Books Meet Real Life

My friend Jen were talking books lately, specifically audiobooks, and she recommended I listen to Sue Monk Kidd's novel "The Invention of Wings". It has been my car companion for the past couple of weeks...and what a great companion it was! It tells the story of several women but mostly concentrates on two - Sarah Grimke, a daughter in a wealthy Charleston family and "Handful", the slave she is given on her 12th birthday. 

While it is a novel,  evidently these were real women. Sarah and her sister Angelina were abolitionists in the 1800s, and were great activists who helped change our country, not just for slaves but also for women. Handful was also representative of a real person, and while a slave was given to Sarah, not much is known about her or their relationship. It is known that Sarah taught her the alphabet and how to read when they were girls, thus breaking the laws of SC and most other states in the union. Handful died young in real life, but her character grows up in the book is a representation of the life of many slaves during that time. Fiction based on fact.

One of the interesting things about the book is the way the church was portrayed during this time. People used the church to validate their wrong thinking. To say that it was right, good, and appropriate to oppress people based on the color of their skin and the station they were born into in life. To make judgments of them because of one obvious factor for which they were not in any way responsible. For a factor that was a gift of the creator, something that brought to the earth richness and beauty and uniqueness. Churches segregated, even when attended by both races. They were open to all, but yet in many ways reinforced the barriers between the races. They often still do that today. 

Also recently, another friend Jennifer acknowledged on Facebook the anniversary of the 1967 Supreme Court decision that invalidated laws against interracial marriage. That decision allowed Jennifer to marry a man she loves, who also loves her, and create a family with their two gorgeous and happy children. It stunned me a bit when I thought about it. 1967 wasn't that long ago.... it was in my lifetime. It took so long for something I see as such a non-issue to even be legal. Still, it's another wrong concept that churches often help reinforce in people. I remember an argument I had with a woman once who told me that the Bible says people of different races shouldn't marry. She didn't know where the Bible said that....she said her pastor said so and she believed him. I asked her to ask him for the reference, because I had evidently missed that passage and he probably needed to set me straight. The passage she returned with said nothing about races....it was about belief. It says Christians shouldn't marry non-Christians. People whose center of belief is different from theirs. A very different thing than skin color. I hope our conversations raised doubt in her mind....and in the mind of our pastor. If so they never acknowledged it to me.

I don't get racism. Any logic attached to the discrimination of others based on such an arbitrary thing escapes me. Why would you think less of people because of something about them that they had nothing to do with? As a white woman, people tend to speak freely around me about race. Well, those who don't know me well, or forget my point of view. I am glad they do, since I don't understand keeping silent on your opinion, and I hope I am never the kind of person who ridicules someone whose beliefs are different than mine. I probably will question you about it, though. That's how I learn. That's how I grow. And if I think you're wrong, I often have the responsibility to tell you and make you think about it, too. Truthfully I often wish I could insulate myself from any sort of talk of it. That doesn't seem to be OK with God for me, though. I continually get put in situations where I would prefer to be non-confrontational, but in which God says "You are mine. I gave you a mouth and a mind. Use them." It's frustrating and I often feel it is futile. (Probably why the book of Jeremiah is one of my favorites in the Bible.) Sometimes racism seems so deeply ingrained in folks, that I lose hope in the human race. Yet I know we are all actually quite hopeless on our own....but ultimately I know God is able to change even this. I plan to be paying attention so I can see it unfold.

I started writing this blog prior to the murders of the nine in Charleston. For those of us who are Christians, our citizenship is in heaven. As much as I appreciate being an American citizen, the greater value to me is the church I make with other believers around the world. It's a colorful community, a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural community, a community with diverse opinions, styles, traditions, and ideas.  It's a community whose bond is not that we do right, think right, live right, or that we know and believe God similarly, but the thing we have in common is that we are self-acknowledged dirty rotten sinners who need God. 

My church is people....it is not a building and it does not have walls. I guess what I want to say is this...some of us aren't loving our church well. Some of us are not appreciating the artwork of the creator and are even using religion to justify it. The young man who shot my church...he was not born a racist. What are we teaching our world, Christians? I listen and I know racism flourishes in our world. Still. With all races. In churches and out. In fact, sometimes I think more in than out. When are we going to make the decision that it really doesn't matter what color someone's skin happens to be and when it comes to seeing the souls of people we choose to be color blind?

Life has changed much since the 1800s, but not enough. We need to invent wings of our own and fly away from some of these things that are dragging us down and making us less than we were created to be. You....all of you....are fearfully and wonderfully made. God's works are wonderful, I know that full well. The color of your skin is beautiful, but really it is just a lovely, but insignificant, detail. 

On Being A Grownup

Often I feel like being a grownup is over-rated. I see people who think it means the fun is zapped from your life. I certainly don't believe that....if you do it correctly, the fun increases, as does your ability to create fun in most life situations. You learn life is short....and you want to make it good. Being a grownup should make life easier, and better.

I've been thinking a lot about maturity lately, though. There just seem to be a lot of adults around that don't seem to have gained much of it in their lifetimes. When can you tell where it is lacking? Look for the drama.

What do I consider drama? Responding to life in ways that make you appear to be a hormone-controlled adolescent. Oh, I remember those days well. Going home from school and laying on my bed crying for no reason....or a stupid reason. Saying "I hate you" to anyone who didn't make me happy at the moment. Trying to play games to get my own way....and not grasping why everyone didn't understand that the "rules" I expected others to abide by, didn't necessarily apply to me. Silly thoughtless pranks, words that cut, making decisions solely to hurt those who have hurt me. Remember?

When you are an adolescent, your changing hormones sometimes control your body. Our body chemistry always controls human beings to a degree. We are pre-disposed to certain things - some to anger, some to tears, some to stuffing everything inside until we blow, some to depression and mania, some to perfect calm. While some of these body fluctuations change and settle down as we get older, some stay with us forever. The difference between an adolescent and a grown-up? These changes are new to the adolescent and we need to gently teach them how to manage them, and apply a lot of grace when they get it wrong. An adult should have somewhat mastered the art.

As you age, you should get better at exercising self-control. You should know yourself well enough to know your strengths and weaknesses. You should get help for things you can't manage yourself....and know that sonetimes asking for help is the greatest show of strength. You should realize life just isn't all about you and your feelings. While it is natural to see and respond to the actions of others, at the heart of our thought life should always be "So, what am I doing wrong here?" Your biggest God-given responsibility is always the person you are becoming. That is where you have choices. That is where you can make the biggest difference in this world. Most often the choices of others are out if your control....and you should keep them there.

Life in itself has a lot of drama. People get sick. People die. People get married. People get divorced. People wrong us. People love us. People make bad decisions. People make good decisions. People win. People lose. People triumph. People fall.

When life happens, there doesn't have to be a scene. You don't have to make everything a dramatic event...or make the dramatic events of others your dramatic event. You don't show your love any more when you do. In fact, you often show your own selfishness - you make their issues about you. 

You don't have to condemn. You don't have to be the angel of righteousness. You don't have to be the Holy Spirit. Others hold down those jobs and responsibilities....and they are better at it than you.

Because you are hurt or scarred by others, does not mean your best place to reside is in the crux of that. And because you love someone, you don't have to solve their problems for them. If you're spending too much time thinking on their issues, or worrying about them, you're probably neglecting your own purpose. Offering a hand up when someone falls down is usually the right thing to do. Carrying them around on your back when they have legs that work, is taking everything a bit too far.

The emotions that come when someone wrongs us are natural. They become wrong when we let them control our future. We are all "done wrong" at some point in life. Forgiving and moving on does not mean they were right....it means your future is not controlled by their actions. I've been told some unbelievable stories of forgiveness during my time on this earth. What's interesting is that if you watch their lives, you can easily see these true forgivers are people of power. Those who stay victims stay weak. Often forgiving is not a one-time decision....it is a constant process until it no longer controls us. Until it no longer has power in our lives.

It's weird to me when I see hatred directed at people from someone who has wronged them. This is something I want to study a bit more.....I just don't understand it. My thought is "So you did this to them, what gives you the indulgence to hate?" I know there have probably been times in my life where people looking on my life thought the same thing about me. Splinter, meet plank. I figure studying this may demonstrate that to me more. But I am willing to face the pain if seeing that plank in my eye so I can change me. So I can see truth better. I read something recently that was talking about people evaluating other people.... it said our opinion says much more about us than it does about those we evaluate. It made me start looking inward a bit more when I find myself "evaluating."

As we reflect on our plan to get our life on an emotionally even keel...and I can tell you that from my experience, living life mostly in balance does make life better....we have to consider the feelings of others around us. Sometimes those feelings won't be rational to us - they are looking at the world through a different lens, that has been distorted by their own set of problems and experiences, and body chemistry. They act out of pain, out of fear, out of emotion....just as we do, but yet differently. Or maybe not so differently, and that is why we combust when together. We see in others that in ourselves that we hate or fear.

Life should be more fun as we grow up, because we learn the art of self-control. We learn to mind our own business, and have faith that others will work out their own challenges without our taking over or acting as their avenging angel. We should roll our eyes a bit at the drama...and get to the business of enjoying our life and employing our purpose. Remember all those things that we thought were so important and dramatic in our past? Many of them are now just a blip in our life experience. Not even enough to register as life-changing. Almost amusing because of the energy we devoted to them. We can see now how those around us (those we probably considered our best friends during that time) threw gasoline on the fire to make it even more spectacular, instead of handing us a bucket of water to put out the flames. They may have been well meaning but dead wrong in their approach. They added to the destruction instead of helping us rebuild.

So how are you doing? Are you living your life now as a grown-up or a child? It's a choice. And one that will impact the quality of your life and the lives of others. Life is short....make it good. Find peace and purpose. Be a fireman.....not an arsonist.