Bullhorns and Bob Dylan

I love Facebook.  Blogs. Instagram. Twitter.  All of it.

I look forward to seeing Tracey’s latest ocean adventure or chew on the profundity of Donald Miller or hear myself say “awww” each morning as I read Jen’s quotes posted to encourage all who stop by.  I love Catherine‘s Biblical wisdom and Mackenzie’s scientific brilliant wit.  I could swear I smelled the garlic as I read Brian‘s descriptive account of his and the fam’s adventures at their Tuscany cooking school and I was so happy to fete my sister when I saw she received award at work recognizing her accomplishments.  My nephew’s adventures as he settles in to his first apartment in LA would very possibly have not made its way on to my radar if not for social media, and without it, I might not have known to pray for Allie in the early days of her cancer.  And to miss my daily belly laugh, courtesy of Seth, or the hilarity that comes through Deanna’s or Junko‘s mommy musings … are you kidding me?  Quelle horreur.

It’s like having my own pleasant little neighborhood coffee shop where everyone knows my name and where I can poke my head in when I have a minute to sip a cup of joe as I hear quick updates from folks I wouldn’t otherwise see.  Call me Pollyanna, but it often feels like my own little Mayberry.  In that place, people often make statements about their truth, whatever that might be and although I may not always agree with their position, I appreciate hearing it as I see it as an opportunity to gain a little more insight into who they are.

But in an instant, that lovely atmosphere can get poisoned.  You know what I’m talking about: those times when it is as if someone walks into that corner meeting place with a bullhorn in hand and publicly blasts that person’s truth, and all of us on the sidelines are forced to witness the verbal carnage in front of us.  All it takes is a couple of acerbic volleys between two opposing points of view and bam,  we all just want to head for the door or at the very least, select “unfriend”.

Really, what could possibly be accomplished when we bash Kirk Cameron or the POTUS on our newsfeed?  Do we actually believe we’re going to change a person’s opinion about DOMA by blasting our viewpoint, or do we really think Christians are going to suddenly kick their God to the curb because someone bullies them on Facebook for their beliefs?

I just don’t think that clubbing someone over the head with a quote by Jon Stewart or Huck or the Huffington Post or even the Bible as a means to win an argument serves any purpose except to unnecessarily cause division. Sure, we need to stand for truth when the time is right and yes, we live in the land of free speech… but in that setting?  Just because we can… should we?

When I look at the whole counsel of Scripture, I see that no matter who He encountered in public, Jesus hit the core of everyone He met with love and in fact, said that love wins.

Every time.

My mother has always said “You can always say more, but you can never say less.”  Good advice, mom.

As I was chewing on all this the other day an old protest song came to my mind and before I knew it, I’d penned my own satirical rewrite as my own little protest.  I hope Bob doesn’t mind.

 

(Listen to Bob Dylan sing “The Times, They Are A Changin”)
 
Come gather ’round people wherever you roam
And see that the whole world around us has thrown
Us a curve ball that no one could guess would be shown
So many around us are hating
What if we looked inward to see how we’re prone
For the times, they are a changin’
 
Come right wings and liberals
Who shake hard your fists
And keep up the rancor and how you insist
That your bents and opinions are all catalysts
For the changes you think should be raging
For whoever wins now will be later to lose
And your ground, it’s slowly fading
 
Come family and old friends throughout the land
Do criticize what you can’t understand
And pound down your fist but the flame will be fanned
Insist the opposer’s worth blamin’
Though red or though blue, all opinions remand
And your cause, no one is listening
 
And God, what thinks You as this tumult abounds?
You must feel so saddened as Your kids expound
On their theories and slants as their prejudice unbounds
The twists on Your truth they are making
Straight on at a mirror we all need to gaze
At ourselves, we all need changing.

And in closing, some great advice from the best selling Book of all time:

“’I have the right to do anything,’ you say—but not everything is beneficial. ‘I have the right to do anything’—but not everything is constructive. No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.'”
1 Corinthians 10:22
 
 “One of them, an expert in the law, tested Him with this question: ‘Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?’ Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.’
Matthew 22:35-40

Sylvia Lange is a Christian women’s speaker who lives in Southern California.

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Pancakes, cows, and Mom

My mother is a recovering Southern Belle.  She would still be Emily Post’s only begotten child if not for having her dignified roots collide with my father’s California surfer casualness in the 60s. Years after moving away from the daily influence of her refined Northerner mother and bonafide Southern gentleman father, she too became more and more casual with time. But even though Daddy has successfully loosened her up over the years, she has never lost her connection to her Memphis upbringing.

You see it everywhere in her life in some hilarious but mostly thoughtful ways. One would never pour ketchup straight out of the bottle in her house; of course not, it’s ladled from a silver bowl.  She would never think of drinking coffee out of anything other than a porcelain teacup.  Thank you notes are in the outgoing mail by nightfall, usually penned on engraved monogrammed note cards. She would never show up to a wedding without having sent a gift weeks ahead, wouldn’t dream of letting her living room be devoid of fresh flowers at any time, and never, no never would she arrive at your home for dinner without a case of your favorite fruit, an exotic round of cheese, or an orchid in tow. As a child, I drank root beer floats out of a crystal goblet, never wore pants on public transportation, and owned two pair of gloves by the time I was 6.

However, it is in her speech where her “Southernness” is especially apparent.  Her Tennessean drawl is still alive and well after over 50 years on the west coast and she isn’t afraid to use it to get what she wants… and she always does. No lie, that archetype shows up when you least expect it. She can get total strangers to do the most unbelievable things by simply purring “Oh my, I’m in a terrible jam and I just know you’d love to help me”.  (Admit it: you’re reading this with an accent, aren’t you?)

Further, she uses all kinds of colorful expressions that people from that corner of the world are known for.   Though I adore them today, we would often cringe as kids and struggle with “calling her blessed”.  No kidding, there wasn’t a situation I’d face for which she didn’t have an expression at the ready. If I was tempted to telephone the latest heartthrob who didn’t even know I existed, she’d be quick to tell me “Darlin’, don’t you know a good cow sells tied in her stall?” If I complained about someone who had wronged me, she’d say “Sweetie, just remember that no pancake is so thin that it doesn’t have two sides.” When I’d criticize a boss or a politician, Mom would empathetically spew “Oh honey, he doesn’t know if he’s a foot or on horseback.” Oh yah, I’ve got a million of ’em.

But it’s the expressions she’d say in my darker moments that stick with me the most. When my fiancée cheated on me when I was 26, she scooped me up and defiantly stated “Sweetheart, let him pound sand because he doesn’t deserve someone as amazing as you”. When I was going through a phase of joblessness, she’d continually hurrumph “Sugar, something is going to happen any day now because there is no one as capable as you”.  When I thought I’d lost my faith, she whispered “God’s still got you, sweetie.” And when I came to the end of the asphalt 14 years ago and was finally ready to transform the way I was living, Mom’s unhesitant response was her usual “I am soooo proud of you”, which quite simply helped to change my life.

The way she has mothered me has also taught me what to look for in other mom influences in my life.  I’m not sure I would’ve recognized the powerful impact my spiritual mom Gail would have on me at first if Mom hadn’t not only encouraged the relationship in its early days, but in fact, strongly urged it.  Even now when I’m struggling with something, she’ll ask “have you talked to Gail about it?”

Here’s the thing.  She’s not technically my mother.  But then again, I guess that depends on what definition of the word you use. She got me and my two older siblings in the deal when she married my father and endured all kinds of drama that sometimes goes along with being a stepmother. She went on to have a child of her own who shares her DNA.  I don’t. I don’t have her nose. I don’t have her body type. She’s short and I’m tall.  But she is my mother.  And in more ways than not I’m proud to say I’m just like her.  She knows me better than many biological moms know their daughters and has taught me that you don’t necessarily have to give birth to be a real mom, something I’ve needed as I co-mom my own stepdaughter.

I may not have my mother’s blood in my veins but that matters bupkes to me.  I may not have her hair or her eyes or her ample bustline, but I have her heart, her values… and maybe even a few of her Southern ways.

So, the next time you ask me what I think about something you want to do and I respond with “Honey, you need to do that like a fish needs a bicycle”… you’ll understand.

Her children stand and bless her.

Proverbs 31:28

 

Sylvia Lange is a Christian women’s speaker who lives in Southern California.

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Hang a right

When you look at this image, what do you see? One person might say it’s a silhouette of a woman while the next sees a man playing a sax.

So which is it?

A singer on a stage will hear something vastly different when staring down the throat of the speaker’s horn than what she hears upon taking just two steps to the right. The dark image up ahead the hiker is sure is a bear ends up being a rock when he advances just 20 feet. The neighbor who bugs the snot out of you today ends up being a treasure after you find out she’s the one who called the police when an intruder broke in your house. A prolonged period of great financial uncertainty becomes the very thing that confirms deep in your spirit that you can’t only depend on your own ability.

When circumstances suck, many of us get stuck. But even a tiny step in either direction can make that which we initially viewed or heard or felt one way suddenly look, feel, and sound completely different.

When I came face to face with my alcoholism 13 years ago, life seemed to be over. It was as if I’d been bathing in emotional cement which had hardened when I wasn’t looking and I couldn’t see my way out of the mess I’d created. I’d failed everyone I loved and everything I attempted and felt nothing but shame about who I’d become. I was stuck and wanted to die.

But then.

After walking block after block down the depressing road that was my life, out of nowhere I took a right and found myself on a new path. Here, nothing looked familiar but man-oh-man, the light felt good. On this road, there were trees and empty lots where kids played basketball, and all that would come out of my mouth was “thank You”. With the help of good people, a solid program, and a new understanding of a great God, the reflection I’d see in the windows as I passed revealed that indeed, I was beginning to look like a new creature. Over time, the feeling of shame that had choked out all semblance of living within me was replaced with the overwhelming awareness that it had all been a gift.

My friend Ann showed us how it’s done recently after a long and devastating battle with cancer. As she began to take the turn on to heaven’s road, she chose not to feel sorry for herself but rather to thank God through it all. She continued to thank Him, even up to the time she gracefully moved from her current location to her celestial zip code last week, inspiring all who watched her go through the fire.

Perspective.

When one of my girls was hit with breast cancer this Spring at the age of 30, she decided to articulate gratitude instead of swimming in fear as she went through a double mastectomy. Though still dealing with it, Erin has come through this ordeal a vibrant and catalytic believer, profoundly influencing the spiritual lives of all she touches.

Perspective.

Is that really all it takes? Yah, pretty much. That, and a belief that a Power greater than ourselves can restore us to a place of wholeness. Things we thought were insurmountable become small mounds when we give it up, make it a practice to turn it over to God on a daily basis, and watch the Spirit do mind-blowing things inside of us.

I believe this stuff, I really do, and everything has changed as a result. Is my life all sewn up? Not even close. In fact, at this writing I’m going through one of the scariest things I’ve ever faced. I’m anxious and I’m scared– but I’m not derailed. In fact, I see my connection to God deepening and the size of my own agenda decreasing as my eyes are glued to His. When life is going well there is a tendency to give Him a fleeting glance but I thank Him for this trial because through it, I’m getting more in the “habit of Him” as I hang on to Him more than ever before. I also know I need people who want the same things I do. I need caring souls to refresh my memory that I’m God’s very favorite child or I’ll get caught in the cement again. I need folks with a sunny outlook and a great faith to remind me that God is nuts about me and doesn’t want me to stay stuck. Perspective shift? You bet. In fact, the way I see it these days is that I have the extraordinary life I have today all because once upon a time I drank too much. No matter what your issue is, we have Power available to us to squash our flaws, foibles, failures, and fears– we only need to seize it… and live like we believe it.

Maybe the skyscrapers on the road you’re on are so tall they’re blocking out the light. It seems no one notices your feet are dragging. But up ahead is an intersection; you can keep walking down this street or you can make a turn up in the next block. You may be unemployed, on the verge of divorce, ill, bankrupt, or just plain lonely. Take a different path. Hang a right. Get out from in front of your computer, have someone move your bed, bring the phone closer to you… whatever you’re doing or wherever you are, call or go talk to someone. Now. One of my favorite passages from James says “Tell your stuff to another person”; the words on the page actually say “confess your sins one to another” but what it’s telling us is open your mouth and tell another human being the exact nature of what you’re up against. Why? “So you may be healed”. Healed. Trite? Maybe. But pinky swear, this stuff works.

It takes guts, but come on… you can do it. Hang a right.

“I sought the Lord and He answered me; He delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to Him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame. This poor (wo)man called and the Lord heard him; He saved him out of all his troubles.” Psalm 34:4-6

 

Sylvia is a singer and Christian women’s speaker, and lives in Southern California.

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They’ll know we are Christians by our T-shirt

Across the street from where I grew up was a big Catholic church complete with a school, rectory and nunnery.  They hosted robust fiestas, the priests wore floor-length robes, and the nuns were nice to me.  Don’t get me started on the holy water; let’s just say for awhile that year every door in our home had a half-full Dixie cup on its threshhold and an eleven-year-old who crossed herself before going in to the toilet to pee.

I was jealous of my friends who got to go there as I thought the place rocked. My experience with it was only from a distance though, but from my upper bedroom window looking down over the church yard I saw and heard a lot.  But what really got me was the music; Folk Mass was on Sunday nights and the songs were some of the most beautiful things I’d ever heard, igniting my budding musical sensibilities.  This was the beginning of the 70’s… a time of simple words with simple melodies sung with a simple acoustic guitar.  One stanza and chorus of one song said

We will work with each other, we will work side by side.

We will work with each other, we will work side by side.

And we’ll guard each man’s dignity and save each man’s pride.

And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love

Yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love. 1

 

I never forgot those words.  But the real impact of them didn’t hit me until much later.

I learned that when He was here, Jesus ticked off the religious leaders of the day when He said the commandment that trumped all others was that we should love God with everything we are and next, that we should love our neighbor like we love ourselves2.  Who wouldn’t agree with that?  But although I called myself a “Christian” for a long time, for years I didn’t live up to what that moniker means, in fact, sometimes not even close.  I didn’t love — I lied.  I judged. I compromised. I put myself first and tried to get away with all degrees of ugly.  But I sure looked good when I needed to.

Oh maaaaan, it seems to be there’s a lot of that going around especially on the public stage. Is it just me, or lately does there seem to be a rash of Christians in the news who seem to be tarnishing the label beyond repair?  As I listen to some of Christianity’s more vocal public critics like Bill Maher, Joy Behar and Jimmy Fallon bashing so much of what I hold dear, I want to shout at the TV  “that’s not Jesus!”  And although I cringe at their vitriol, I have to admit something to you:  I kinda don’t blame them.  I mean, come on.  If all they see “Christianity” to be is a TV pastor who once publicly decried homosexuality but then was caught in the back room with a male companion, or believers picketing a California state proposition in anger, or the singer who sang songs about Jesus but then stole another woman’s husband, or a Christian politician’s family member who (whoopsiedaisy) had a child outside of marriage… what are they SUPPOSED to think it’s all about?

Lest I scare some of you, I hope you’ll hear this: I believe we need to stand up for what we believe and strongly defend our faith.  I do. But when we do, do we sometimes forget people are watching as we claim to represent God Almighty?  Are we only ambassadors of His judgment… but not His mercy and love?  What would it look like in today’s political and moral climate if we “put on love”3 in the way He did?

Here’s how I see it.  I can’t speak for how you’ve “lived love” in your life, but I can sure say I’ve done some of those despicable things they’ve done when I knew better.  Many of the hurtful, selfish, idiotic, judgmental things I’ve said or done would cause anyone to question whether I was in fact a real Christian, or certainly whether or not I knew how to love.  As a result, I know I’ve caused a whole lot of people confusion and pain.  Worse, I have very likely done serious spiritual damage in some who might’ve looked to me for what a Christian should be like.  That’s just the awful truth and although I know God’s forgiven me, I have to live with that.

But here’s the sweet part of the deal: today I know God is the “God of the second chance”.  He forgives, He remembers no more, and He moves on, wanting us to do the same so that we don’t waste one more second of the limited time we have on earth wallowing in yesterday’s news.  That’s the beauty of being His kid!  I will always be a bonehead who blows it but hopefully, those “I knew better” moments will be fewer and farther in between and man-oh-man am I grateful He wipes the slate clean each time I recognize it, tell Him so, receive His forgiveness and MOVE ON.  Hopefully I am learning each day to be less concerned with being the perfect Christian and more concerned about what it means to love Him (action) with all that I am and to love others around me (action) as God asked me to do, whether or not they believe the same way I do.  The rest will take care of itself, I know it.  I am convinced today that I am a member of a royal line who is forgiven, loved, and thought the best of by the King.  I want to live like I believe that and will keep on trying to love the way Christ would want me to, all the way until He greets me at the door of heaven.

How will they know we are Christians?  I’d like to think it’s more than what’s emblazoned on our T-shirt, but rather, by the unmistakable way we love.

 “If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I could be nothing.  If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing. Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.”

1 Corinthians 13: 1-3; 13

 

Sylvia is a singer and Christian women’s speaker, and lives in Southern California.

Read Sylvia’s other posts, and LIKE her on Facebook!
1 ©1966 F.E.L.Church Pub., Ltd. Assigned 1991 to Lorenz Publishing Company, a division of The Lorenz Corporation. Reprinted with permission (8/30/12).

2 Matthew 22:37-39

3 I Corinthians 13

4 Isaiah 43:25