Be Kinder than Necessary

I had a friend in college who used quotes as a footer in her e-mail signature. One of them was, "Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle." By the time I met this friend, I already knew only too well what that quotation means, but I still have to remind myself every day of why it's important, why I must never forget, why I cannot stop striving to be kinder than necessary to every person.

I don't remember much about middle school. But even today, I still remember James. James was in my Spanish class when I was in ninth grade. That class was the center of my life at the time. I sat in a corner of the classroom with three other people: my friend Melissa; my first real crush, Matt; and James. Since the class consisted of a lot of little group exercises and study activities, the four of us spent a lot of time talking about things that were not always class-related.

At that point in time, James was a source of major irritation for me. He was frequently interrupting when I was trying to work my pathetic middle-schooler "magic" on Matt (who was reasonably friendly but never ended up "noticing" me). James was constantly asking really awkward and personal questions. He was like a class clown with feelings, someone who could laugh along with the people who were laughing at him but who also clearly wanted a personal connection. We weren't mean to him, but we still rebuffed him somewhat. He used to say hi to me in the halls, and I would feel so self-conscious and embarrassed. There weren't very many people lower on the social scale than me, and I was desperate for friends and acceptance. I didn't want to be stuck with unpopular James who made me squirmy with his direct commentary and his desire to be in my personal emotional space. I was a fourteen-year-old, and frankly, I was a bit of a self-centered idiot.

The next semester when we had new classes, I didn't see James around very much. I didn't notice when he was gone. Not until the day that I found out that he was really and truly gone—James had killed himself playing Russian roulette. It turns out that there was a lot I didn't know about the battle James was fighting until after he was dead. James had come from an abusive family, and I had no idea about the scars on his body because I had never seen him shirtless. He had been living with some kinder relatives while he was in Spanish class with me, but something in James' emotionally scarred mind made him run away from the people who loved him and go back to visit the crazy people who had abused him. That's where he was when he died.

I felt like a monster, a hypocrite, a terrible Christian. I went home and cried and cried. I still cry sometimes when I think about James. It was only after he died that I learned how to love him. Beyond his awkwardness, James was a nice boy. He was kind to me, going out of his way to recognize me and to give me his attention, and I did not give him much kindness in return. I'm not going to tell you that it was my fault that James died, that if I had been his one true friend he might have been OK. I don't know what would have happened. But I do know that kindness might have helped him, and that my kindness can still help others today.

I don't know who has been abused. I have no idea who has just lost a loved one or whose dear friend is sick or who is secretly dealing with depression. I don't know who is questioning faith or losing hope or desperate for a lifeline. I can't tell who is having a bad day or who feels invisible or under-appreciated. I do know, however, that it's likely that every person I meet will struggle with something like this, and every single person, no matter who they are, carries some care or pain on their hearts. Kindness is a salve that costs me very little to give but can make a world of difference to the recipient.

Since I have grown up, I have realized that I shouldn't need suicides to get my attention. People shouldn't have to be destitute for us to put forth extra effort and goodwill on their behalf. We should think not only of how to avoid wounding the vulnerable but also of how to build up all people in the service of a healthier and happier population. If there is one thing I can do to honor James's memory, it is to try to be kinder to all people, no matter how much or little I know about them—to be friendlier and more patient, understanding, and compassionate. Every single person is worth my time and effort, and they all deserve to be treated with love and respect. I want to be an ally to more of my neighbors in their daily battles both great and small.

In Sickness and In Health

I'm sick right now, and it's kind of a drag. I'm not a fan of body aches, insomnia, or that annoying pressure that I get between my eyes sometimes that makes it hard for me to think. We all devote a reasonable amount of energy to not getting sick—we take vitamins and wash our hands and avoid sick people. We don't like to be slowed down, and we don't like the unpleasant (and sometimes painful) symptoms.

Still, a few of my happiest moments in life have arrived during an illness.

When I was in 8th grade, my showchoir was invited to perform at the White House employees' Christmas party. Nearly our whole choir got sick. I think one kid even threw up in a bathroom at the White House. I felt like crap, but I could still sing, and I remember how beautiful the surroundings were and how intoxicating the smell of all that pine was (the place was filled with live Christmas trees, and there were live greenery garlands around all the doors). I have a marvelous photograph of myself looking up in awe at the iconic portrait of George Washington as I was walking into the East Room to sing. Sickness and all, I wouldn't trade that day for anything.

Later, when I was a sophomore in college, I spent a trimester in Ireland. It was an incredible and challenging time of self-discovery for me. I caught a cold during my last week there. I remember feeling all fuzzy in the head, and I went into my bedroom in the cottage where I was staying, opened the windows, and crawled under the covers to take a nap. I remember how blissful I felt as the smell of all that wonderful green grass wafted over me and I snuggled deeper into the soft sheets. I was actually grateful that I had a cold that day because it gave me the excuse to stop working and experience this wonderful moment of absolute tranquility. I might have missed it if I had been well.

Just last night as I was bumbling my way to bed with my stuffy head, I stopped for a moment to look at an embroidery sampler that a friend made for me as a wedding gift. It has my husband's name and mine and our wedding date, and it bears the following verse from Ezekiel: "I will give them one heart and put a new spirit within them. Then they will be My people and I shall be their God." I stopped for a minute to stare at it as I internalized the words. There I stood, sick and moderately miserable, but God was there with me, promising to put a new spirit within me. All the aches and the pains of my body faded away as I remembered with joy the incredible promise God has made to me, the promise that transcends all sickness and hardship.

I have another wall hanging in my home that reads, "Anyone who says sunshine brings happiness has never danced in the rain." I truly believe that God gives good gifts in all circumstances, and that we can find joy even in sickness. When I married my husband, I promised to love and be faithful to him for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health. What are our marriage vows but a reflection of God's promises to us? He will be with me in sickness and in health, every single day of my life. No hardship can separate me from him, and no sickness and take away my joy. I am blessed to be a beloved daughter of God, even now while I have a headache and an overabundance of snot. I am so happy. I am so loved.

A Picture of Law and Gospel

It seems like Christians love to argue about law and gospel. Does the law mean that we are still at risk of damnation when we sin, even if we believe in Jesus? Does the gospel mean that the law is obsolete? Do we need the law anymore? Should we still be concerned about sin, or should we just focus on loving each other? Are people confusing grace with a blank check to do whatever we want?

It all seems very complicated. We are, after all, both sinners and beloved children of God at the same time, and that's a hard thing to wrap one's head around. So I've decided to try to explain it (to the best of my understanding) with a diagram:

Imagine that the spiritual world—our true existence, so to speak—has two dimensions. Spiritual life is one and death is the other. Life is tied to righteousness and death is tied to sin. When God is telling his people to choose whether or not they will serve Him in the promised land, He declares, "See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction." (Deuteronomy 30:15) He tells the people that following Him leads to life, and rejecting Him (sin) leads to destruction. These two dimensions are separated by the law, which tells us how to choose righteousness and warns us to avoid sin.

God gives us life, and the law instructs us on how to keep it. However, none of us can keep the law perfectly. None of us can always please God and avoid sin. As much as we want life, sometimes we court death instead. We all have a reckless and rebellious streak in us. So when that happens, we end up "on the wrong side of the law", so to speak:

Uh-oh. This is not where we want to be. It doesn't feel at all good to be covered in sin, and what's worse sin is contagious—by hanging out on this dimension, we inevitably bring spiritual, emotional, and/or physical harm to ourselves and those around us. When our sin drags us over to the wrong dimension, we usually have one of three reactions:

• Denial. We're not sinners. We haven't done anything wrong. That big wall labeled 'law' is all in our imagination, so how could we possibly be on the wrong side of it? Everything is fine, and this side of the spectrum is no different from the other side. This approach is bound to get us into trouble. Just because we say nothing is wrong doesn't mean nothing is wrong. Our sin will continue to pollute our lives and those around us until we face up to it.
• Atonement. We try to climb back over the wall to the righteousness side by atoning for what we've done. Unfortunately, this doesn't really work. We aren't really capable of rescuing ourselves from our own sin, and our righteous deeds simply aren't going to erase the failures that dumped us over here in the first place. The sad fact is that law is a bit like a one-way door—it convicts us of our sins but has no power to pronounce parole for good behavior.
• Repentance. This is the only real way to get back to the side of life. When we ask God to forgive us, the sin that sent us over here in the first place is erased, and voila:

 We're back on the side of life again! Of course, that forgiveness erases the act, but not all of the damage that act caused. We may still be hurt, and some other people may be too. But we are back on the side of life and on our way to recovery. We cannot get back across that wall on our own—we need God to carry us.

I hope that this diagram points out a few important truths:

• This is not some tiresome exercise in legalism. This picture does not tell the story of an angry God who wants to punish us for breaking the law and crossing into the realm of sin. The truth is that God wants us to be on the side of life, and he teaches us righteousness because righteousness leads to life. It is the sin itself that harms us, and that is why God warns us so strenuously not to sin. If He wanted to, God could just leave us there to suffer, but He doesn't. The second we humbly ask Him to make things right, He accepts our apology and carries us back over to life.
• The law serves a useful function, even for those who believe in grace. It's kind of a guidepost that helps us figure out where we are on the spectrum. Without the law, we may not realize it when we cross over into the bad land of sin and death. By pointing out what we've done wrong, the law reminds us that we need to get help to go back to where we want to be.
• We don't want to be righteous just so we can be God's little 'A' students. We want to be righteous because we want to live. We want our souls to flourish and be healthy. We want to have joy. This spectrum should not be an exercise in pride. The fact is that we only ever made it to the side of righteousness in the first place because God put us there Himself, and on our own we'd be mired in the land of sin and death before the day is out. Every one of us. Even Mother Theresa would have been lost without God's mercy and forgiveness. None of us can stand in the land of the living by our own power.

So, really, I think law and gospel are partners. Neither one makes complete sense without the gospel. Law shows us where we are on the spectrum, and gospel helps us get to where we want to be. Without the law, how would we know that we need to move? We would never take advantage of the gospel if we didn't know we needed it. Without the gospel, the law is very depressing. We find ourselves in a dark land with no way to get out. But together, law and gospel provide us with the clarity and help we need to successfully navigate our faith.

Investing in Community

Sometimes I worry about our insular, independent culture. We have a huge focus on self-sufficiency, privacy, and personal space. Each of us is a bit of an island, and that can make us feel isolated and unsupported. We keep both our joys and our sorrows to ourselves so as not to impose our feelings or our business on other people. We think of interaction as a bother or an invasion—either to ourselves or to the other person. We create a small list of loved ones whom we allow ourselves to "trouble" with our personal business and our private feelings, and we carefully hide our personal thoughts and feelings from everyone else. I don't like this, and I don't think it's what Jesus wanted for us.

Lots of people talk about their personal relationship with Jesus Christ, but have we forgotten the second great commandment: love your neighbor as yourself? If we thought that "love God" means to simply avoid making Him angry, then it would make sense to interpret "love your neighbor" as simply endeavoring to do no harm to anyone. But if we truly believe that the commandment to love God means that we should have a personal relationship with Him in which we share our joy and our pain, our hopes and our fears, then why would we think we should keep our neighbors at a distance? Should we not also love our neighbors through personal relationships? Should we not volunteer to help them when we see them in need or ask for their support when we are struggling ourselves? Should we not band together in the knowledge that two are more powerful than one?

It seems to me that Paul had a very good reason for writing so eloquently about how we Christians are all members of one body. We are meant to work together and to be responsible and responsive to one another. We think too much in terms of "me and mine" when we could be stronger and healthier if we more often thought in terms of "us" and "ours". Why do we not not more often pool our resources with others—our money, our possessions, our space, our time, our thoughts and feelings? I'm not necessarily advocating radical socialism here. But I see it as a strength—not a weakness—that I am planning for my mother to move in with me and that I am increasingly more willing to confide my personal thoughts and feelings to more and more people. I want my children to be welcome in other people's homes. I want to give to those who find themselves without something they need without them feeling like they owe me. I want my home to be filled with people and joy. I want a large circle of friends that I can share my dreams and my struggles with. I want to be myself openly as much as possible, and I want to see the true essence of the people around me.

Why should we hide what God has given us? Why should we see each other as anything less but brothers and sisters? Are we not all creations of the same God? Are we not all offered redemption through the same Christ? Are we not all imperfect beings who need all the help we can get, including from each other? Do we not all have something good to offer to those around us? It's time for us to become more proactive about using our gifts and less standoffish about sharing our pain or our "private" business. After all, God said that it was not good for Adam to be alone. He designed us to function with others, to help each other through community. When we work together for the good of all, we are inevitably at our best.

Being a good Christian is not about being locked away like a hermit studying holy things. After all, Christianity is not an intellectual exercise or a collection of beliefs—it is a way of life, and our life is given meaning through our interactions with God and each other. We need our neighbors so that we have someone to serve and someone to share the good news with as much as we need them to help us when we are not strong enough to bear our burdens alone. All of this interaction is right and good. Christians are supposed to invest in their communities. It's a challenging thing to do, because getting involved and opening up takes energy and it makes us vulnerable to others. But it is an investment worth making, for I believe that countless blessings will come upon those who accept the challenge.

Be Prepared

When it comes to socializing or leisure time, I don't mind flying by the seat of my pants. When it comes to important and serious parts of my life, however, I like to have a plan. It doesn't have to be an exhaustive plan or a far-reaching plan or a rigid plan. I'm OK with flexibility, and I'm willing to change my plan when circumstances change. But I like to feel like I have at least some handle on what's going on, that I have a strategy that will help me succeed. I like to feel prepared.

Some people might say that I'm fooling myself with all this planning. I don't have any control over most of what happens in this world or even in my life. I don't know whether my house will be burglarized, whether someone will steal my identity, whether someone I love will die in an accident, even whether I myself will wake up tomorrow. I don't know how to put enough money away to provide for my family's future. I'm not even quite sure how this year's finances are going to turn out—there are so many variables. To a planner, all of this may seem a bit depressing. Am I really just throwing myself into the arms of fate and hoping against hope that everything will turn out OK?

Yes and no.

While it is true that I can try to take certain precautions, I can never be completely prepared for any eventuality. I could spend hours worrying myself sick about the weaknesses in my financial portfolio or the gaps in my education. Or I could call to mind some soothing words of Jesus: "I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? . . . Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:25–27, 34) 


After all, didn't Jesus send his disciples out with no provisions at all? "Take nothing for the journey except a staff—no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. Wear sandals but not an extra shirt." (Mark 6:8–9) Yet, is it fair to say that Jesus sent out his disciples unprepared? Were the ready for this incredible journey? Yes and no. They certainly didn't have a detailed plan for any eventuality, but they had an overarching faith that guided them. They were prepared in a more general sort of way, and all of us can emulate their example.


So all plans, logistics, finances, and random chance aside, I can feel confident knowing that there are certain things I can do to be prepared for anything:

• Read the Bible. Any time I find myself in a huge dilemma or embroiled in a big problem, chances are that I can find something in Scripture that can help me figure out what to do. In fact, I should read the Bible over and over, even when I'm not in trouble. The more I read it and think about it, the easier it will be for me to use it when I really need it. 
• Pray. I find that it's a good idea to ask God's opinion when there are difficult decisions to be made. I may not always get a straight answer, but listening for God helps me to feel calmer, reminds me that He's in charge instead of me. And sometimes inspiration does come.
• Build a living support system. No matter what happens to me—good or bad—I'm going to need family and friends. Their advice will help me make both big and small decisions, and their support will help me through everyday and crazy experiences. I should dedicate a significant portion of my energy to nurturing a wide variety of relationships. As we help each other, the road will become easier for all of us.
• Embrace love. No matter what happens, love is real and it is a fuel unlike any other. Knowing that I am loved convinces me to trust when I would rather panic, pushes me to keep trying when I would rather give up. God loves me, and so do my family and friends. Even when my loved ones can't offer the tangible support I may want, their love means that I am never alone. There is no problem too big for God, and there is nothing that can stop me from being with Him in the end.

I don't have to make the decisions all by myself. I don't have to create a plan for every contingency. God is my navigator and my family and friends are my co-pilots and my supporters. It may get sloppy sometimes, but I know that in the end I'm going to get where I wanted to go. Sometimes I may have to wing it, but my life is in the hands of a higher power who is much kinder than random chance. 

The truth is that as long as I have God, the love and teachings of Jesus Christ, and my loved ones, I will always be prepared.