5.30.2020 - week 57
on the n--- word and what-about-ism
there i was on the beach. and before i got to it, the boys told me. the n-word. written clear as day. centered behind some kind of weird shrine to a frat-boy prank, right in the middle of a beautiful beach in the middle of orange county, california, in late may 2020, was that word. a vulgar word used against precious children of god. it was little snuffed out by my boys kicking dirt on it, but the n-word none-the-less. this not two hours after watching the video of george floyd’s death was like a double kick to the gut. my boys asked the typical questions sweet elementary school aged boys might ask …
but like why would you not like someone you have never met?
but i know lots of different kinds of people and they can all be cool or not, it has nothing to do with their skin color right?
the kinds of questions that break your heart in their good hearted youthful naiveté.
i thought we were at least kinda getting there. some of us?
but i have had to be honest enough with myself to say that although my social feeds are filled with people crying out for justice, the systems of power are lagging far behind. i know for sure my eyes were opened by a series of friends god put in kristen and i’s path through the years and the gentle way they pointed me to issues of justice that i was blind to…
sheila.
donald.
deborah.
deborah a second time. (she deserves a whole newsletter sometime, that girl changed us forever)
j-griff.
pastor charlie.
pastor bryan.
celebrity chef kim stratton.
never guessing god would give us a unique view, being blessed to serve in a church full of amazing african american folks. there’s one move in the justice conversation that people (mostly white) folks do that drives me nuts … it’s ‘whatta bout X’
what – about – ism is a common weak intellectual move. when cornered on a subject that one side in an argument knows is a loser, you try a quick juke to a topic you think is better. the classic moves on police violence is …
but what about black on black crime?
but what the statistics on how infrequent these police events actually are?
but what about abortion?
but what about the good cops?
but what about ….
these are real convos. and they are important ones to have. but they aren’t topics to introduce the day that people who don’t look like you had to watch someone that looked like them BRUTALLY die in such a preventable and unnecessary way. it’s a day to mourn. and listen. and not think FACTS (or more commonly, your cherry picked from a news source slanted towards your already decided viewpoint ‘facts’) are of any help. as long as public beaches scream the message ‘you aren’t welcome’ to some of us, we need to fight to change things for all of us.
if there isn’t justice for all,
there isn’t justice at all.
KG Korner
(a few wise words from lady kristen macdonald)
This week like many of you I spent a lot of time thinking about George Floyd and how incredibly far our world has still to go in justice and human decency. I don’t have words to put around it yet but I spent some time this week listening and gleaning from friends. I hope to share that at some point but until then I thought I would re-share my ‘pruning’ writing from a few months back in case you missed it:
One time years ago I was walking along the beach while in Florida and I remember coming upon a home that had been battered by a hurricane earlier that year. I have seen footage of storms and their aftermath as well as read about the “house built upon the sand” but seeing the actual wreckage took the reality of the “rains fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it,” to the next level. It’s that “ah-ha moment” as teachers like to say, when the principle and the practical align bringing understanding that hasn’t been achieved before.
Fast forward to yesterday as I drove up to our home and the landscaping service that tends to our neighborhood had pruned a bunch of our bushes. I literally gasped at one of the bushes because it looked as though it had just gotten a bad haircut.
I know very little about landscaping and I have been known to kill a plant or two even in the six months that I have lived in California. That said, I haven’t read up or done research on pruning or trimming trees or bushes. In all honesty when I left our house earlier that morning, I was eyeing the beautiful roses on most of the bushes that line our garage. My thought would have never been to trim them off the tree but to enjoy them as long as possible.
The only possible aim of the landscaper is to make the foliage look the best it can be, to prune as needed knowing that the future blooms will come only if the bush is tended to. The imagery from John 15, came alive in my mind as I saw the lovely roses strewn all over the ground:
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” (v. 1-2)
The bushes don’t look like anything special at the moment but because I know that I have seen the “fruit” that they can bear and that they have been trimmed in the past, I believe more “fruit” is to come. The beauty in the plant isn’t just in the fruit but that it can go to it’s source (the vine) and it can in a few weeks time produce something beautiful.
There’s a season for everything as Ecclesiastes says. I know firsthand that a season of pruning can be painful. But, I believe that the very vitality of the plant, the very health of the believer isn’t just in the exterior boasting of something beautiful and “all together,” but in knowing it’s true source and knowing that the season of bounty is coming. So often in the midst of pruning we lose sight of what we can’t see because what we can see is so drastic from before. Therefore, I pray that whatever season you are in- about to be pruned, just pruned, or recovering from being pruned that God’s Word would come alive to you today and be the living water and bread you need to bloom beautifully again into what He has for you. To Him be the glory, #wontHEdoit.
book review
before i started this newsletter, i spent a lot of years as a self-deceived aspirational writer. similar to the person who watches food network instead of actually baking, i substituted consumption and study for actual writing. this book, a classic, gives great insight into why writing is so magical and elusive for even professionals. annie dillard writes beautifully about how hard it is to write beautifully. in her search for how to consistently do her important work, she guides us as well. like most brilliant guidebooks, we are led by watching, not by aggressive prescription. this little book was a delight. if you write or aspire to, this is a must read.
super christian guy
“who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? it is before his own master that he stands or falls .... each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.”
romans 14:4-5 esv
content this week
i preached a message that helped me a lot .. ‘praise is the pathway.’ as a bonus i sang a duet with my friend kurt on the closing song
message starts at 26:40
hitting your inboxes soon.
a timely and lengthy read on the intersection of race and church in 2020.
verse of the week
but let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
amos 5:24
pieces of good news I saw this week
1. our church faithful central did a fantastic zoom choir this past weekend, i think you will dig it.
2. two of our favorite music artists (who happen to be married ) have been doing a cover song in their kitchen basically every night of quarantine. i genuinely loved a bunch of them … scan through the list and hear a fun fresh take on a song you love.