The Organ of Meaning

Do I have what it takes?

This is the question that rattles through so many minds; from my experience it does so for males far more often than for women. I’m not saying that it never barrels its way through the heads and hearts of women, I have just heard and seen its effects in men more frequently.

It comes out in reaction to so many things.

Career. Relationships. Sports. School.

Honestly, just about every guy sees some aspect of life as a competition with every other person. It’s not (necessarily) that we want to beat or destroy the other “competitors”, we just want to know that we have what it takes to succeed. As boys (and sometimes even as adult men), we turn everything into some sort of game.

I’ve seen games of Frisbee evolve into “disc dodge”, I know guys who compete at kicking flip-flops onto a certain set of stairs, a guy I had coffee with two weeks ago loves to play a game that involves tennis balls, a golf club and the emergency stations that are on every college campus. Honestly, look at curling, it was totally a few guys trying to prove that they had the best stone sliding skills.

Stone sliding skills. Not a skill that will help in hunting or gathering. Not something that is actually useful like running fast. It’s guys trying to prove that they have what it takes in some (very) small area of life.

This has been the question that I’ve wrestled with the most during the past year and a half. My wife has been promoted within our team and I have not. The reason that I have not is because I am fulfilling a role outside of our team, but in our region that no one else is filling because they don’t possess the expertise required to do it. The role that I have is useful and it is proof that on some level I have what it takes more than other people.

Yet, for my selfish heart, I need more. I want to know that I have what it takes in every area. I want to be the one everywhere I go. I want to be the Regional IT Specialist (capital letters) and I want to be one of the Missional Team Leaders in Washington, DC (get it, capital letters?).

One of the things about this question is that it always is looking for more. My heart asks this question every day and it leads to nothing less than idolatry. Idolatry is something that I’ve been very aware of lately. The next post that I’m still planning on sharing from the Advance09 conference was some thoughts on idolatry in general and in specific.

What I’m realizing is that idolatry is the thing that lies at the root of every annoying foible and every disgusting corner of our lives and society.

The human heart is a factory of idols – John Calvin

Whatever you think of Calvin himself or his theology in general. On this point he is undoubtedly right. We are constantly looking for things to save us. Things to save us from boredom, from insignificance, from pain, from sadness, from want and desire and need. We look for the things that will give us our desires for pleasure, for money, for control and power and importance. We’re looking for the things to which we can give our all and will give us everything we want in return. In short, we’re looking for something to worship, a god who will receive our service and hear our prayers and give us everything we want because we make it happy.

Yet, it can’t.

The wonderful answer to the question of whether or not I have what it robs us of control and steals our fear, striving and insecurity with it.

In the end, I don’t have what it takes. I don’t.

And that’s good.

Because, the One who steals all of that away does have what it takes, and is willing to give it to me. Give what you ask?

A pain free life? No.

Power and fame and money? Probably not.

Happiness and pleasure all the time? Nope.

Himself?

Yes, himself. This is the Gospel.

That the God who created all of this, who has what it takes to create worlds and to oversee all of time, who is able to see the past and the future in one glance, who loves every person in the most intimate and personal way, yet refuses to overpower our choice to love Him back or not, the one who is infinite yet became one of us so that we can comprehend who is is and to pay a debt that we could not pay; that this same God is willing to exchange me for Him.

The good news is that I don’t have to have what it takes, I just have to have Him who has taken it all. When I have Him, I have everything that I need. I have what it takes to look at tomorrow and know that whatever it carries, He has seen it coming and He will see me through it. Even if there is pain in it. Even if the life that I know crumbles around me, I have Him who knows the end from the beginning and knows the ultimate good at the end.

As the Campus Crusade for Christ Mid-Atlantic Regional techi nerd-type guy. I underestimated the amount that the ministry on the whole is “with it” as far as upcoming technology is concerned. I’m realizing that it may be just some of the people that I know in our region who seem to distain technology, or maybe I am just over-sensitive to the issue.

A week ago I said that I would be seriously surprised if we ended up having an active hashtag to use on Twitter while we were in Ft. Collins this summer to post things related to it. I was mistaken. And while I think it could have been shortened, I am glad that there is one in any case. We’ll be using #csu09ccc to mark our tweets (I still hate using that word, I feel like a fool every time I do).

Good job people. Now we just have to convince the naysayers that it’s not completely worthless and narcicistic.

The organization that I minister with is, relatively speaking, huge… we’re active in 191 countries (I’m still amazed that there are that many countries at all) and have 25,000 staff members. I am always impressed at how honest our leadership is with our shortcomings. Just this month the Vice-President of the Americas wrote up a response to a question about our organizational strengths and weaknesses; I was far less interested in what he had to say about our strengths as I was in the weaknesses. This is what he summed it up with:

I’d say we need to have a humble attitude, knowing that we’re just a part of God’s overall plan. And, also, we need to be willing to push the outer-limits of what He’s called us to do.

This is interesting because this is pretty much what my answers would have been. I’m thankful that the leadership of our organization is actually aware of it and addressing those issues.

If I would have answered that question, I would have gone into more specifics about where we’re not “pushing the envelope”, but it would have just been where that is true where I am working. Also, most of the field staff (myself included) are painfully aware of the damage that those who have gone before us have caused with the overdone pride in our organization and our methods – because we’re constantly working to repair damaged relationships with other organizations.

Thank you leaders, you’re doing a good job!

This weekend is another conference for me. I’m running PowerPoint and video yet again and I’m having a pretty good time doing it too. The conference is a regional conference for Impact – an “ethnic student ministry” associated with the organization that I work with. Impact primarily focuses on reaching out to and building up African American students on college campuses.

I am learning a lot about where our ministry is falling short on being more effective on campus… for example, partnerships with local churches are something that Impact does a great job with; and something we do not. I’m hoping to have some opportunity to work more in partnership with Impact locally here in the DC area (did I say that we’ve pretty much decided to stay in the Washington area for at least another year) – even if it’s just helping to train and disciple some of the students on their campuses.

One of the things about Impact is the fact that they don’t have staff on campuses, they depend on the students they work with to be the ones doing the ministry on their campuses and coach them over the phone. Yet, it’s has been very effective… students can do ministry! But, one of the shortcomings of this strategy is the lack of people who can interact one-on-one and face-to-face (I like hyphens (and parethesis)) – we’re hoping that we’ll be able to help out and fill some of that void.