Creatives and Critics

The OEV blog has been down for some time now because I've been writing a novella for Kindle!  You can find it under the author's name "Nathan Collier" The title is "The Wren"  it should be available Tuesday June 11th or Wednesday June 12th.  99 cents!  Barely 100 pages!  It's a quick read and it doesn't really ask a lot of you.  Check it out if you can. 

Let's talk about creatives first.  

People who "create" writers, artists, film makers, music makers, comedians, speech writers, chefs, marketers, photographers, graphic designers, sure even bartenders and baristas, and many more occupations I'm leaving out, typically have something in common personality wise.  

They're not great when it comes to taking criticism.

This is interesting and difficult, because they often occupy a world where people are constantly giving opinions of their work, and many of those opinions can be negative.  

So they're not wired to handle critics but they live in a world where they are constantly doing exactly that.  

Because of this, surviving in any of these fields requires more than just the creative juices to make something from nothing, it takes perseverance.  You have to wade through the mire of rejection daily. It's often not the most talented creatives that survive in their industry.  You see over and over again that it's the most bull-headed.  The ones who are the best at allowing the negativity to bounce off of them and keep going.  

God is creative.  

He made something from nothing.  And we're not his audience, we were never meant to be.  We are literally part of the painting.  We are his Mona Lisa, his Melting Clocks, even his The Screamer.  That means we can affect and change his creation in negative and positive ways.  We can make the painting better, or worse.

There's something I love about kids movies.



Kids movies are so much more enjoyable when there are actual children to watch the movie with. Half of the fun is watching the kids react as the movie progresses. They laugh, they cry, their eyes get huge. They are the absolute definition of a "captive audience". Their eyes are literally glued to the screen. And slowly it dawns on us what's happening to them.

They're being awed.

Then we get older. And it stops happening. 

We stop being a captive audience, and we become something else. 

Critics.

We lean over to each other and discuss the trailers. We even make sure we arrive at the theatre extra early just so we can review the trailers. Then we go eat, and it happens there too. We're critics. We talk about the menu, the wait staff, the speed of service, the "atmosphere".

We get in the car, and then it happens again, we do it with the music we listen to. 

"You know they only digitize his voice because he can't sing."

The thing about critics is they must remain disengaged from the thing they are reviewing. They can't allow themselves to be engrosed in the event. Be it a movie, restaurant, concert. If they let themselves sink into it they run the risk of being awed. And critics don't do that. 

They have to stay dissconnected. 

Adding to this issue is the fact that our culture finds it very uncool to be genuinely in awe of anything.

So we go through our days with our critics mentality and then one day it happens somewhere else. 

Church.

In God's world, we're the creation, but when we worship him we need to realize that we're the performers, not the audience.

"Could that guys prayer have been any longer?"

"Somone needs to tell that song leader he always starts that song too high."

"Did she really wear that to church?"

Since we're wired to be this way everywhere else, we do it at church too. 

Worship however, if anything is an offering.

Something we're offering would then makes us the performers, not the audience. 

The audience is of course God.

An interesting opposite occurs here. 

Instead of the audience being awed by the performers, the performers are awed by the audience.  Well, in an ideal world anyway.

If the audience loves the offering, isn't that what matters most?  

Why Divorce?

As far as I can tell, divorce is the only thing in scriptures that God hates, then turns around and allows us to do it.  

Think about this,

God hates divorce, all divorces, all the time.  (Malachi 2)

Yet we have several passages where Jesus, Paul, or someone else allows divorce as a very real option for certain problems.  

So here we have God, laying out the groundwork and letting us do this thing that he hates so much.  

Why?  

For all the other things God hates (see Proverbs 6) he doesn't give us some loophole to perform those actions.  It's just simply, "don't do that."  

For the longest time I thought to myself, "why not just make divorce wrong all the time?" 

We don't have any red letters that tell us "divorce is wrong, always, just go ahead and never ever divorce."  

The problem I was dealing with lied in the fact that I found this rather inconsistent of God.  

But the problem wasn't God, it was me.  Or rather, the problem is "us."  

Matthew 19 is an incredible chapter.  The kind of "sweet spot" of the ministry of Jesus.  The Transfiguration had just happened and now he's really into the heart of his ministry, which is now in its prime.  He's got huge crowds, huge miracles, huge followers, and he gets hit with huge questions.  

The Pharisees, who are trying to trick Jesus, ask him, "Is it lawful for a man to send his wife away for any and every reason?"  

He tells them the part in Genesis that says "What God has joined let no man separate."  

"Ah yes," they reply, "well then why did Moses allow men to deliver certificates of divorce to their wives?'  

Jesus reply is a stabbing reply, not just for them at that time, but for all of us.  He said, to paraphrase, "Moses allowed you divorce because your hearts are hard, it wasn't supposed to be like that in the beginning."  

Basically saying, "divorce exists because you are all bad people."  

The laws of marriage exist, but they don't automatically make us good at marriage.  And thousands of years ago when Moses was given laws for his people God understood something.

Some people are still going to hurt each other, they'll still lie, cheat, slander, and mislead.  

I know a therapist who has a phrase framed in his office, it says "The God who Wastes Nothing."  

He can use everything to his will, even when someone breaks apart something he joined together.   

King David Teaches Hemingway a Lesson

I remember being semi-shocked to learn than Ernest Hemingway died via committing suicide.  I was in high school and as I studied Hemingway's life it read like an absolute adventure novel.  He survived two world wars, he survived being attacked by virtually every kind of creature Africa has to offer, he survived 2 plane crashes, he survived relationships with many varied Parisian vixens, he seemed invincible.  It didn't make any sort of sense to my young mind that after all that he would end it himself.

One anecdote in particular showed the kind of mettle he had.

In the summer of 1944 Hemingway was in London covering WWII as a war corespondent. (There he is on the right, with another journalist on the left, their army driver in the center)  One night the air sirens went off while Hemingway was being driven through the streets in a limo.  As was custom at the sound of the sirens the entire city went dark, including the street lights.  Hemingway's driver (not the one in the pic) ended up crashing the limo and the resulting head injury netted Ernest 57 stitches to the head.  A British doctor told him he needed to cancel his plans to ride along in a landing craft on D-Day (Ernest asked for special permission to be in one of the landing crafts).  He rode in the craft anyway, stitches and all.  Once his boat hit the sand the men in the boat proceeded to hold down the 45 year old writer with head stitches, who was straining to run out on the beach.  The men were told before hand to treat him as precious cargo.

If you've ever been in any 5th grade English class you've probably learned every story has conflict, but there are essentially only three kinds of conflict.

1. Person vs Person

2. Person vs Nature

3. Person vs Self

Hemingway's depression certainly contributed to his suicide, still there's a sort of objective irony to his life.  A man who was so powerful and lionized regarding conflicts 1 and 2, only to be felled by conflict 3, perhaps the most dangerous and perplexing of them all.

A person versus themselves.

I've found, from my varied and short existence, that conflict 3 is the most oft ignored, yet also the most critical to our lives, it is also the one that most requires a relationship with God.

Now the best Biblical comparison for Ernest Hemingway, as far as I can tell, is easily King David.

Another warrior poet, bold in battle and a weakness for women, who also had some pretty intense mental issues.

Unlike Ernest Hemingway, David was not an atheist.  His moments of mental anguish seemed to result in some of the most heartfelt Psalms you'll ever read.  In Psalms 6 he says things like "my bones are in agony" and "I'm exhausted from all my groaning."  In Psalms 77 he says "you have kept my eyes from closing" and "I am too troubled to speak."  David's moments of depression didn't stop him from talking to God.  He actually told God all about it, at times even blaming God.

"you have kept my eyes from closing"

David knows a profound truth, namely that God wants to hear all that stuff.

If it's on your heart, God wants to know, even if it's messy, angry, sad, and even the moments when your anger seems to be turned toward him.  We tend to turn toward God in the rough moments don't we?  However, it's usually to ask for salvation, to ask for relief, to ask for help.

When really what we need to be doing is expressing how we're feeling, less "help me" and more "I'm hurting."

"Help me" stinks of a one-sided relationship, one where you're interested in what you can get out of it.

"I'm hurting" is different.  It shows you're feeding your emotions into the relationship.

Tell God when your exhausted from your groaning.  Tell him when he's kept your eyes from closing, and then plead for salvation.

Hemingway used to joke that he was the one exception to the old adage "there are no atheists in foxholes."

Of course, that also meant in the most horrible of moments he had no one to talk to.

In many of the Psalms you can see David, being expressively happy about the fact that he worships a God who hears.  Psalms 5,10,17,38,61, and 65 all have direct lines about God listening. 

The act of telling God your troubles is more for you than it is for God.  And the fact is hearing your own problems expressed through your own words does more for you than you probably notice.  So the next time you find yourself asking for help with a problem, try spending some time first telling God about the problem its self.  Because there is quite simply nothing like a God who listens.

That One Starfish

Remember the Christian anecdote about the footprints in the sand?  It's easily the most popular "Christian fable" (if such a term may be employed) that I can think of. 

If "Footprints" is the most popular Christian fable, then the Starfish fable is probably the silver medal. 

Basically, a man is seen walking down the beach, periodically he stops and throws a starfish from the sand into the surf, essentially saving the starfish's life.  An observer who sees that the beach is full of starfish comes up to the man and says "There are so many starfish to save, even if you worked all day and night you wouldn't make a difference."  The man flings another starfish and replies "I made a difference to that one."

The story works so well because we so often take the role of the "observer".  We're big picture people, we like to step back, frame our world, and then make judgements.  When you step back, you see nothing but a beach full of dying starfish, the one man becomes such a small part of the picture he's barely noticeable.  So the observer walks away with a sad story, there's a beach full of dying starfish. 

In the real world this unfortunate "framing" happens on a much bigger and more significant level.

How many times have you heard someone claim that Christianity has only caused problems?  It's a popular argument among skeptics and agnostics.  When you look through their frame though, you can see where they're coming from.  The "frame" their looking through is called "recorded history" and when you lay it out end to end it tells a sad tale of Christianity.  

The persecution of the Caesars

The scattering of the believers

The Crusades

The Spanish Inquisition

Catholics killing Protestants

Protestants killing Catholics

Being arrested, tortured, and mocked at the hands of various governments.

It's not pretty, and much of the violence listed above was caused by people claiming to act in God's name.  So, using "recorded history" as your frame, you'd see the same thing a skeptic would see.

The problem is, essentially, the frame its self.

Remember how the observer on the beach lost sight of the man helping the starfish?  All he could see was the sad painting that his point of view provided.  The same is true of history.

But there's a whole other picture that history seems to lose sight of. 

During all those horrible times cited above, there were Christians, by the thousands, feeding the hungry, healing the sick, clothing the naked, giving time, giving energy, giving money.  And doing it because Jesus told them to.  

And even when there wasn't "bad times" there were still Christians doing the same.  All over the world.

And they're still doing it today.

The lives saved by Christianity would so far outnumber the lives lost because of Christianity that the comparison its self would become asinine.

However, history records the grand moments, the large scale events, and more often than not, forgets the good in favor of remembering the bad.

How many history books have a sentence like "Jimmy traveled around his village handing out bread and coins, and he did this every week until he died."

History forgets Jimmy.

So looking through our frame, gazing down the beach, we see only stranded starfish, the "helping man" becomes a speck on the horizon.

A walk down the beach however, will reveal something the frame didn't show.

The helping man is not alone.

There are millions just like him, and they won't stop.  

     

 

You are Not The Hulk (and that's a good thing)

When "The Incredible Hulk" premiered in May 1962 it lasted only 6 issues before being cancelled.  It would have been easy then for Stan Lee to write off the character and cut his losses, but we all know that didn't happen.

Yes, his original title series had been cancelled, but all of a sudden we see Bruce Banner and his big green rage monster appear as a guest in "The Fantastic Four" (March 1963).  Lee wrote in the character first as the enemy of the Fantastic Four, then 3 issues later, making them his ally.

Then, The Hulk shows up in "The Incredible Spider Man" in '64.  Once again, Stan was ignoring the fact that the market had rejected the character.  In the fall of '64 Hulk makes an appearance in a comic series called "Tales to Astonish" an episodic comic series Stan Lee would use to introduce characters and test the markets approval of newly invented superheros.

Now, as you probably know, The Hulk's blessing (and curse, Stan Lee won't give you a superpower unless it comes with a catch) is super strength that is triggered as a direct relation to his anger.  His power exists on a sliding scale that literally makes him stronger the angrier he gets.  This means he spends his days hyper managing his emotions, until it's "hulk smash" time, then he must force himself to somehow trigger his own anger in order to transform and save the day.

I've often wondered about The Hulk, specifically if he has one memory in particular he can use to trigger his anger, the same way an actor has a memory he/she can trigger in order to cry.  It turns out that this is often times exactly the case.

Stan Lee revealed to us in some origin work the fact that Bruce Banner's father was abusive to his mother.  In fact, when Bruce was young his mother used to hide and protect him during his father's fits of rage.  This in turn, meant young Bruce was afraid of anger and the specific physical reactions it could cause.  On a very deep level in Bruce's mind being angry is directly tied to acting angry.  In fact, Stan Lee says, in many instances where Bruce needs to fight, he is often times triggering the memory of his father being abusive, that's his "go to" Hulk memory.  It's ironic then that the one memory Bruce needs to erase from his memory is in fact the memory he needs to keep closest.  You can see now how deep and touching the character is, and why Stan Lee wasn't ready to give up on his story, which leads us to one of Bruce's signature catch phrases.

"You're making me angry"

An interesting phrase considering the fact that no one "makes" another person angry, well, not for "normals" like you and I.

People that aren't The Hulk have this barrier between "being angry" and "acting angry" we all have to make the active decision, even when angry, to act on our emotion.

The problem is, too many people act as if they don't have control, they imagine themselves with the curse of The Hulk, unable to fight against their actions once they become angry.

We all know "being angry" and "acting angry" aren't automatically sinful.  The theology behind this can be discussed at depth in another blog.  The point of this short little ditty is the simple fact that you and I have a power that The Hulk does not.

Once we "feel angry" we can decide to not enter the doorway into the "acting angry" realm.

From OEV, hope your holidays were special and we'll be back with more soon!

For Sandy Hook

Words so often fall short, it's important to notice the moments when they don't. 

Provided below is the poem "Christmas Bells" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.  It was, as you'll notice, written about the American Civil War, a conflict that was fascinating to the poet.  The poem its self, especially the last half, is heartbreakingly fitting following the events at Sandy Hook Elementary.  Our nation has so many difficult discussions ahead of us, and there will come a time to talk about the political ramifications.  For now though, it's more appropriate to "be in the ditch" with those who mourn, as using their loss to further any agenda at all undermines the event its self. 

The last 3 stanzas are when your mind will, despite your best efforts, turn to Sandy Hook.

So read these words, and picture those you hold close as you do.

Christmas Bells

I heard the bells of Christmas Day
their old, familiar carols play,
and wild and sweet,
the words repeat 
Of peace on earth good will towards men!

And thought how, as the day had come, 
the belfries of all Christendom, 
had rolled along
the unbroken song
Of peace on earth good will towards men!

Till ringing, singing, on its way, 
the world revolved from night to day
a voice, a chime, 
a chant sublime 
Of peace on earth good will towards men!

Then from each black, accursed mouth, 
The cannon thundered in the South!
and with the sound,
the carols drowned, 
Of peace on earth good will toward men!

It was as if an earthquake rent, 
The hearth-stones of a continent 
and made forlorn, 
The households born
Of peace on earth good will towards men!

And in despair I bowed my head, 
"There is no peace on earth!" I said, 
for hate is strong, 
and mocks the song,
Of peace on earth good will towards men, 

Then pealed the bells, more loud and deep!
"God is not dead; nor does he sleep" 
The wrong shall fail
The right prevail, 
With peace on earth, good will towards men!

Tank Preaching

This is the M1A1 Abrams Tank.  It's been around since 1978 but recent upgrades and add ons have made it easily the most dangerous and successful tank in existence. Ever.

Machines like the one above carried out Operation Desert Storm.

Many of the engagements in and around Desert Storm were fiercely lopsided, and this tank was the reason.

Like the time M1A2 tanks destroyed seven T-72 Lion of Babylon tanks at point blank range (less than 50 yards) with no losses to the USA.  In fact, no M1A1 has ever been destroyed by fire from an enemy tank.  

Any M1A1 that's been disabled or broken down, has been destroyed by the United States, for obvious reasons, and many Army engineers have gone on record about how difficult it was to sufficiently destroy one of these fellas.

Can you imagine what it would look like, if sitting atop that tank, was a person preaching about Jesus?  The tanks main gun barrel transformed into a giant megaphone, and it drives around the countryside preaching the good news.

Stay with me, just for a few paragraphs.

In 1st Kings 10:29, we're told that Solomon was in the business of buying and selling chariots, ie, the "tanks" of his day.

http://bible.cc/1_kings/10-29.htm

Chariots were war machines, and were absolutely devastating to men on foot.  You know, like a tank.  Solomon used Israel as a sort of "middle man" and imported chariots then exported them for huge profit for his people.

I'm sure the people of the royal court were happy, impressed even.  Thanks to their king Israel was building wealth and securing a fine future.  I think, if I were around then, I'd probably shower Solomon with compliments, congratulate him, maybe a slap on the back or two.  This was an impressive business decision and it meant profit.  That's good, right?

I'd imagine, though I'm not sure, that David (Solomon's father) would have taught him well in the law.  If that's the case, then Solomon no doubt knew about Deuteronomy 17:14-20.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Deuteronomy+17%3A14-20&version=NIV

Don't multiply power, and don't build wealth, and most importantly, don't use Egypt (your former life) to do it.

Thanks to Solomon, chariots were now in the hands of several kingdoms, and these kingdoms can use their "tanks" however they want, and Solomon can't do anything about it.

Once you add in Proverbs 21:31, the irony gets thick enough to run over with a chariot.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Proverbs+21%3A31&version=NIV

Solomon wrote that.

He intrinsically knows where his salvation and strength come from, and it's not your money or the size of the army you can put on the field.  So then, why persist with the wealth building, why keep on turning chariots for big profits to nations who will almost certainly use them for a violent purpose?

1st Kings 10 also says that the gold Solomon received weighed 666 talents.  Wow.  That's a very "Hebrew" way to say something very wrong is going on here. 

But, as we all know, that's not the end of the story.

One of the things I love about Jesus is how his story transforms whatever it interacts with.  There's several cases of someone meeting Jesus, even for only a moment or so, and they leave changed.  The story of Jesus changes people, and the Biblical narrative shows us in no subtle way.  His is a story so powerful it can take something previously used for war and violence and suddenly use it to carry his "good news."

Like a chariot

In Acts 8 a man named Phillip sees another man on a chariot reading about Jesus.  The man on the chariot was an Ethiopian official in charge of the treasury of his nation.  After their incredible interaction, the Ethiopian went on his way rejoicing about Jesus.  It's easy to read that story and glaze over the intentional irony woven into the tale.

The chariot, hundreds of years previous, was misused by Solomon, and thanks to him they were now all over the known world.  Then, the story of Jesus transforms this war machine into a vessel that will carry his story out of Israel and into other parts of the world.  A tank collides with the story of Jesus, and it leaves the meeting carrying a preacher.

"Swords to ploughshares" Just like Isiah said.