Recently I received a complement that really got me thinking.  Someone came up to me and said, “Jon that shirt looks really good on you.”  I said, “Thank you very much.”  As I walked away I thought to myself, “That’s one of the weirdest conversations I’ve ever had.” As I thought about the phrase “That shirt looks good on you”, I realized that I was being complimented for being a hanger.

As I thought about it more I came to the conclusion that what was actually being complimented was the shirt.

The person didn’t say, “you look very nice, and I like your shirt”.

Now the person who said this is not the weirdest weirdo in the conversation, because I said, “Thank you”, as if in some way I could take credit for how good the shirt looked.  I didn’t make the shirt; I picked it out from a pile of ten other shirts just like it.

I was complimented for something that had nothing to do with me,
and then I took credit for it.

–

 Compliments are essentially our way of congratulating someone
on things that we admire.

Some people are good at giving compliments.  They don’t compliment people on things, behaviors, or appearances but rather on character traits.  When I was a youth pastor, every night of our mission trips ended with a time to encourage and compliment someone about “who they are” or who we see them becoming in Christ.  We always tried to push past behavior and commend the character behind it.

For instance someone might stay behind after dinner to help clean up.  We didn’t say, “Thanks for cleaning the table”, we said, “Today you were such a servant, you were selfless, and gave up your time for others.”  That’s a good compliment, because it goes beyond what was done, and down into “who you are” and “who God is causing you to become.”

I’ve learned that you can tell what is important to someone by the things they compliment in other people.

I’ve heard girls complimented for being pretty,

as if they had anything to do with it.

Boys complimented on being tall,

like short boys just aren’t applying themselves.

Men complimented on having such thick hair,

“Like a Russian Cossack!”

 And women complimented for having great nails,

Just say, “nice genes” next time.

These compliments don’t really mean much, they’re just a way of telling someone they pass our muster.

–

Some people aren’t bad at giving compliments; they’re bad at receiving them.

It’s like they’ve coated themselves in compliment repellent.  They are so busy denying your compliment with self-deprecating deflection that you almost want to scream and walk away.

Sometimes they can’t receive a compliment because they’re too busy saying, “It was all God…”.  As nice as that sentiment is intended to be, I’m of the belief that God would do things 100% better than us 100% of the time.

Nothing we ever do is actually God good.

It makes you wonder if either person has ever heard the phrase “Thank you” before?  “Thank you” is a perfectly acceptable response to a compliment.  It doesn’t dethrone God, it doesn’t make anyone else uncomfortable, and it tells the person doing the complimenting that you appreciate their kind words on your behalf.  “Thank you” is both honest and gracious.

There are great and Godly ways of saying thank you.

 David remarked longingly to his men, “Oh, how I would love some of that good water from the well by the gate in Bethlehem. So the three (warriors) broke through the Philistine lines, drew some water from the well by the gate in Bethlehem and brought it back to David. But he refused to drink it. Instead he poured it out as an offering to the Lord.” “The Lord forbid that I should drink this!” he exclaimed.  “This water is as precious as the blood of these men who risked their lives to bring it to me…”  II Samuel 23:14-17

This gift was a tremendous compliment and affirmation, but David refused to drink the water.  Do you think that this was what the 3 men expected? Is David someone who cannot receive something from someone else?

I think we can learn from David exactly what to do in a situation where we are the recipients of an amazing outpouring of gracious behavior.  David accepted their gift, THEN offered it up to God.  David received their grace, then added truth to the mix.

Most of the time we do one or the other.  We accept the gracious comments of others as if we are the only ones responsible, or we disingenuously deflect them towards the Lord.

You’ve seen this before right?  You’ll try to tell someone that you really respect something that they’ve done, and they just keep saying that it didn’t have anything to do with them, it was “all God”.  Pastors are the worst at this.

“You know Jon I really enjoyed the sermon this morning.” 

“Oh it was nothing, it was all the Lord.”

That might sound righteous initially, but aren’t I asking you to ignore hours of work and then believe that I got up on stage, and something Godly just tumbled out?   That’s a lie.

There’s nothing wrong with accepting the congratulations or the compliments of others.

In fact it’s actually an exercise in humility to stop and say thank you.  By saying “thank you”, you are acknowledging that you are not above the giver.  You’re acknowledging that that person has something to offer you, and you’re also giving them the opportunity to speak the words of the Lord to you through them.

Beyond this this, can you really offer something to God that isn’t actually yours?  In truth, you must own and acknowledge a gift, before passing on to the only one that is worthy of worship.

Each of our lives is lived out in much the same manner as the boy who brought his loaves and fishes to Jesus.  Even though we might have plenty of skill talent or resource, it’s never actually enough until it gets placed in God’s hands.   I could put 40 hours into a sermon, but if the Lord is not in it then it becomes merely entertainment of the narrowest variety.

Whenever we are complimented we have the opportunity to accept the gracious offering and marry it with the truth.  It’s our responsibility to accept what is being given and then offer it up to the person who multiplied our work into something better than it could have been on its own.

Today, don’t skip the self-humbling step of owning someone’s praise before offering it to God.

When we offer the praise that has been given us to God, it points people in the direction of the one who is always worthy, but vastly under recognized.

This act of sacrifice is something that honors God and brings humility to everyone involved.

I don’t think that I need to spend too much time making the point that bad attitudes spread from person to person like a virus from that monkey in Outbreak.

You’ve probably spent 15 minutes with hungry kids right?

You’ve visited the post office on December 22^nd.

Ever seen an NBA game?

It’s almost impossible to contain a bad attitude.  This is because, in the moment, none of us will admit to having them.

When you confront someone on having a bad attitude they always have the same response don’t they?

“I don’t have a bad attitude, I’m just being realistic.”

Unfortunately, there’s no such thing as a “realistic” attitude.  Attitudes are positive, negative, or ambivalent.  Realism is a way of thinking; being a crab apple because you think you know how things are going to work out is an attitude.

See, you can be the world’s biggest realist and still have a great attitude in the same way that you can be a romanticist and have a terrible attitude.  A realist with a good attitude looks a lot like Mr. Spock, and someone with a romanticized view of pessimism looks a lot like…

…well Radiohead comes to mind.

As if denying our bad attitudes isn’t enough, when confronted with the Incontrovertible evidence of a bad attitude we immediately begin defending them:

“Well you’d have a bad attitude too if you’d had the day I’ve just had.”

“It’s not wrong for me to feel this way, I’ve been mistreated.” 

Don’t these gripes gloss over many people who have it worse than us, some of whom are working twice as hard as we are just to survive? Right now there are kids undergoing cancer treatment who aren’t screaming at somebody for getting onions on their burger or having spotty coverage from their mobile provider.

I’m not saying that it’s wrong to feel a certain way after being mistreated; I’m simply saying that there’s never a justifiable reason to treat people as if they aren’t human beings.

Quite simply, bad attitudes become an excuse for taking our hurt and frustration out on other people.  In short, we choose to hurt others because we have been hurt.

Treating people with dignity is a responsibility that we never get to set down.  You see, it’s only when we are willing to lay down our supposed “rights” and “expectations” and pick up our responsibilities that we give God permission to overcome our negative attitudes.

When God overcomes our bad attitudes we stop the spread of negativity and gain the opportunity to demonstrate that the love of Jesus Christ has

Penetrated our wounded heart,

Permeated it,

and is Passing on to others.

In second Kings 6 we see this play out in the life of Elisha:

“Now the king of Aram was at war with Israel. After conferring with his officers, he said, ‘I will set up my camp in such and such a place’… Then he sent horses and chariots and a strong force there. They went by night and surrounded the city.”

At Zero Dark Thirty, what kind of attitude do you have? Elisha’s servant has the attitude and the response that I think I would have.

…“Oh no, my lord! What shall we do?” the servant asked.  “Don’t be afraid,” the prophet answered. “Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”

Elisha’s response is:

“Keep calm

and

trust God.”

In Elisha’s response we get to learn some very important attitude adjusters.  Elisha places his faith in God.  Right away the prophet declares that the servant should not be afraid, and the reason for this is that they are not really outnumbered.

“Elisha prayed, ‘Open his eyes, Lord, so that he may see.’ …the Lord opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire…”

A negative attitude reflects the belief that what we can see is all that is happening.

Elisha’s righteous attitude came from a belief that God is working behind the scenes, and that God is faithful to work things out on his behalf.  This wasn’t blind optimism but a demonstration of faith that comes from knowing where he stood, not in relationship to the enemy, but in his relationship to God.

Elisha loved God and was living in obedience; when we live this way God consistently demonstrates that whatever circumstances we are experiencing are for our ultimate good.

“As the enemy came down toward him, Elisha prayed to the Lord, ‘Strike this army with blindness.’ So he struck them with blindness, as Elisha had asked…And he led them to Samaria.”

The second thing that Elisha did was call out to God.  He specifically asked God for spiritual power to accomplish his mission.

“… Elisha said, ‘Lord, open the eyes of these men so they can see.’ Then the Lord opened their eyes and they looked, and there they were, inside Samaria.  When the king of Israel saw them, he asked Elisha, ‘Shall I kill them, my father? Shall I kill them?’”

What are the circumstances that Elisha is living in?  Warfare, hostility, combat.  Elisha is entitled to an attitude informed by anger and self-protection, but he reveals a different kind of attitude than his circumstances should provoke.

“’Do not kill them,’ he answered… Set food and water before them so that they may eat and drink and then go back to their master.’ So he (the King) prepared a great feast for them, and after they had finished eating and drinking… they returned to their master.  So the bands from Aram stopped raiding Israel’s territory.”

Elisha’s righteous attitude and Godly response set a new tone for two kingdoms.  The interaction between him and the king led to the interaction between the king and the soldiers, and the interaction between the soldiers and their king brought about new interactions between Israel and Aram.

Elisha submitted to God, his servant submitted to God, the King submitted to God.

Until we grasp this concept we will see it as our job to fight against people because “they brought a bad attitude out of us” instead of fighting for people by presenting them with the attitude that God has filled us with.

Our situation is actually very similar to Elisha’s isn’t it?  Without a Godly attitude we fall into bitter warfare with our bosses, friends, spouses, and kids.  We won’t be able to control our actions or our words.

When our attitude is wrong we begin waging war in an effort to get what’s ours, proving we’re right at all costs.  That negative attitude spreads from us to others and infects our relationships in ways that strip away any merit from the gospel that we proclaim.

In the end we forget we are dealing with human beings don’t we?

So what do you need to set down?

What words do you need to apologize for?

Who do you need to stop fighting?

More importantly, whom do you need to invite to a feast?

–

A positive attitude doesn’t guarantee positive outcomes, but it’s the only thing that gives it a chance. We don’t do it because it’s going to work every time, we do it because it’s Godly.

When we choose to respond to relational crisis with a Godly attitude, we step back from working our personal plan for a situation and we actually let God do the work.

This is when we stop filling a situation with ourselves, and we leave room for God to do a miracle.

“A soft answer turns away wrath,

But a harsh word stirs up anger.

The tongue of the wise commends knowledge,

But the mouths of fools pour out folly.

The eyes of the Lord are in every place,

Keeping watch on the evil and the good.

 A gentle tongue is a tree of life,

But perverseness in it breaks the spirit.”

- Proverbs 15:1-4

When you’re a young pastor you imagine giving the kind of sermons that will really produce a change in people’s lives.

This is hard because no one in your home church will let you get up and preach when you’re just starting out, they usually farm you out to other churches and camp-outs to get “experience” before they put you in front of people that you will have to see again the next week.

When you first get these opportunities you immediately begin preparing like this is the most important thing that you will ever do and the only time that you will ever get to do it.

The whole time you’re preparing the sermon you’re writing with the end in mind… and by end I mean: “People coming up afterwards to tell you how awesome the sermon was.”

When you’re young this is the only way that you know to gauge whether or not you did a good job.

It’s an honor and a privilege to deliver a “guest sermon” on a Sunday morning or at a conference or retreat. If I’ve learned anything from speaking pastorally in a new public setting it’s this:

Every sermon you give is unique in that it is equally the best sermon that someone has ever heard,

AND

Quite possibly the worst sermon that someone has ever heard.

I know because people come up afterwards to tell you both of these things.

This is why you can’t accurately use complimentary comments as an barometer of success.

The people who find you immediately afterwards are usually incredibly effusive about how amazing the teaching was. In fact they’ve usually “never heard anything like it.”

These are the most encouraging and sweet-natured people you will ever meet. Many times they have personal stories about how you addressed something they were dealing with that very week, or that it felt like you were “talking directly to them the whole time.”

In this situations you need to be as gracious as possible because you know that while you were speaking to them, it was actually God who was speaking to their heart.

This is when you do the internal good work of battling the arrogance that presses you to stand there and lap up the adulation.

There are usually about three of these people in a row, enough to make you begin to believe that everything IS right in the world and that you really might actually be “the next Billy Graham.”

It’s my belief that God brings these people into contact with you because without their kindness you’re probably not going to be able to make it through the coming onslaught of conversationalists waiting in the wings.

Like bearded relief pitchers making their way out of the bull pen of intimidation, I’ve learned that the next 5 kinds of people will most certainly be bringing the heat “high and inside”.

You don’t know this yet, but this is also an essential, yet unforeseen, part of the experience that your own pastor wants you to get.

What follows is a field guide to the people you meet after giving a sermon out in the wild.

–

The Screwballer
The Screwballer moves in like they really loved the sermon. On approach they lob out genial statements, lulling you into believing that there will be some encouragement at the end of their paragraph of statements.

Just when you’ve sized up this person as someone you need to thank, they reveal themselves to be their church’s equivalent of Lieutenant Columbo; pointing their finger and demanding an answer for the theological conundrum that they believe they’ve just trapped you in.

“So you’ve agreed with me that God is love,
and that love is also blind,
are you also now expecting me to believe,
that Ray Charles is getting into heaven!”

While this immediately takes you aback, and it feels like you need to begin defending Ray Charles, the only thing you can really do in this situation is to begin asking the Screwballer your own off-topic, confusing questions.

“If God is all-powerful, can he make a rock so big that he can’t pick it up?”

“How did Adam name the whales? Did he swim out to them or did he and God make a raft?”

“Did Adam and Eve have belly buttons?”

As the Screwballer begins wresting with these hypo-theological hierarchies, ask his wife if they are going out to lunch, then ask him if there are any good restaurants in the area. This will perform the brain equivalent of a “hard reset”.

If this doesn’t get you onto a new subject, mention that you’ve just had Indian food and then excuse yourself to go to the bathroom… trust me, nothing makes the Screwballer feel uncomfortable.

The Inferrer
The Inferrer speaks with you like you know exactly what is going on in his personal life and in his church. To make matters worse, even though he begins talking to you as if you share a common reference point for the conversation, he also never settles on a conclusion to his thoughts or sentences.

“Great words this morning Pastor, especially with all that we’ve got going on here these days… I’m sure we’ll get things dialed in eventually. How did you guys do it?”

Compounding this intellectual brain teaser is the fact that The Inferrer is quite often a “close talker”. This means that the intimations and insinuations are coming faster and faster while the persons face is coming closer and closer.

It’s like having a conversation with the Riddler, except you’re not Batman.

Dealing with Captain Inference means simply saying “no” and “I don’t know” over and over again while asking return questions about the only thing you know about him… which is the ethnic takeout he clearly had the night before.

The Interrogator
The Interrogator is so focused on probing the implications of your sermon, they don’t even respond when you ask their name and reach out to shake their hand, they just grab yours, give you a single pump and immediately launch into a barrage of questions so exhaustive that by the time the last one is finished you need to ask them to repeat the initial question all over again.

Surviving the onslaught of the interrogator is simple: nod your head, give several “hmmm” and “ahhh” responses while crossing your arms and leaning back on something.

It’s important to let them know that you’re listening, but whatever you do don’t respond with words until they wrap up. This isn’t a conversation, it’s an opportunity for them to process what they just heard that you know, while letting you in on the things that they know. Questions are simply the form of rhetoric that they’re employing to communicate with you.

If you wait for a few seconds before responding, they’ll prove this to you by answering the question that they just asked you; which is great, because this was the answer they were looking for anyways!

The Investigator
Although The Investigator asks just as many questions as The Interrogator, they are actually a completely different kind of animal altogether.

The Investigator doesn’t seem to want to apply the things that they just heard from the Scripture, but their problem is that they actually can’t argue with what you’ve just preached… because it came straight out of the Bible.

Instead of arguing scripture with you, The Investigator begins probing your personal life and belief systems in search of flaws that will allow them to throw you (the bathwater) and your sermon (the baby) out of their life.

“How many kids do you have?”

“Do you believe in homeschooling”

“Do you agree with Rick Warren?”

“Why aren’t you using the ESV?”

“Did you vote for Osama?!?”

The Sniper
True to their name, you never actually see The Sniper. Their salvo comes at you silent and violent by way of your email. You come into the office on Monday morning hoping to begin prepping for the week, only to find that an unpublished book has been delivered to your inbox.

The Sniper clearly did not sleep on Sunday night, because their incredibly researched and footnoted email is too long, and too comprehensive to have been written in day-light hours alone.

While the content of the Email may be vary from Sniper to Sniper, it always opens with: “You don’t know me but…”
and closes with: “…correcting bad theology is very important to me.”

Bonus points can be awarded if the email contains something to this effect: “I don’t know John MacArthur personally, but I’m sure you would agree that he knows more than both of us on this subject.”

Dealing with The Sniper is best done with a polite reply that his email contains “many interesting details” that you will “certainly entertain” and that “sound doctrine is very important.”

Trust me, replying with anything more will only invite the kind of conflict that results in poor John MacArthur waking up to an unsolicited and annotated forward of your email… “for his thoughts”.

–

I’m pretty sure that it’s becoming apparent that waiting around to hear someone congratulate you after giving a sermon is a huge mistake, and I can say that I wish I’d realized this much earlier myself.

I’m not saying that a pastor should immediately evacuate the building after preaching, I’m saying that the reason a pastor hangs around after a sermon is for that rare instance that someone approaches you in need of pastoral attention resulting from the movement of the Holy Spirit in their heart.

That was the whole reason the sermon was prepared and delivered to begin with right?

That’s the experience our mentors are hoping that we get.

Photo: Josh Plueger

My wife and I hosted an African pastor in our home about two years ago.  He was incredibly funny and intelligent; he was also massive, 6 foot 3 and about 230 lbs.  Not only was he big, he was also fearless.  His life was lived outdoors in a bush country filled with snakes and lions

 He arrived at our house late and went to bed. My wife told him that breakfast would be at 8 AM and that we would see him in the morning.  At 7:59 he came cruising down the staircase for breakfast, but when he got to bottom step he squealed like a little girl and just about broke his own legs trying to run back up the stairs on his hands and feet.

My wife and I were shocked and I had to go up and get him to come down to eat.  He wouldn’t come downstairs because he had seen something in our house that terrified him.

 He saw our beagle lying in front of the fireplace.

We tried to explain to him that beagles aren’t dangerous, but he wouldn’t come downstairs until we took the dog and put her in the garage.

You can probably guess that a dog had bitten him.  Beyond this, he’d seen people killed by packs of dogs.  He lived in the presence of cobras and lions but was petrified of a dog.

We came to understand that this was because he had experience with those other animals and an understanding of what to do to protect himself when he was in situations with them.

–

 As a pastor I consistently get asked a question that sounds a lot like this:

 “I’ve been hurt by the church, why should I ever go back?”

There’s an old saying that goes like this; “If a dog bites you once it’s the dog’s fault.  If the dog bites you twice, that’s your fault.

This is the logic and reasoning that people are applying when they say things about not wanting to be involved with church based on observation or past experience.

In fairness, this is a true and logical way of thinking.  While the saying is true, it’s important to remember that “truth” and applicability aren’t always the same thing.

This is because truth, while valid, doesn’t always have universal application.O ne plus one equals two, but that doesn’t have anything to do with how much I love my wife.

Truth isn’t situational, the application of truth is.

So let’s go back to the dog bite analogy and try to apply that truth to other real-life situations.  By this line of logical and truthful reasoning:

-Everyone who’s ever gotten sick at Disneyland should stop going to Theme Parks.

-Everyone who has ever gotten fired should stop working at jobs.

-Everyone who has ever been dumped should stop entering into relationships.

The truth contained in the quote about dog bites isn’t that all dogs are untrustworthy, it’s that people bear some measure of personal responsibility in regards to protecting themselves from danger.

Now this is a truth that is extremely applicable isn’t it?

Each of us has a responsibility to protect ourselves from people and situations that can be potentially harmful.  This is why it wasn’t a bad idea for our to run upstairs, but applying only that truth to his life meant staying upstairs and never coming down again.

My first answer to the question about church is, “You should go back to church because knowing how to protect yourself is a more valuable and practical life skill than knowing how to hide is.”

 Hiding doesn’t guarantee safety and it leads to a life spent in fear and isolation.  Knowing how to live amidst the dangers of life doesn’t guarantee safety, but it leads to a life filled with adventure, growth, and companionship.

Here’s my second answer to the question:

Our Kenyan friend’s problem wasn’t logical; it was emotional.  He was scared of something that had never actually hurt him because he didn’t actually understand it.  No amount of logic was ever going to remove his fear.

In correlation, has any person ever really been hurt by “the Church”?  The answer might be yes, but what are people trying to say to us when they say this?

Are they trying to say that the building hurt them? Are they trying to say that the way the church was organized hurt them? Are they trying to say that every person who attended the church hurt them?

No, they’re saying that some very specific people, people who have names and faces said or did hurtful things to them.

So let’s rephrase our question to be more accurate and fair, “I’ve been hurt by some people who attended church and claimed to be Christians.”

Is this an emotional problem or a logical problem?

It is a very valid and true emotional problem.  Unfortunately, appealing to logical solutions won’t actually solve these emotional problems will it?

What helps with our emotional problems is when people come to you and apologize, including asking for forgiveness, for what they did.  It’s at that point that we offer forgiveness (let go of the hurt) and experience emotional healing and reconciliation.

When we generalize our problem by blaming an institution, and then pour out our wrath on a generalization, we actually lose the ability to work through the actual emotional problem that we have.

So why do we do it?

The simple answer is that we either don’t want, or understand how, to solve our emotional problems.  We just want to punish the people who hurt us.

When we identify the person who hurt us, we find ourselves with personal responsibilities.  For instance, if I say that my wife hurt my feelings, you can very easily point out that I need to go talk to her about my feelings and come to reconciliation.

Personalizing the problem means that there are responsibilities and accountability.

If I don’t want reconciliation I just go around talking that wives are just a pain in the neck.  Generalizing allows me to run from my responsibilities and hide from my pain by blaming.

Many people hop from church to church, eventually withdrawing from them completely because they would prefer not to have the confrontation that could lead to their emotional healing.

Unfortunately it’s too easy, and unfair, for me to say, ”People hurt people so that’s no excuse to stop going to church. “

 While it’s true that Christians aren’t perfect and they hurt do hurt people, the simple fact of the matter is that we aren’t supposed to be hurting people.

II Corinthians chapter 5:15-20 presents us with some applicable truth about church and hurt.

“And he (Christ) died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.   So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

Jesus died to take us from our old life of death into new life.  This new life is a life marked by the presence of God’s Spirit in our lives.  In our new life we no longer live for ourselves, instead we live for Jesus.  In this continuing process of “being made new”, our lives begin to be measured against the truths of God’s word.

This means that we will be faced with truths about our lives that we would rather ignore.  In these circumstances it becomes very easy for us to blame “the church”, or “Christianity”, as the vehicle for presenting us with a truth that causes us personal pain.

I recently took the Disc Assessment profile; it’s a leadership tool that assesses your personality so that you, and your coworkers, better understand how to relate to you.  The first page of the assessment revealed that I am confident, personable, and a good communicator.  Anybody who knows me will recognize right away that they nailed me.  At this point I loved the DISC because it was a validation of who I am.

Page two revealed that I am impatient, have a tendency to overestimate my abilities, and don’t pay attention to details.  Every bit of this information was also true. That applicable truth revealed the areas of my life that need to change.

 How do you think that applicable truth made me feel?

The pain that this truth brings me is the result of my need to grow, not the test being unfair.  I can run from this or I can embrace it and enter into the process of asking for help from God and my faithful friends to become a new creation.

One of the reasons that church hurts is because spiritual growth is a painful process.

When I am willing to do the difficult work of living for Jesus I gain the opportunity of joining him in the process of making others new as well.

“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.”

-2 Corinthians 5:15-20

 Living for Jesus is actually not merely self-denial, it’s self-denial for the purpose of joining him in the process of reconciling people to God.

Which points us back into the issue of hurt in the church.  An applicable truth from the word of God doesn’t simply hurt some people; some people get hurt because someone takes a truth that was not applicable and lays into them.

Churches are filled with people who are faced with the daily decision to live for themselves or live for Jesus.

 Many times we choose to live for ourselves.

In these sinful choices we demonstrate a desire for power, authority, or recognition and praise; choosing to deny truths about ourselves in order to get it.

“Church hurt” is often the result of people who’ve chosen to believe that “living for God” means attending church services and they’ve set down the Ministry of Reconciliation in order to pick up a façade of personal piety.

I’ve worked inside churches since I was 20 years old and I can tell you stories that would curdle milk at the North Pole.  Do you know what each of these situations has in common?

Each of them happened when someone made the fatal error of setting down the Ministry of Reconciliation and picking up something else.

Sometimes they picked up the crusade of being right: They needed to win the argument regardless of kindness or the truth.

Sometimes they fell in love with their own ideas and refused to listen to anyone else.  They believed that methods or styles were more important than results.

Sometimes they were so wounded that they hid behind a position of authority to fend off any new injuries.

Often, they gloried in their mind because their heart was broken.

Most often people were mean because they refused to submit their heart to Christ.  They agreed with Christianity as a philosophy but they wouldn’t submit to Jesus.

When we become hurt or offended we have a choice, will we stop living according to God’s spirit, listening for him to tell us what to do next according to his plan for our world, or will we engage in self-directed behavior and begin working our plan for the world?

The Bible has a great example of this in 2 Kings 5.  It’s a story of a Hebrew slave girl who demonstrates kindness to her foreign master Namaan.  As Namaan’s story unfolds, we see him take a little girl’s advice and become physically healed of leprosy, but more importantly he comes to know and worship the God.

Through the ministry of a wounded little Girl, Namaan is reconciled to God.

This story is a brilliant illustration of what can happen in the world around us as the result of us choosing to join God in the ministry of reconciliation, even when we are the person who has been wounded.

This is ultimately why we go back to church, even after we’ve been hurt.

When we embrace and process the painful growth that truth brings, we become God’s ambassadors to our hurting world.

Don’t miss this: God’s Spirit doesn’t promise that we won’t be hurt, it gives us the power to break the cycle of hurt from the inside.

“So from now on we regard NO ONE from a worldly point of view.  Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!”

If that little girl had chosen to regard Namaan from a worldly point of view she would have just let him die.  Instead she swallowed her pride, and her right to be angry, and she demonstrated the compassion that God had put in her heart.  She submitted herself to God and was obedient to his vision for the world.

When we are willing to do this, the old creation passes away and the new creation life born in us spreads to the world.  The hurt of our heart is met by the healing power of God, and our healing makes us ambassadors for the God who is looking to reconcile all things to himself.

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Our Kenyan friend melted when he saw an ancient beagle because he was unprepared for the encounter.

So here’s some information to prepare you for the hurt that comes from the people who attend church but aren’t interested in being God’s ambassadors:

People tell us about their ideals with their words, but they tell us about their hearts with their behavior.  Believe what people’s hearts tell you.

If the fruits of the Spirit are not immediately visible in a church, something is wrong.  It shouldn’t take weeks to determine if the majority of the people are joyful, loving, peaceful, faithful people.  If they aren’t, they aren’t working God’s plan.

Some churches claim to be cold and hard because they’re confronting people with cold hard truth.  Don’t buy it.  We aren’t given a choice between grace-givers and truth-tellers.  Jesus never copped out that way.

If you’re part of a church that doesn’t present applicable truths that call for life-change, leave.  Jesus is the Way, the TRUTH, and the Life.  This means that there must be moments when TRUTH reveals to us a path for painful life growth.

If church confrontations aren’t private and restrained, leave.  Self-control is a fruit of the Spirit, so if you are being bullied, it isn’t coming from a spirit-led person.

If you are confronted, check out what the confronters are saying with other people who know you well, and check it against the word of God.  Self-examination is a sign of humility and godliness.

When you want to know who to trust in conflict situations, look for the people who are working for reconciliation.  People who go to great lengths of self-denial to give peace a chance are the people who are being like Jesus.

Finally, there’s a reason I‘ve said, “run” not “fight”.  God very rarely calls us to a church to be a reformer but he’s always calling us to be truth-speakers.

God usually calls someone with the power to be a reformer to be a reformer.  When we walk in off the street and decide that we have the power to change an organization that neither wants to change nor has it given us permission to change it, we’re probably just spoiling for a fight because of an injustice that we’ve experienced someplace else.

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There are snakes and lions in every church.  Some churches are actually run by them.  But the majority of them are just beagles doing their best not to bite anybody.

Not every pain we experience in a church is bad.

The final evaluation in every situation comes down to whether or not you AND the church you are attending is committed to the ministry of reconciliation.

Photo:ABCnews

Over the past 30 years the process of globalization has revealed a tremendous amount of information to us about the people of our world.

Quite simply, globalization is the concept that the nations and people groups of our world are now interconnected by financial and communication networks to such a point that events happening in one region have effects that cause international repercussions.

The last 20 years of our civilization have been marked by violent collisions between the organizational super-societies of the western hemisphere and the ethno-religious zealotry of the eastern hemisphere.

If these collisions seem to be happening more frequently and more violently, imagine what it feels like to live in the eastern hemisphere- a place constantly on the verge of turbulent conflict.

As the global desires of western countries continue to demand financial interactions with eastern regions, the return on these investments is secured my military personnel and private security contractors.

When the blood, sweat, and tears were being spilled by professionals on foreign soil this interaction was seen as an “acceptable risk” by most Americans, but globalization now means that this conflict comes home to meet us in fits and starts.

Which brings us to this week’s most recent bout of “fits”.

In our western mental paradigm two individuals decided to protest something by blowing up people who had no apparent connection to whatever grievances they might or might not have.

Our confusion surrounding the issue is apparent in the news coverage and speculative conversation taking place in public gathering places.

Individualism is such an essential piece of the American thought process that it can be especially difficult to understand how and why a person would be willing to engage in overwhelmingly destructive behavior, especially when they know that it will end with their own destruction.

It’s important to understand that individualism and self centering is not only repressed but punished by many eastern societies, especially those who value honor above justice.

In a society built around the prime values of honor and shame, loyalty to the social unit is a deeply guarded prize.

In these societies an attack on one person is an assault on all. To assault all is not an injustice, it’s an act of shaming that must be met with retribution. That act of retribution is then regarded as justice.

If that line of logic seems hard to follow, read it again… But this time from the perspective of an eastern thinker who believes that his entire society is under assault because one of the members of his social group has been shamed by encroachment from the structural government and immoral values demanded by individualism.

In terms of retribution, there is no “unconnected” person in an honor/shame paradigm. Assaulting one American is assaulting all Americans, and it is an act of collective justice issued for a perceived act of collective shaming.

In an honor/shame society it is not altogether difficult to “radicalize” young males. Their duty is a matter of honor, and that duty is to the group, not themselves.

In these societies, especially societies who have lost tribal authority or familial self-rule, assaulting the people they believe are responsible for oppressing them is a noble act that brings esteem to the entire social, religious, or ethnic group.

One of the most important pieces of this process is convincing the young of an idealized version of the past.

“Back when we were a free people we lived according to our noble customs and religious convictions. Now the outsiders have corrupted our purity and we are estranged from each other and God.”

In these idealized versions of self-rule, people are presented as having all they needed and living in peace thanks to a homogeny of thought and action.

Revolution against the outsider and the infidel is not so much a grab for truth and justice, it’s an an attempt to restore peace through purity and piety.

Which brings me to the American church… Obviously.
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The parallels are incredibly consistent aren’t they?
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Appealing to an idealized past to promote a righteous purity, by way of cultural homogeny, may actually be a “religious” concept, but it is not actually a Biblical one.

The Bible consistently presents Jesus as calling for people to break with their past and become a “new creation” through a transformation… Not a revolution.

In fact, refusing to lead the revolutionary reform of a religion for the purpose of re-establishing a failed social/religious/ethnic homogeny is what marked Jesus for death isn’t it?

Appealing to an idealized past never works and I’ll tell you why; because it costs youth their future.

Every nation that has ever lost its “golden age” still suffered from injustice, famine, and war during that golden age. People still got sick, children still died, there were people who lacked jobs, and there were still people who refused to submit to the rule of God in their lives.

These are all facts that must be “ignored” during the appeal to homogeny as a motivator.

Appealing to this motivation is actually appealing to ignorance, and this means actively discouraging education.

An uneducated person is more likely to make decisions that sacrifice their future for a past that cannot be restored because it never truly existed.

Jesus consistently calls his people away from the painful reality of their past for the purpose of living in a present reality that exists only because of his righteousness.

Submission to this reality is the only thing that creates a righteous future.

The fascism of social and religious homogeny is actually destructive because it is a lie presented by men whose power is only capable of concealing their spiritual impotence.

If 20 years of ministry have taught me anything about motivation young men towards righteousness, it’s that calling them away from the collective destruction of their past is only accomplished by pointing them towards a destiny that is solely founded on the personal righteousness of Jesus Christ.

When they are led to believe that it’s their job to restore their society they simply become cynics, critics, and Pharisees. The resulting destruction is a spiritual terrorism that strikes out at “wickedness” in the name of a self-righteous sense of honor that God is actually ashamed of.

When they believe that it’s ultimately God’s job to create his kingdom, and it’s their job to enter and live in it, then they not only embrace their destiny, but they also make room for others in it as well.

Jesus is the hope of the world.

He isn’t simply our heritage or history, he is our righteous destiny.

Over the past 30 years the process of globalization has revealed a tremendous amount of information to us about the people of our world:

They need Jesus as much as we do.

We all enjoy having choices, because of this many successful businesses will allow consumers to have some say over process and product.  This isn’t something that is easy for a company to do, but they’re willing to do it because they know that it produces results:

Burger King offers The Whopper their way because they believe that this is the way that it tastes best.  They are also willing to take the additional time and effort to make it your way because they want you to not only purchase their burger, but also return to purchase more burgers over time.

They’re willing to set some preferences aside in order to develop a long-term relationship with you.

This is true in relationships outside of business as well isn’t it?

If I invite you to a go see a French movie, you have to decide whether or not spending time with me is more or less important than your distaste for foreign cinema.

To live in relationship with other people we will always have to set aside some of our preferences; this is because insisting on having things “our way”  always limits the depth and scope of our relationships.

A person who insists on having their preferences met is naturally limiting the amount of relationships that they will engage in.  This also means that they will also be limited in the amount of influence they will have in the lives of other people:

When we don’t care about people, they don’t seem to care what we want to do, or how think about things.

This means that self-centered people often have a difficult time appealing to the quality of their relationships as a way motivate people to help them or to join them in their endeavors.

They have little ability to demonstrate authority from a relational perspective.

The solution to this relational problem is to develop another kind of authority.  Through the demonstration of a skill or a talent they have to develop an authority that flows from their position in the community.  This is easily illustrated by our American affinity for celebrities.

Celebrities become effective spokespeople for products and politicians, not because of their relationship with us, but because of their status as an “exceptional talent”.  Their authority is not relational, it is positional.

We do the things they ask us to because we believe that they are better than us in some way.

Sometimes they can kick a ball.

Sometimes they can sing a song.

Sometimes they just have nice teeth.

We elevate people to positions of admiration, based on accomplishment, that allow influence regardless of relationship.  This means that selfishness is culturally permissible for people whom we choose to believe are exceptional.

To be fair, this isn’t necessarily something that is wrong with them.

We allow people to influence us based on skill and appearance, largely because they appeal to our sense of “what we wish we could be.”  If we love basketball, basketball players have positional influence over our life.  If we love music, musicians can have this same effect.

This means that people who lead people can actually take shortcuts to quickly attain high levels of influence. If you have an amazing ability, you can demand that people meet your preferences while completely disregarding theirs.

Good athletes can become coaches who don’t know how to teach.

Good singers can become worship leaders who don’t invest in people.

Good speakers can easily become pastors who don’t really care about human need.

The problem with these shortcuts is multifaceted:

1.) When this happens, people get hurt, especially in church ministry.  While there is a lot of physical work involved, ministry ultimately happens at a relational level.  People who love sports, theater, music, or theology, but don’t love people will ALWAYS end up hurting people in the name of sports, theater, music, or theology.

2.) The shortcut never lasts.  Hurting people eventually stop elevating people whose effectiveness is dissipating, regardless of talent, especially when they become a liability to the organization and lack relational capital.

What kind of leader do you want to be? Because the best leaders don’t have relational skills OR people skills, they are lovers of people who have developed great skills in order to serve them.

What skills are you working on?

Are they relational skills or technical skills?

Because it takes both to make a difference in someone’s life.

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In 18 years of ministry the most important skill that I’ve identified is to stop demanding that other people meet my preferences.

It’s also the hardest skill I’ve ever had to begin developing.

It wasn’t really until I began this process of self-denial that the ministry I was attempting started to reflect God’s preferences more than my own.

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To live in relationship with others we always have to set aside some of our preferences; this is because insisting on having things “our way”  always limits the depth and scope of our relationships.

This is ultimately true about our relationship with God  isn’t it?  We can demand to have our way, but when we do, we don’t really have a relationship with him.  There’s only one person who has preferences that must be met and isn’t he the one we’re ultimately serving?

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We really can’t have things our way forever.

Trying to just comes at a terrible price…

…for everyone.

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“Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.  Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.  Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit,  speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord,  always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” –  Ephesians 5:15-21

(ABC News)

Wilcox County High School in Georgia has two Proms and two Homecoming Celebrations each year.  There is one Prom and one Homecoming for students who are white, and one Prom and one Homecoming for students who are black.

If you are wondering how this is still happening in the year 2013, it helps to understand that the school doesn’t pay for these extracurricular activities.  The events are planned, promoted, and hosted by the parent-led “student groups” of teens who attend the school.

“The district hasn’t paid for a prom in 30 years, leaving the planning up to student groups that are free to organize them as they wish, Wilcox County Schools Superintendent Steve Smith told ABC News.”

In the past, black families sponsored the “Black Prom”, and white families sponsored the “White Prom”.  The kids have then historically done what they were “supposed to do”.

This year some kids are saying “enough”.

Tired of living out a historic view of “voluntarily segregated” race relations informed largely by “Jim Crow era” policies, four young ladies have begun the fundraising process to host a racially integrated prom.

You probably wouldn’t be surprised that the school district is strongly supportive of the integrated prom.  However, the school can do nothing but provide space and allow for advertising since they don’t have the money to fund it.

You also wouldn’t be surprised to find out that there are people who are opposed to the new Prom.  You might be surprised to find out that some of those people are students though.

“‘I actually put up posters for the integrated prom and we’ve had people ripping them down at the school,’ one of the young ladies told WGXA.”

The school in Wilcox County isn’t the only one in the region to host voluntarily segregated dances. A number of other schools located in small rural counties do the same.  There’s a similar logic employed by each district: We don’t sponsor Proms, student groups do, they are the ones who decided to hold separate events.

What’s difficult about this reasoning is that it can’t obscure the social inscrutability that caused it.

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People don’t just change because the government tells them to.

In 1954 the U.S. Supreme Court banned segregated schooling.  The integration intended to follow that decision was resisted by many local populations for years.  At some point, deciding to remove dances from the list of “school activities” meant that the schools did not have to enforce laws requiring them to be integrated.

While integrating football teams allowed a socially acceptable exploitation, integrating dances created an environment that infuriated the cultural majority.

To avoid this, many counties created a loophole to avoid doing something that they could not, or preferred not, to do.  By creating events where Federal Law “did not apply”, they encouraged or allowed people to segment their hearts and minds into places where the law did not exist.

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Jesus consistently talks about this human tendency in the New Testament.  He spends a tremendous amount of time confronting people whose religious behavior is exemplary… until it no one is paying attention.  He was constantly indicting the “private, independent moments” when they would return to fulfilling the true desires of their hearts.

Jesus’ hope for us wasn’t that we would have the correct behaviors for public performances, instead he called us to submit our hearts to the desires of God through obedience.  His teaching was this:

When our hearts change,

Our desires change,

When our desires change,

Godly behavior naturally follows from us.

For this change to happen, a person has to want to change.  We have to desire to please someone other than ourselves or the collective “cultural self” that demands our performance.

To accomplish this change God offers us his power in the person of his Holy Spirit.  In submission to God we find that his external power has come to reside inside us, and when we allow it to change and move us at the level of our inmost desire we become the person who lives righteously regardless of cultural expectation or state legislation.

In essence, we don’t do what is right because God, or the government, tells us to, we do what is right because we love to please the God who is transforming our heart.

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While living in a rural part of our country doesn’t automatically mean that you will subscribe to antiquated ideologies, it does mean that you will likely come face to face with them and be forced to make a choice about how you respond to them.

I’ve learned that my best, and most Christ-like, responses flow from my heart and mind when I allow God unlimited access to every area of my life.

Four young women want to close a loophole created to keep justice from taking root and spreading throughout their region.

I don’t know how any of the individual involved feel about the person of Jesus, but I do know that their quest to end physical segregation is also an assault on the idea that we can live in the denial that comes from declaring portions of our lives “off-limits” to the desires of God.

They have the will, the permission, and the numbers to do it.

All they need now is some money.

I once worked for a boss who consistently asked the question, “Would you rather be loved or respected by your subordinates?”,  of course the majority of the employees responded that they’d rather be loved.

The boss’ response to his question was that being “loved” meant that people would walk all over you, but being “respected” meant that they would produce results for you.

The next time we were asked this one of my fellow employees suggested to the boss that he might be confusing the word “love” with “approval” and the word “respect” with “intimidation”.

You can probably guess how much longer he continued to work for the organization.

While I completely agreed with my friend’s assessment, I ultimately quit that job over a different issue; I didn’t believe that you can actually make a choice between love and respect.

I don’t believe that you can actually love someone and not respect them.  Conversely, I do believe that disrespectful and dishonorable behavior are the evidence of a complete lack of love for other people, and an extreme desire for selfish results.

Which brings me to Rutgers Basketball coach Mike Rice.

Coach Rice was fired today for verbally and physically abusing the players on his basketball squad.  The coach was fired after video of him shoving, kicking, verbally excoriating, and throwing balls at players was released to ESPN.

When we don’t love people it’s easy to appeal to their fears through intimidation; all for the purpose of coercing them into doing what we want.  When we don’t care about the players on our “team”, it becomes possible to place our desires for achievement above theirs.

This means that we become willing to make appeals to the darkest places in their hearts in order to manipulate them into serving the darkest places in our own.

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Intimidation is only as effective as the fear that it causes.

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For a player, poor performance already means the possibility of losing your place on the team, and the scholarship that accompanies it.  That’s already a fear that players live with, appealing to physical damage and mental derision simply means that there is something else going on in the heart and the mind of the bullying coach.

Coaches who resort to this don’t necessarily want their players to succeed, they wants to control them.  This reflects the belief that  having power over power players gives control over the score.

It’s no secret that bullies crave power.

Gaining positions of authority is the quickest way for bullies to consolidate power and give orders.

Unfortunately for power-hungry, control enthusiasts, none of us actually has the power to “make” other people “do” the things we order them to.  This is where fear comes in.  A bully appeals to the fears of the person they are hoping to intimidate.  When they find the right fear, they often find a very effective motivator.

While that fearful motivation may initially produce the desired results, the lack of love and care demonstrated by a willingness to employ it prevents respect and admiration from growing in the hearts of the people who suffer.  When we remove love from our relational offerings we only guarantee a loss of respect in return.

You can demand, or simply prefer, that people fear disappointing or failing you, but in the end you’ll simply be surrounded by people who don’t respect you.

You can however love people, and by respecting and honoring them coach them on how to respect and honor others.  Guess what return that this investment in others produces for you?

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Love is always as effective as the respect that it inspires.

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We can’t choose between love and respect,

They go hand in hand.

Much like abuse and firing.

“Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.” – Hebrews 13:7

I’ve watched a lot of people gripe at Disneyland.  If I had to rank the adult grievances about Disney Parks I’d certainly place “expense” in the number one spot and “kids whining” at number 2.

Number three would probably be “It’s A Small World” though.

For my money “Small World” is the most polarizing feature of The Happiest Place On Earth.  People seem to either love it or hate it.  I’ve found that many of the “haters” also feel the need to be excessively vocal with their derision of the ride.  I usually overhear at least one conversation per visit to the park in which someone rails against “Small World” as if it is one of the world’s great evils.

Sometimes mom’s announce that they “don’t want that dang song in my head all day” or kids announce that they’re “too grown to be seen in that ride”.  I’ve actually heard one father* tell his children that the “overriding ‘secular humanist’ message of the ride is in conflict with our Christian beliefs.”

The casual listener can probably leave fantasy land with the idea that few people truly enjoy Walt Disney’s “It’s A Small World”.  This isn’t to say that people don’t ride “It’s a Small World”; quite often the line for the attraction is as long as many of the other rides at the Disney parks.  It’s just to say that the ride seems mostly targeted to impress very young children or optimistic racial profilers.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not an IASW “hater”. I ride it whenever it’s open.  This is because I’ve noticed that the ride does offer some very specific perks:

On hot days the air conditioning provides about 10 minutes of relief.

On long days “Small World” offers the opportunity to catch a power nap.

Closing hour means cuddling couples might get a boat to themselves.

Of course whether or not you’re attempting a “cool down”, “sleep off” or a “warm up” you do run the risk of suffering a ride malfunction.

Since It’s A Small World was built in 1966 (apparently out of  the technology developed to create cuckoo clocks and rubber band guns) most return guests have undoubtedly experienced a breakdown during one of their voyages.

While this might seem to enhance several of the ride’s “secondary uses”, the ride operator protocol appears to forbid turning off the ride soundtrack.  This means that when you’re stuck, you’re stuck listening to a very simple song over and over again, and in the case of certain rooms, in Swedish, Cockney, or my personal favorite… “gargling mermaid”.

While getting stuck inside It’s A Small World isn’t uncommon, it does seem to reinforce the ire of many visitors.

I’ve actually complained about getting stuck inside It’s a Small World. I was once in there for about 9 extra minutes.

The song did get stuck in my head.

I did feel like I was too old to be seen riding it.

I did not become a secular humanist.

I did tell the other people in my party that it was “the worst part of my day” though.

This morning I read a story about a disabled man who was awarded $8,000 after being stranded inside a malfunctioning “It’s A Small World” for 30 minutes.  Apparently the wheelchair bound man had to go to the bathroom and was not able to get up and walk out of the ride like the rest of the passengers.  They never turned off the soundtrack.

I don’t know how much merit the case had.

I don’t know if the award was just or not.

I do know that I was stuck inside a ride for 9 minutes and I felt like people needed to hear about it.  I didn’t read the article and get mad at “a litigious society” or “attitudes of entitlement” I just got a little embarrassed about my own behavior.

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We don’t get to pick what happens to us,
We simply get to pick how we are going to respond to our circumstances.

The next time I feel like my circumstances are bad enough to warrant a negative attitude I’m going to remind myself that I have more power than most to do something about my current situation.

Very few grown ups enjoy “It’s A Small World”, but their wives and kids often do.  For a fully grown, fully functioning man to pretend that riding “It’s A Small World” is an injustice is beyond silly, it’s an infantile misrepresentation of a life so blessed by privilege that “misfortune” boils down to spending about 10 minutes of time with his children in Walt Disney’s UNESCO doll collection.

Getting into that little boat doesn’t cause a bad attitude, a series of decisions made long before that moment does.  It only takes one decision to change that.  Let’s let that decision be made in light of those who actually do have it worse than us…

…and by that I clearly mean the people in line for those Winnie the Pooh honey pots;)

*yes it was my dad.

With this month’s revelation of a new famous and successful girlfriend, the world’s number one ranking, and a renewed Nike campaign, the platform for the restoration/rehabilitation of Tiger Woods appears to be nearly completed.

The only piece left now is a win at the Masters in Augusta, Georgia next week.

With a win, Tiger will be welcomed back to the talk shows and sports highlights for something other than the personal scandal that took an enormous toll on his professional life.  All of which makes his new Nike campaign so fitting, if not mildly controversial.

With the launch of the new Nike campaign, commentators are beginning to question whether or not “Winning takes care of everything” is an appropriate motto, especially for someone whose personal life was a mess- while he was winning.

We all know that winning doesn’t really take care of everything in life; whether or not someone is a world ranked Uno player has nothing to do with the success or failure of their cooking career.  The point that Nike is making is simple: “Winning takes care of everything… in Golf.”

The problem is that we, the general public, want to believe that “Winning” takes care of everything in a universal fashion and this is not a Nike problem or a Tiger problem,

It’s a human problem.

Each of us believes, implicitly or explicitly, that enough personal success will eventually spackle over the gaps in our true nature.  We hope that at the end of our lives the good that we have accomplished will outweigh the bad so that in the final analysis we will be referred to as “a good person” by our many admirers.

In order to validate these beliefs to our conscience, we rush to appoint “Messiahs” who begin as people, but ultimately become personalities for public consumption.  We elevate people to levels of “complete heroism” for heroic deeds performed in one area of their life.  If the successful area of their life provides significance or fortune for many, we tend to actively ignore or suppress inconvenient truths about the other aspects of their life.

This was the historic pattern of hero-worship that played itself out during the Modern Age, and in the Information Age we’ve added a subtle nuance to our mythological quest for absolution.

With the emergence of new media and tell-all reporting, it has become impossible to maintain the purity of our gods.  Each of them eventually fall beneath the weight of our ambitious anxiety… because watching them fall and redeem themselves adds a compelling twist to the personal narrative we are also living out.

“If Tiger can come back from this, then there’s hope for me.”

The inconvenient truth in all of this isn’t that Tiger may have been a scoundrel, it’s that we couldn’t root for him as simply a golfer.

We needed him to be more.

We wanted Tiger to be a product that enhanced our self-actualization and when it became apparent that the product was defective, we didn’t just want our money back… We put him back at the bottom of the hill and gave him a bigger boulder to carry.

If you doubt this consider that we’ve spent the last 4 years judging “the product” solely on the amount of wins that he’s produced, and now we want an older, more broken version of himself to resume his production for our entertainment.

This is typical behavior for consumers.  When an athlete wins, we choose to forget the affairs, and the drugs, the gambling, the cheating, and the arrests.

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“Winning takes care of everything” isn’t just a Tiger quote or a Nike slogan, it pretty much sums up the life perspective of our results-driven society.  We aren’t so much concerned with how something gets done, we just want what we want, and we want it done in a way that is exciting, economical, and satisfying.

If someone can deliver what we want, why in the world wouldn’t we want to root for that?  Now that a pretty woman and the professional broadcasters are done punishing Tiger, why should we continue to… especially if he puts on a display of skill and determination that inspires us right?  A win catapults him back into the category of “Hero”.

What’s faulty with this way of thinking is the idea that we ever needed to punish Tiger for things that he never did to us, and that his success next week has anything to do with us.

Whether or not Tiger can “come back” from his personal failures doesn’t truly register on our radar screens because we have no way of really determining it, and no desire to see him do anything other than succeed wildly or fail spectacularly on the golf course.

“Winning takes care of everything” isn’t just Tiger’s motto, it’s ours.

 Tiger only needs to win to prove that to us.