly known as the Prayer of Examen and is typically credited to St. Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), who encouraged fellow followers to engage in the practice for developing a deeper level of spiritual sensitivity and for recognizing the presence of God throughout the day.

In its most basic form, this practice is simply looking back over the past day (or week or month, season or year), the big and small aspects and asking yourself, in an intentional and prayerful manner, two simple questions:

For what moment today am I most grateful? 

For what moment today am I least grateful?

There are other ways to ask the same questions: When did I feel most alive today? When did I feel life draining out of me? / When was I happiest today? When was I saddest? / When did I feel closest to God? When did I feel most disconnected from God?

As a family, we have incorporated this practice into our evening dinnertime.  As we are eating, we go around the table and share our ‘peaks and pits.’  It has become an important family ritual, and one of the great ways that we stay connected, especially as blended family.  The other night, after a rather long and stressful day, as we sat down for dinner, said a little prayer and started digging in, Kelli rather forcefully put her hands down on the table – startling the rest of us – and she said, “THIS!  This is my peak!  All of us here around this table.  This is what I’m most thankful for today.”  It was a moment of grace and gratitude.

During this season of Lent, we have been inviting one another to wake up and make space in our hearts for that which is holy; to remember that each moment is sacred, that each day of the journey holds the possibility for experiencing God’s abundant mercy. 

What about you?  What has been your peak in the last 24 hours?  What’s been your pit?  Where, in the last couple of weeks, have you felt most alive?  In what moment did you feel life draining out of you?  When did you feel closest to God?

As we open our hearts to all that is around us, may we discover that God is present in all of it, and may we discover moments of sacred grace everywhere we go, in nearly everything we do.