Month: December 2012

check points

March 31st was determined as the last day of the year under the Julian Calendar of the Roman Empire. But this set in motion a time-drift of approximately 11 minutes a year between vernal equinoxes. By the time church astronomers recalculated the loss in time 10 days had been lost since Roman times. When this was reported to Pope Gregory XIII, he signed a Papal Bull (Inter gravissimas) correcting the time-loss, establishing a new calendar in 1582 (named the Gregorian Calendar, appropriately) that also designated December 31st as the last day of the year. [Albeit, many Protestants, including the Pilgrims, continued to use the Julian Calendar in opposition to the Church’s injunction, insisting on March 31st as the last day of the year.]

In this postChristian era, New Year’s Eve has been elevated (or denigrated) to a time of Baucus revelry and celebration, including the consumption of liberal amounts of alcohol. For many, New Year’s Eve is a time of laying aside the mistakes of the past and making resolutions of doing better in the coming year. As we all know this doesn’t work out so much; though for 1-2 weeks it seems right.

Nonetheless, it is good and right to establish check points throughout life to measure the progress made toward our aspirations. New Year’s Eve is probably a more significant point as it also marks the shift in the civil calendar. So as you begin your celebrations for the New Year, you may find it enjoyable and enlightening to reminisce on your life-progress of this past year.

On a 1-10 scale, what progress did you make toward your aspirations in —

– Your awareness of who you are

– Your sense of integrity

– Resolving interpersonal crises

– Your work-ethic

– Being safe before God

– In making a difference in life

– In learning to lead by example

– Being gracious

– Trusting others

– Letting go

Please complete these check points BEFORE further consumption of alcohol.

Happy New Year!

Gary

bah! humbug!

Why is it that some people just seem to get out of bed grumpy? Admittedly, I am not the most social a person until I have a cup of coffee in me; or two, or three. OK, I can tolerate conversation on one. But there are some people who wake up to make their day, and yours, miserable.

For some it is seasonal. Seasonal Affective Disorder— the darkness becomes overwhelming; the depression spirals downward. For others it is far more serious; for a cluster of historical and/or environmental reasons their life itself is miserable. For some personal reason they believe it their responsibility to pass their wretched state along to all they meet. O joy!

Though it can be true that this perpetually dark mood can be due to hereditary, it is not true that that it is irrevocable. There have been those who have come to me for counsel who have revealed their consistent struggle with a sense of failure and depression; some, even to a point of desperation, longing for relief. In an earlier phase of life my wife would often describe my personality as morbidly introspective. And she was right. My depression and external moods were deeply rooted in failure.

What did I do to claw my way out of this perpetual Bah Humbug!?

  1. First, I gave up trying to please or impress others. I simply started living within the parameters of my gifts, skills, and passions. I developed and expressed my strengths and addressed my weaknesses in privacy.
  2. Then, secondly, I stopped using others to feed me and started to feed them. I became the vessel of service in their lives rather than always calling on them to empty themselves for my sake.
  3. In a couple months I found I could laugh more. I kept laughing. There is always a tad of joy and comedy is almost every situation.
  4. My conversations with God became less intense, and more receptive. I accepted His forgiveness in Jesus Christ and laid aside the roiling guilt that added to my failure and depression.
  5. To my shock I discovered that there were some people who actually enjoyed being my friends. This surprised me. I shifted to enjoyment in our friendship rather than making them about me.

I know there were probably a number of conscious and unconscious things that went on in that period of my life. But it sure feels great to no longer carry around my own inner Scrooge.

Have a nice week,

Gary

Christmas

011_edited-1For most people in Western cultures Christmas is about giving gifts. Whatever your economic level, you want to give gifts—whether home-made or purchased, even at great expense. For many, this is all Christmas is about, with a sprinkling of parties, decorations (some to exceptional heights), & very special treats, like Christmas cookies. Not that this is all that bad. It certainly is not! For all the giving (read buying), decorating, and celebrating fills the air with a sense of good will, of caring for our fellow human being, and of fostering peace on earth, good will toward men.”

Now that we live in a postChristian culture, and have since the early 1980s, it strikes me as somewhat miraculous that we celebrate the entrance of the God of the universe onto our insignificant meager planet. Of course, His story, that of the First Christmas & beyond, has been relegated to the traditionalists, conservatives, and religious types of Christendom decayed.

So what is the place of the genuine Christian during this secular holiday season? Is it to withdraw into our ancient celebrations of joy around the birth of the world’s Saviour? Is it to ignore the world’s celebration altogether? Or, maybe, to enter into it with moderation? Maybe it should be celebrated only in the confines of our own families, and church?

For our part, my wife and I intend to celebrate Christmas, the historical birth of the Christ-child, who would one day save our world, as well as the cultural Christmas celebrated by those around us, until the cows come home. Actually, we don’t own any cows; but you get the point! If we can inspire anyone in this economically doomed, war-torn, pain wracked, broken world to celebrate Christ in the midst of their pain, sorrow, and fear, then we will have opened a window for the Spirit of God to enter in to bring healing, peace, love, and His deep regeneration for a new life within.

The Wassail is boiling on the wood stove. Come on over! You are welcome here…, as it is in heaven.

May God grant you the restoration to life you long for this Christmas,

Gary

longing

          Throughout our lives we pursue things that we hope will give us fulfillment, happiness. Too many believe that happiness comes through acquiring money when, actually, it merely eliminates a fear of poverty. Some find “the ultimate rush” in sex, alcohol, drugs. Others look for their significant other, in hopes that they will find their own soul in relationships. Expectations in relationships can be disappointing. Some find meaning in status, success in business, music, design, or theatre.

Yet, underlying all of these pursuits is something deeper— longing. British author C. S Lewis once wrote, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” Quite a point to ponder.

Disappointment can be a major catalyst, igniting our deepest inner longing. Not the trivial regrets we feel when we realize the frivolity of some things. Rather those depth-of-soul longings for something more, something deeper, solid, and incorruptible. We want a security found in the bedrock of all being as the sanctuary for our lives.

In recent times, the value of soul, of a single life, has been so diminished that those of us who remain barely react to the loss. The Evening News has dulled our senses. Yet we are vessels without a rudder when a death comes near. It shakes us. We have no emotional or spiritual mechanisms to cope with this new, final reality. Thus do we float on a vacuous sea of fog, with no rudder or compass to set us back on course. For me, this has always seemed a forlorn loss of deeper resolution.

I, too, have this deep longing. Yet I know that, someday, it will be utterly fulfilled in a restoration of my soul with the God who made me, and made us all. Is this a naive fantasy to which I cling? I think not! There are too many compiled coincidences in my life for this longing to go unsatisfied. Although, it may be in another world, most likely, I do have such great expectations to anticipate in my future. How about you?

Have a nice week,

Gary