From Fault to Fix

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Last week, someone apparently unhappy with things I’m selling on the internet posted a fake ad including my number. I was DELUGED with calls about some gun I was allegedly selling, but that I have never owned, as people were excited to pick it up. It took backpage an entire day to remove the fake ad, and I still receive messages today about it. This is pretty childish to prank someone like this. Unfortunately it happens all the time.

They will excuse it as a prank, as harmless fun. The trouble is that it’s not fun for anyone except the perpetrator. The people who contacted me were disappointed and upset that it was fake. I was annoyed to constantly be harassed by people despite posting that the ad was fake. Apparently nobody read that one. I worried that people with whom I actually WANTED to speak would not leave messages or think I was ignoring them, when really I had to screen calls for two days because I didn’t want to tell dozens of people that there was no such item for sale under this number.

Fun at another’s expense is really only fun if the other finds it so. We are taught, at least I was, to treat other people as we would have them treat us. I understand that this person is upset, but I don’t really know why. I don’t even know who it was. What I do know is that two wrongs do not make things right, and harming me because they perceived a slight just makes the entire internet blind. How would they feel if I did this to them? It wasted my time and energy, and it infuriated a lot of people. Rather than confront me directly, they took a childish route and came at me sideways. If they were men, they would come face me rather than attacking me through other means or other people.

Far too many people today are quick to take offense. When we say or do something, they take it personally, when that’s unlikely, particularly if we don’t know them. One thing I learned from the Sequoia was the necessity of growing a thick skin if you want to survive the scorching behavior of others. Rather than assume that it’s a slight, perhaps they should ask. Recently, a principal was fired for asking that children speak English on school grounds in Texas. How exactly do English teachers do their job if asking students to speak English is racist? How do they expect to succeed if they can’t speak English? Special pleaders do whatever they can to drive wedges between us. They balkanize us to make us suspicious, but not because they care about us as much as because they care about increasing THEIR power.

Many people insist that we are judged by whatever deity or belief system they practice according to how we treat other people. They then charicature people they don’t know, villainize people they hate, and lionize their friends and favorites. They see only virtue in those they love and only evil in those they hate. They look at others sometimes and see that the problem with another person is that this person is the way they are. I do not conform to that ideology. I agree with CS Lewis that if you take away all that is good in man you are not left with a bad man. You are left with nothing at all. Fortunately, this prank didn’t hurt me much. The worst part is that it didn’t help anyone at all. Nobody was helped. No justice was served. It was a lose-lose all around, all to slake a bruised ego. While teaching in graduate school, I bought a T-shirt from www.toothpastefordinner.com that reads, "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate". Rather than be pranksters, let's move to solutions.

My best friend posted this image to the internet with which I agree.

It's time to look at fix rather than fault. If you don't like the way things work, change them. You don't attack the people who made the error, particular if they didn't do anything wrong or if you don't seek them first for a resolution. Imagine how much more we could accomplish if we switched our focus from fault to fix! If I have offended you, let me know. The more specifically the description of the problem the more fully the healing process and the solution I can offer to make things right.

True to the Faith

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After living in my congregation for three years, a member of the leadership finally made a feeble effort to reach out to me this week. Rather than talk to me at church or visit me or do anything proactive, he chose the path of least resistance and sent me an email. I chose to ignore it so far, because he has no reason to believe I have seen it, and because email does not demand an immediate answer. As I stood in the shower this evening after my regular Friday racquetball, I pondered my predicament. I am not a conformist. I do not change to please the jury. I am not here to validate others. I am come to discover who I really am.

From my early school years, I learned that the reason why I was unwelcome, unacceptable, and unwanted by others was because I live what I believe. My Faith has cost me friends, opportunities, and love. I am not perfect, but since I really try to be on my best behavior most of the time, I know it makes some people nervous. Having a lion's share of moral fiber used to be more attractive than it is now, but now I think most people are less secure than they really let on, and so some people don't like that I show them that it's possible to be more than they are. At many critical junctures in my life, I suffered because of what I believe. I find I am in good company.

Last term, one of my students mistakenly assumed I was Catholic because I quoted Sir Thomas More, who is one of their saints. Inspired by the movie "A Man For All Seasons", I bought and studied the writings and life of this man. We know a lot more about him than we know about some other historical figures because Henry's daughter Queen Elizabeth I liked him and his son in law Lord Roper and preserved More's actual writings. Even to the death, More refused to leave his God and died His Majesty's good servant but God's first.

Conversion is not a seasonal event. Fair weather friends and seasonal saints do not usually bear much fruit in our lives. It was meant to be that way. If you forgive the following lengthy excerpt from Chapter 8 of Lewis' "Screwtape Letters":

He will set them off with communications of His presence which, though faint, seem great to them, with emotional sweetness, and easy conquest over temptation. Sooner or later He withdraws, if not in fact, at least from their conscious experience, all those supports and incentives. He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs-- to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish. It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be. Hence the prayers offered in the state of dryness are those which please Him best. We can drag our patients along by continual tempting, because we design them only for the table, and the more their will is interfered with the better. He cannot 'tempt' to virtual as we do to vice. He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our Enemy's will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.

When we first recognize God in our lives, His presence looms large. Perhaps it's because it's so very new and unique that we notice it as we do, and I think it's also a function of who He is. God always attempts to speak to you. When you finally decide to pay attention to Him, He eagerly passes on all the things He's attempted to communicate to you while you ignored His whisperings. In order to prove that conversion is a true change of heart rather than for the free marshmallows of obedience, God withdraws and lets us show whether we really mean it.

As soon as you submit yourself to follow God, the world tests you. It doesn't like it when you do, and it doesn't like what fruits result from true submissiveness to His will. While I rode my bike this morning, God brought back to my remembrance this poem: "Good timber does not grow in ease. The harsher the gale, the stronger the trees." Many of God's favorite passed through more and deeper troughs than anyone else. Coming to God does not mean that things get easier as many people assume, but frequently it makes things more difficult. Now you have to prove that you mean what you say. If you want to learn to ride your own bicycle or be the quality of wood worthy of the workman's time then you eventually have to stand on your own and stand well.

Perhaps this is why the few admirers I have look up to me. They know where I stand. I cannot recount the number of times I stood looking around at all evidence that God had withdrawn everything from my life, asked why I was forsaken and then obeyed anyway. I will admit I often look up to heaven and ask God "Well, now what?", but He has always had my back, and so I will not leave Him. I will be true, for there are those who trust me, those who look to me, and I begin to believe that all of this is because people I have never met are watching me to see what I will do next.

Trusting God is hard for me sometimes. I have to remind myself of what He tells me, and I have to trust that He speaks to me in ways that I will understand. Sometimes what He says makes me laugh. Sometimes it makes me think. Sometimes I know I misheard it or didn't understand it. Yet, He continues to look after me and talk to me and exalt me at work, in my family, and among my peers. Twice in the last two years, I know that listening saved me from physical harm; at least once, I know it saved me from a financial error. So I will stand like More steadfastly because it has worked every time I tried it as long as I was the only agent affected. I have had people threaten my life, and God refused to let them take it.

When you do stand on your own, God gives you what you need. I have learned that God's blessings, while always sure, come when we really need them and how we can use them, and not necessarily in the form or timing that we prefer. When we leave Egypt, go up on the mountain, stand before the blood tribunal, or face a moral dilemma, we find that any appeals to God's camp are quickly answered. I keep an Austrian Shilling on the bookshelf downstairs to remind me that I have always had enough. It is the adversary who drags his followers down quickly when they fall. God upheld More, and we remember him today because God held More up as an example to which we might look to see what being true to the Faith really means. Once God puts it into your heart and mind what His will and plan for you is, stand firmly in that path. You know it, and God knows it.  Since He will not deny me, I will not deny Him. No matter what happens in the end, I'll be in good company, and there will be more like More, true to the Faith.

God Gives Me Justice

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As I take stock of my life, I realize that the only way in which my life could get better is if I had a wonderful woman with whom to share it. For the few friends and family members who know about the privations of my life, many of them stand in awe and gratitude that I have weathered things as well as I have. I know after my paternal grandfather died, my paternal grandmother told me how much they worried about me because I was like him. He crusaded for what ought to be, and fortunately for him there were people in positions of power who knew him and his character and who restored him to his previous posts when other men cut him down. Even now as I stand somewhat disappointed at the events of August 2013, I continue to maintain that what should be will be when the time is right. God’s work and plan is not frustrated but only the work of man.

Many of us do not trust God as much as we claim. I see all sorts of people who clamor for enforcement of the Law of Social Justice and who demand their pound of flesh right now. Many of these are Christians who apparently find it convenient to ignore the fact that Christ said that the Mosaic Law which preaches “an eye for an eye” ought be done away. I watched this weekend the Count of Monte Cristo as Edmund Dantes scratches over and over into an indentation in the wall the phrase that “God Will Give Me Justice” and then goes about trying to exact justice himself. When we take justice into our own hands, often that is the end of our reward, and we also miss out on the peace and tranquility that comes with forgiveness and letting go. In the end, Dantes admits that the priest was right, and that he should have used the things with which God blessed him to bless others rather than to only serve himself.

Over the past decade, several people attempted in various ways to derail my life, my finances, and my career. In each of these cases, the legal costs and ramifications cost me a great deal of time, effort, and money. However, over the past few years, God gave me opportunities disguised as trials by which I have been able to earn back either through extra work or through returns on investments almost everything fiduciary that the adversary ever took from me. I can actually honestly say that for me as God did for Job I am better in the end than I was in the beginning. Sure, I don’t have a family, but I dispensed with the tyranny of my ex-wife, and I now know what it must feel like to purchase your own freedom. I am in better shape financially, physically, and even grammatically than at any other point in my life heretofore.

When we go out and demand reparations, we in essence deny the Christ. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is about more than purging sins and iniquities. During His carnation, the scripture He chose to describe His mission came from the book of Isaiah and doesn’t mention sins at all. It reads: (Isaiah 61:1-2)

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord

All of these things mentioned have to do with alleviating the suffering of mortality. In other words, there will be a restoration of all things, not just the material things or the loss of loved ones who die. Christ’s suffering compensates for our grief, for when other men do justice to others and hurt us, for the fact that some are held captive to circumstances or chemicals or choices of others, for when we turn the other cheek and men revile and persecute us. Turning to the courts for justice or demanding that an offense I did not give against people not present to be offended be paid by me denies Christ and says in essence that we have no need of a Savior. It says we prefer a small token now rather than a bountiful harvest in the end. When we hold onto the “right” to exact justice, we cheat ourselves of the opportunity to have something greater.

Turning to the “justice” system has been a mixed bag for me. Sometimes I win, and sometimes I lose, but in the end it really isn’t decided for me. When I had the opportunity to exact what society calls “justice”, I realized it would hurt other people besides the guilty and abstained from any reparations. When I knew that turning to the courts would render me unemployable in this state even after I won, I trusted that God would lead me to a land of promise and refused to “lawyer up” even though friends suggested I should. God was right, and it opened up more opportunities to where I am now that I would have curtailed if I took another path.  I might have had money, but that would have likely been the end of my increase.

Sometimes we find it hard to trust God because we lack experience or because we lack vision. As a man trained in science, I too rely betimes on empirical evidence because I know it retains some degree of substance. However, there is an entire world beyond that we do not always see because we are too focused on the problem in order to see the ramifications or the best solution. While out shooting this weekend, sweat accumulated on my shooting glasses. Someone asked me how I could possibly hit targets with that in the way. I told them that my father had taught me when I first learned to drive to look beyond the glass. If we focus on the problem, we cannot see the solution, and as long as our gaze remains narrowly focused on an impediment immediately before us, we may not be able to see a larger looming danger or a better path or any way around it. Humans tend to arrive at the place where they place their gaze, and so looking too much at the problem keeps us from seeing beyond.

Learn to look through and see beyond. I know it can be a difficult thing. There have been times where I have trusted even though information conflicted with inspiration. Perhaps I could have found a “successful” solution by following the ways of man, but all of these people who preach the old Mosaic tradition draw near to Christ with their lips while their hearts are far from Him. Christ taught us that whosoever believes in God might with SURETY hope for a better world, and when questioned by Pilate, Christ told the magistrates that His kingdom was not of this world. You can have your reward now, however meager it might be or you can patiently wait for something greater and something of a greater nature. This video helps me keep that in perspective:

In other words, the Gospel of Christ asks us to wait. It says, you may either have your pound of flesh now, however unfulfilling that might be in the end, or you can wait for something better. Most of the things awarded by the Gospel of Social Justice are things of no value, things that cannot satisfy, and things that do not last. You cannot take money or property with you when you die, and if that’s all you managed to obtain as “justice” your reward is pretty meager. Plus, when you elect to hurt another, you are no better than the offender, and nobody likes to be lumped together with the miscreant class.

Forgiveness asks us to look through and see beyond. Many of my fellow humans have hurt me greatly. Some broke my bank accounts; a few broke my skin. Some of them broke my confidence; others broke my heart. Some tried to break my Faith; others tried to break my stride. I continue to go on, straight on in the course on which I originally determined to walk. I know that most of the time, people are not doing things purposely to hurt you, especially if they don’t even know you. I know that most of the time they think they’re doing what is right, but that’s because they usually don’t know any better. CS Lewis wrote that you have never met a mere mortal, but it is immortals with whom we hobnob and whom we cheat and exploit. If you believe in Karma or reincarnation or another level of carnation then you know that those transgressions will return to haunt you. You may have your pound of flesh now, but ultimately God’s justice will have a pound of yours in return. People make mistakes; perhaps you have also sinned a little. Christ taught that he who is without sin among us should be the first to cast a stone, and then He abstained, meaning that we ought follow His example.  Forgiveness is the greater path and yields ultimately the greater rewards.  How much of an upgrade was it for everyone when He forgave the woman taken in adultery!

In every facet of my life where God can, God gave me justice. I continue to increase in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and most men. I found new opportunities through trusting Him, and the fruits of my field and flocks of my fatlings continue to grow. The Destroyer passes over without harming me. I have all the blessings that are not dependent on the agency of another person because each time I had the opportunity, I chose to let Him decide what is just. How can I possibly know? Even if all the information I possess is true, I usually don’t possess all the information. I don’t know sometimes how He plans to heal my heart, but everything else in my life is wonderful, and I wouldn’t change a thing. I am unashamed of my past and unafraid for my future. I have seen the hand of God in my life. I know it, and I know that God knows it, and I will not deny the Christ. He gives better gifts than the courts anyway. I testify that God gives you justice as well as mercy. I testify that He will punish you as little as He must and bless you as much as He is able as you humble yourself before Him and trust His will and way. If you do your best, it will be with you as if all things worked out the way you hoped, and in some cases, the blessings He gives will be even greater than you expected. Upgrade complete.

Spring Cleaning

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This past week was Spring Break, and although I still had to go to work, I accomplished quite a bit. Perhaps it’s because I started the week with some goals of things I’d like to have done, and perhaps it’s because I decided to tackle them in order of ease, but I managed to clear many things from my to-do list as well as in my household generally. Some things probably should still be done, but I’m not sure I’m ready to dispense with them, and so I hold onto them until I make a choice. You see, I made it so far through my list, I added more items!

Of course, work responsibilities topped the list. I arrived at work to discover that an instructor had erroneously been in for lab on Saturday. Fortunately, the room was ready, and unfortunately for me, the instructor left it in disarray. I prepared the enzyme assay for next week and made sure that it worked, and then I started on the sugar solutions for the following week. I finished grading all the exams, posted everything to the internet and waited for complaints only to hear from exactly zero students either way. I cleaned out the fridge, tossed out old reagents, took the plants home that need care outside of term so I can water them at home, and even cleaned up my desks.

Many personal things got done too. I finally arranged for Goodwill to take the donations I had ratholed in the garage, moved them to the porch, and wrote up a list with photos in case the IRS wants to know what I gave them. Then, I cleaned and mopped the tile downstairs, reorganized and swept the garage, and then on a wild hair pulled weeds in my entire yard Tuesday night. I posted things to Craigslist, sold a few things on ebay, ran errands including to the grocer, and I even got my driver’s license renewed (I had to go in person this year for a new photo). I dug up some flowers from my mom’s yard that spread and replanted them in the two spots where my yard was barren and then I trimmed the bushes on the north side of the yard. As always, there is trash in my front yard to remove when the wind blows. I cleaned the kitchen, did the dishes, finished all the laundry and even vacuumed my car.

There was also fun and frolic. I still completed seven workout sessions, and then my sister and I went out shooting so she could work on her skills, try some new guns, and watch me sight in a few I have that had never been shot. We went out for lunch, and I’ll visit my parents later. I received some funmail items and played the piano most nights, and I even played the accordion I inherited.

Even the government got its turn. I am almost finished with my taxes (I owe money so I’m not in a terrible rush), but I finished my IRA transfer for last year and organized everything and entered most of the items, including tally sheets of my donations in case the IRS wants to know about those. Oh, and I received reimbursement check for my glasses I bought in February, making that the fastest rebate I have ever received.

I accomplished quite a bit. In fact, aside from actually filing taxes and cleaning the living room, I accomplished everything I set out to do this week, even after adding items to the list. There are a few other Spring Cleaning things I probably should do, and there is a picture hanging in the hallway that I haven’t managed to put away yet because I’m hoping I will still find a watermelon at the end, but we’ll see. I know there are plenty of things I could and should toss, but maybe with this donation kick I’ll finally get all of that cleared away to make room for what comes today and tomorrow. I admit I am sort of a pack rat, but that’s because those things remind me of the past, and the past has some meaning because it was once real. There never really have been good fireworks to anoint the week in my life, because all the really exciting episodes of my life faded into ignominity. Now it’s routine, but in clearing out, maybe I’ll make room for new and better things or for the eventual return of things and people that God decides really are mine to keep.

The Light and The Life

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Most of our laboratories that involve live materials (except for microbiology) are finished for the semester, and as usual, I’m trying to save money by keeping things alive. Last year, I managed to keep two cacti, a potted palm tree, and some pond scum mystery mix alive for the entire year despite our summers and only lost a few ferns. I moved them to a place near my desk in the lab where we have lights mounted beneath the cabinets for light and aerate them weekly so they get oxygen, and I noticed a benefit both to them and to myself. While the plants have thrived and grown and survived, I noticed a lift in my mood, and some things that weighed heavily on my mind and heart until recently finally seem like things I can carry well. It does appear that in more ways than one light improves the quality of life.

Years ago while in graduate school, I attended a seminar on light’s effects on mood. The speaker’s research appears to have been corroborated since then, and studies show that “horrible, wholesome sunshine” affects the body in far more ways than melanin and melatonin production. Sunshine is better because it includes the full width and breadth of wavelengths, but apparently even these bulbs in my office emit the wavelengths that lift my mood. After a good day hiking, despite being tired, I feel better quite simply in the evening because I got some of that sunshine. A few Sundays ago, I went with a friend of mine to a park after she visited the congregation of my Faith with me, and the sunshine had positive effects on her daughter’s cold symptoms.

Of course, light is essential to life on earth. Without it, plants cannot exhale enough oxygen to sustain the animal population and their own respiratory needs. In past semesters, my pond scum mix failed due to lack of light. Ultimately, even these tiny mixtures of protozoa depend on photosynthetic organisms who serve both to oxygenate as well as feed the rest of the mixture. The plants, including my palm, need sunlight, and I can see new growth from the ferns and palm in this new lamp. Even the moss is not only still alive but thriving, and that’s saying something in Vegas!

Both my plants and I thrive because we draw near to the light. Likewise in our lives, we benefit in physical means by associating with light, and in a larger sense we really thrive when we draw near to The Light. I know a lot of people who are “looking for love in all the wrong places” or happiness, or health, or companionship from the wrong sources or people because they erroneously think that the benefits of light can be found in the darkness. They seek wickedness in doing iniquity and draw near to the darkness hoping to reap the benefits of the light. Then, they wonder why they feel bad and do the walk of shame and feel unsatisfied, and they often turn to booze and drugs and debutantery in order to escape guilt and force themselves into a happier mood. I have never really understood why people turn to alcohol, which is a depressant, as a “cure” for their dejection and depression. Sunshine and worship do far more to lift the mood and lighten our burdens.

Only by drawing nearer to the light can you benefit from its positive energetics. Light is a form of energy, and it works in syncopation with other energies of the body and soul. Just as in plants, if we want to turn waste into work, if we want to have energy that gives life, and if we want to store up good things for the eventide of our mortal experience, we depend on light of specific wavelengths. In fact, some kinds of light damage plants, but they are lights that we cannot see. So much affects us in a potentially negative way of which we are not always aware, and if we are not careful, what looks like a light might actually burn us more than it helps us grow. Light gives us what we need to survive, to thrive, and to have life in all of its abundance. Even fruit doesn’t ripen correctly unless hit with light! As we draw closer to the Light, it gives us Life and improves our Lives and helps us bear Fruit. He came that we might have life and have it more abundantly.

Universe of Useful Work

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I expect to learn most of what I learn at church from listening to God’s Spirit, so I was pleasantly surprised this Sunday to be inspired by a speaker. He read from an updated version of the manual used to train missionaries, and in so doing reminded me of something I believe and that I teach my students. When I arrived home, I checked my copy of the manual, in which the segment of interest is entitled that “No Effort is Wasted” and then went on to remind myself how God makes use of things even when we don’t see fruit and can’t tell how it’s used.

Chemistry teaches this principle. In Gibbs Free Energy equation ΔG = q + w. In words, this tells us that “the change in energy is the sum of the heat quotient and the work performed”. When I covered this just a few weeks ago, I told students how the heat is also known as the activation energy or the preparatory energy needed in order to prepare things for the change that we intend. Although it’s not directly involved in the change itself, the change cannot and will not occur without it, and so it is considered in the calculation of energy and cost because it’s part of the process. Sometimes, the heat quotient is substantial, which is why some things don’t happen as quickly as we like or to the degree that we would like.

No energy is lost or wasted in chemistry. We know that according to the law of conservation of energy that energy is only interconverted, and with some allowances for the universal scale (beyond this planet), there is an accommodation to convert energy to mass and vice versa. When we repurpose matter, that energy is released elsewhere for capture or use in changing and rearranging things.

I am frequently disappointed when my efforts do not bear the fruit for which I hope, and in those times, as God reminded me yesterday, I remember that God’s work continues. Only the work of man can be stayed or frustrated or derailed. Perhaps this is why we emphasize so frequently the notion that God's timing differs from our own. Furthermore, God’s plan is as much about the means as it is the ends. You might think it was a waste of time for Noah to cry repentance prior to the flood, but when he did so it accomplished at least two things. It showed Noah that he really believed it and that he really loved his neighbor by warning them, and it showed the people that God loved them to try one more time to recover them from their wickedness. Sometimes, people aren’t ready to hear everything, and so God makes sure that they hear “that portion of truth they are willing and able to receive and wisely use” (Orson Hyde). God is the lord of harvest, and He knows what to do to prepare good fruits.

Sometimes what we do is preparatory work. In order to harvest fruit, much work proceeds that miracle. You may have to clear the ground, prepare the soil, plant seeds, remove weeds, and dung and prune and dig about during a long season for the harvest. Even things that are possible are not likely without the right investment, and in order for God’s useful work to occur, sometimes we only live long enough to see the heat quotient.

Just this past week after class, I showed the gummy bear demonstration. In order for the reaction to work, it requires specific things in the right place at the right time. Even then, I have to heat one of the reactants to 350C to melt it in order for the actual result below to occur. I have been willing to do this particular demonstration 14 times now because it powerfully shows things I cannot show them easily or concisely. I have found it useful work so to do. 

Likewise, we decide things are useful work because the rewards that may result justify the effort we must invest. Even when the recovery is low or the chances of success seem small, there seem to always be people willing to try. This attitude led Columbus across the Atlantic, NASA into Space, and my ancestors across the plains in covered wagons. All of these are venerated because we can link the fruits of the harvest to their effort, but as I have previously written we sometimes forget the travails and activation energy required in order to convince Spain to fund an expedition, to overcome the earth’s gravity, and to cross an unsettled wilderness. In each of these cases, the preparative energy seemed enormous, but people paid it anyway knowing that it would be useful to someone.

I do believe that God only does useful work. In His Universe of Useful Work, everything that occurs “happens for a reason” because He knows how to get things ready for His children and how to get His children ready for Him. Even string theory tells us that everything is connected, and so even if you feel that you’re part of a fruitless effort, remember that you are only part of a larger vision that will eventually do something useful, even if that utility is only so that you know you were willing to attempt. Discovering truths about ourselves is useful in maximizing future efficiencies in our lives, and so the universe allows us to sometimes do the jejune and the asinine so that we can learn to be wise from our mistakes. As for the universe, it follows the rules, and everything it does that we know follows this rule and maximizes useful work.

This post is dedicated to M. W. former student who was the first to be touched by this realization.

Undermining While Upholding

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A great man once said that what we obtain easily we esteem lightly. We seem to care about and for things that cost us something. I think that a lot of people do not appreciate what they have because when the costs mount they manage to convince or compel others among us to pay the price for them that they were and are unwilling to pay. On an emotional appeal they make what they call a rational argument and demand that the responsible subsidize their lack of wisdom and forethought. Far too many people leverage guilt in order to compel charity, not because they mean it but because they know that you do. Continued subsidies and “charity” without concomitant accountability actually undermine both individuals and nations because they ignore the principle of the harvest and rescue people from consequences. Either people reap what they sow, or they do not, and when people reap other than what they sow it does change their behavior and has other consequences as well.

I am aware of several coworkers who received raises during the budget crisis even though that’s apparently not allowed. Some of them probably received them because they have expensive medical bills or because they live beyond their means. I miss the part where that’s my problem or my fault. The problem with this kind of methodology is that it doesn’t get to the heart of the matter. If you can’t manage money, then it matters little whether you receive a $3000 raise or a $30,000 raise. If you have medical bills but don’t change your behavior, the bills will continue because the problem will persist. If anything, it reinforces bad behavior because we reward it. Rather than reward those who do the work, we penalize them because they do not have problems. How is that karma? How is that consistent with the law of the harvest?

Years ago, I was successfully sued in court for a large sum of money. The judge didn’t even bother to look at the briefcase full of paperwork I provided. He was only interested in awarding money, and I think he thought he was doing justice. However, he did justice neither to her nor to me, because she is back in the exact same place in life under the same burdens, and he essentially sucked away one year of my life and gave it to her. This reinforced her notions that she was in the right, and so she has persisted because she “succeeded” in court, thinking that her misguided notions will lead her to victory once again. Even worse, she now has a child who will grow up and learn from her mother’s example that this method is how you win at life.

They say that to the victor go the spoils, but then they give the spoils to others. All too often, the victor is not the virtuous but he with the vocal vichyssoise of verbiage. When you take away the profit motive, people are sapped of their desire to achieve. I know when I had a job that paid incentives, I was motivated originally because I could earn more money as a reward for hard work. When I found that we were punished or rewarded as a group and that some of the group ALWAYS dragged us down, I started doing just what was required and nothing more. So, the organization suffered.

At other times, we blame something or someone else for our own failures. Some of my students will no doubt blame ME for the fact that the recent exam I gave came back with a 61% average. However, I know that it’s not necessarily my fault. Only one of my students came to see me, and she scored an 87% and is on track to receive an A for the semester. Several others attended tutoring, which I know because the tutors email me summaries of what they discuss. Most of those who complain never asked questions in class, never came by outside of class, never saw a tutor and probably spent as little time studying as possible. Yet, they blame me because they expect me to compensate for their inadequacies.  When it comes down to brass tacks, they lash out at me because I don't make things easy for them because it's easier to blame than to work.

My first semester teaching, a young lady came to me a week before grades were posted to ask how to rescue her grade. I told her, “When you repeat this course, don’t let this experience go to waste.” Then I explained what she could learn from her failure about how to improve her lot. I think she was upset, but how can I reward people who do not do their due diligence when there are students who manage to receive an A? That reinforces the notion that people can get things they do not earn, and when we do that, higher education suffers as a consequence. When they retake the class for a higher grade, unless they change their modus opporendi their behavior won’t change because someone will take pity on them. (That student subsequently graduated and is now working as a nurse.)

Far too often, we prop up the weakest among us rather than doing what will strengthen them. I tell my students that if they end up in medicine they will essentially be tasked with keeping alive people who would be dead in previous eras of time. We have people with bad genetics or bad habits who are kept alive and pass on their genes when in previous ages we would “evolve” to be better as bad genes were bred out. Instead, these genes expand their holding and render us a genetically weaker species as technology makes it possible. Even more alarming, we now institutionalize attitudes in successive generations as people learn from the example of their parents how to game the system and get something for nothing. We talk about minimum wage rather than maximizing opportunity. We talk about safety nets rather than inspiring. We do this because it’s easier; really doing what is necessary takes work and effort, and experience shows that people will do almost anything as long as it costs them nothing at all. The lazy don’t care who it costs, because it doesn’t cost them. Instead of increasing in wisdom and stature as a civilization, we render ourselves fit for scorn as a society because fiscal policy makes it possible. Such a pattern of behavior dilutes the strength of a people and weakens them, either for destruction or for conquest.

Most of us say we do not want a diluted or weakened state even as we continue to vote for and demand it. What do you call the person who receives the lowest passing score in medical school? You call him Doctor, but all of us want the very best person we can find for the money that we pay. We don’t want someone who isn’t willing to pay the price to become a doctor servicing people who do pay the price. At the end of the day, some of the people who demand more than they are willing to give laughably talk about karma, as if karma works only positively for them and only negatively for those who “wrong” them. Karma is supposed to be about virtue, and neither greed nor dishonesty are virtues.

People prattle the principle of fairness without being fair themselves. They give special favors to friends and extra scrutiny to strangers and enemies. They complain about greed in others and emphasize their own need without asking why another person thinks they need it. We all seem to feel that we are virtuous while everyone else is not. We also seem to ignore the fact that the world does not reward virtue; the world rewards those who reward it. “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you (John 15:19).” This is why programs will continue to prop up the weak, not because we really care about the weak as much as we like, but because we can gain from it. We love the world more than we love virtue, truth and God. We love the rewards of our “charity”. Sometimes the weak vote for us; sometimes all they do is like us, but we’re not doing anyone any favors by doing for them things that they will not do themselves. I know this sounds heartless, but it is actually heartfelt. I desire that every man may stand on his own and rise to meet the opportunities that appear rather than simply subsisting. Medicine isn’t just about prolonging life, but about expanding the quality of life.

When we support things that should die, we essentially undermine the entire system. I remember watching some of my beagles throw a litter and cast out some of their young who inevitably died. No matter how often I pushed the rejected back to the mother or how often I fed puppies she would not, the ones the mother knew would die always did. Somehow the rest of nature knows when to call it quits even as we continue in our hubris to insist that we can cheat consequences. Sure some people will survive who would otherwise suffer, and we care about some of the suffering because their faces are real to us. At the same time we do this we ignore the fact that things become stronger when they are tempered, and if we protect them from challenges they are unprepared to come off conqueror.

Christian charity must come coupled to contrition. God does not force any of us to follow Him. Even when we do He doesn’t force any of us to obey Him. Only the penitent man will pass. In His great mercy, He provided a Savior who accepts responsibility for the mistakes of the truly penitent. He fixes things that we cannot fix. He helps those who truly mean it. Men cannot tell who actually needs help, which is why God commands us to help where we are able, but God does not help people who do not mean their contrition. God continues to hold consequences in place, but the sting of sin is taken away through Christ and opportunities in the future are restored through His sacrifice and mercy. God’s plan of consequence vindicates the vigilant and the virtuous. Perhaps this is why they say God helps those who help themselves, because He knows what our behavior actually evinces and can tell a Judas from a Peter.

Routine of Adulthood

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Tonight, as is usually the case on Friday nights, I will sit at home grading while most people are out carousing. Friday is my busiest day of the week, and by the time I leave work on Friday during the semester, I have been on the clock for 52 hours and away from home due to work or work related activities for more than 60 hours. Add up the fact that I try to exercise eight times per week and that all the household work including shopping, cleaning, etc., falls on me, and by Friday night I’m exhausted. After work, I play racquetball, stop by the store on the way home, and then make a light dinner, watch a show I miss on Thursday because I’m in class, and just relax for hiking the next morning. It sounds pretty boring.

Several of the women I dated accused me of being boring. They wanted someone who would fill their life with excitement and variety and fun. What they do not realize is that adulthood comes with responsibilities. I cannot simply leave work at 1030AM on Tuesday and go cliff jumping. If the battery on my car dies, our “date night” might be transformed into accompanying me to the store to buy a new one so I can get to work in the morning. Bills must be paid, my employer expects me to arrive for work, and the household chores rely on me or a maid for which I am unwilling to pay. Especially when you add children to the mix, we add laundry and lunches and extracurricular activities, and that fills up life with a lot of routine activities.

I enjoy the familiarity of the routine. Most of my routine was selected because it includes things that I either enjoy or with which I am comfortable. I keep my routine because I like the ends to which it leads. I like eating well and feeling well from exercise. I nurture friendships while hiking and family relationships with weekly dinner. I work extra because I find some of the students actually learn, and if I transform their lives, then it has been useful work. I clean the toilet and shower because then I’m actually clean when I bathe and eliminate. For most things and people I am pretty inflexible when it comes to routine because most of those ventures turn out to be fishing expeditions that lead to places I prefer to avoid or to nowhere at all.

Apparently young people do not fully realize they are doing the same things and calling it living it up. They go out and do the same thing every weekend or every summer with the same people, but because they meet new people or visit new haunts, they call that “variety”. Far too many of them use “spontaneity” as an excuse to avoid having to keep their commitments. One could say that I prefer to plan, so much in fact that I say betimes that I prefer to have my spontaneity planned well in advance!  In the case of those whose parents still subsidize their expenses, they remain largely free from the obligations of buying food, gas, and clothing beyond the impulses they buy in addition to their needs. They certainly have less of an obligation to meet bills, pay mortgages, maintain their cars, and clean their own homes if mom the maid does it for them.

All of us I think look forward to excitement. The paradox of that is that we all seem happy to return home from vacation. There is something comforting about sleeping in our own bed, using our own toilet, and returning to the mundane. We like it because it is routine. We know what to expect, and so that helps us to PLAN. Living in the moment sounds fun unless you’re a homeless vagrant who knows not where he’ll lay his head or from whence his next meal might come. Being free and spontaneous has a dark side that we all know but that some of us refuse to acknowledge.

We romance excitement because we know routine. However, if excitement becomes the norm, it also becomes the new routine. I know some young folks who work in the entertainment industry, and those with an iota of intellect find it dull because they MUST do it. Partying has become their routine, and sometimes they find it difficult to put on a happy face and pretend that it’s just as fun for them as the clients who come to escape the routine of adulthood.

What we put into our routine tells us what matters to us. We will find time or make time for things that matter even when urgent distractions arise. Not that something doesn’t matter at all because we don’t make time, but it simply indicates that other things matter more. Eventually we either learn to be responsible and accept the routine of adulthood or we expect others to continue to take care of things for us, and that is adolescent.

Subjective Source Suggestions

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I have noticed lately as I started watching more youtube videos related to faith and the Faith that the majority of suggestions for further viewing are subjective. Most of them are actually adversarial and feature people who have left my Faith for “the truth” found elsewhere. Such events as this continue to corroborate my conclusion that Google is anti-faith and counter to traditions of American culture, but I digress. Each of the people in these videos and those who promote them commit a crime against truth by presenting a subjective opinion.

Most of these videos seem to originate with people who abandoned the beliefs of their youth due to some offense. Essentially, leaving something because you are offended evinces an attitude of pride. While I youth, I remember a speaker came to us and told us about his experiences with literature that attacked the Faith with libel and slander. He attended a Sunday sermon by another Christian affiliation that advertised “Three Ex-Mormons For Jesus Will Speak”, and somehow got permission to join in testifying of Christ. Rather than conclude as the others did with a story about how he left when they couldn’t satisfy his demands, Jack told us how he went to his bishop and confessed his sins. The other people had all risen in their pride and left God whereas Jack humbled himself enough for the Spirit of Truth to speak to him. F. Enzio Busche tells us that we can only communicate with God when we humble ourselves sufficiently to enter the lower levels of meekness where we are acceptable for the light of Christ. Evil men change the rules to match their behavior. Good men change their behavior to match the rules. I have been saying for years that most people are not really looking for truth as much as they secretly hope the truth will corroborate what they already happen to believe.

I laugh sometimes when people who never were members of my Faith or people who essentially apostatized from it profess to be experts. When I need an opinion on a suspicious mole, I don’t usually turn to the baker in the donut shop. When I need my tires changed, I don’t take them over to a fast food restaurant. I wouldn’t turn to a homeless person for tips on cleanliness or to a sick person for tips on healthy living or to a cripple for advice running a marathon. We turn to people who really know. We certainly don’t and shouldn’t turn to people who hate what we love for advice doing what we love any more than the British might have asked the Germans for tactical advice during World War II.

A few simple rules ought to govern this debate. Krister Stendahl, lately the Bishop of Stockholm and a professor at Harvard until his death in 2008 suggested the following, which you can hear here:

1. Ask them, not their critics. As he points out, if you ask a detractor rather than a faithful adherent who then criticizes them, you invite them to break the commandment to not bear false witness. When I want an objective opinion of a woman I think worthy of dating, I don’t go ask her exes or the girls who hate her. I ask her friends why they like her. You cannot expect to get an honest and fair opinion from someone whom you know to be openly critical.
2. Compare your strengths to their strengths. Most subjective arguments highlight the strengths of the favored party and the weaknesses of the opponent. You can see in almost any of the videos done by people who left my Faith that they see very little worthwhile in the Faith they once felt was true. That’s unlikely and hence illogical, and it does a disservice to both sides. Most people naturally prefer what they know and caricature the rest. It’s used to scare people away from the unknown or unwelcome, but in reality it makes you less appealing if you cannot stand on your own merits without slandering or libeling others.
3. Leave room for “holy envy”. There are good things everywhere. What Stendahl essentially suggests is that you be open to take the good things away from another belief system that are noble and praiseworthy. Sometimes we take for granted that other people have good ideas and discount them because they are not ours. In other people’s traditions, there are usually things that you admire and would incorporate if you could.

Most people do not want true debate, regardless of what they claim. In fact, I know from debate that it’s more about rhetoric and emotion than facts and logic. A year or so ago, a study showed that the louder party is usually considered to be the winner, and so it’s not usually about truth as much as it is who has the better argument. That’s how Bill Nye the so-called “Science Guy” who doesn’t have a degree in science “bested” some Australian theologian and disproved religion. Nye didn’t follow any rules aside from those of the Kaisers- win at all costs.

Unfortunately, in these debates, I do not see many people presenting both sides even when they claim to be objective. Most people will provide you information that corroborates their position because they mean to convince you to agree with them. I don’t expect any part of the Great Googleplex to suddenly populate the feed with as many videos that support a topic as they have in opposition thereunto. They have an agenda.

The fact of the matter is that people ignore things that they truly believe to be inconsequential. If people felt as Gamaliel that my Faith was faulty and would fall apart on its own, they would ignore it. Since they choose instead to lash out irrationally and write scores of books and record scores of videos attesting to the contrary, they show that they fear. They show that they’re not so certain. The truth is like a lion. It can defend itself. The more apologists an idea has, the more likely it is to be either false or unhelpful. I take comfort in that, because I know people throw rocks at things that shine, that they would not attempt to slay my Faith if they felt it was inconsequential. They are afraid of the truth, because more than truth, they desire to be right.

Whole Wellness

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This semester, I decided to take a fencing class because I felt like it. So, Tuesday and Thursday in lieu of lunch, I sneak away while someone teaches me how to use a sword. I do it for balance and for finesse and as a bucket list item, but it has made me aware of a muscular weakness and changed my perspective on other things in my life. Fencing as many other random physical activities points out weaknesses in you of which you may not be aware.

As a youth, I enjoyed the Mel Ferrer adaptation of Sabatini's Scaramouche. When Scaramouche goes to Doutreval of Dijon for training, Doutreval instructs him that fencing is from the wrist. He warns Scaramouche to handle the sword in a specific manner with these words: "Clutch it too tightly and you choke it. Too lightly, and it flies away". In my own fencing lessons I have seen the same thing, and I learned that despite racquetball my wrists were weak. Using a rapier/epee is one thing, but if you want to hold or wield any other kind of blade, the wrist takes the beating, and very few people exercise their wrists well enough to support that kind of endeavor. It made me wonder this weekend just how strong the arms of crusaders must have been in order to swing their huge swords! Consequently, I changed my weightlifting last month to accommodate this new need, and in addition to my ability to hold a sword at 90 degrees to my body, I have noticed a change on the racquetball court as well. Many of the regulars are amazed at my control and at my power.

Many people discover muscles they didn't know they had when they start to exercise or modify their regimen. I chose the triathlon type exercises on purpose to this end because it gave me what I thought constituted a whole-body fitness program. Fencing taught me that I missed some major muscle sets, not because of their size but because of what they might enable me to do. Small nuances change your capabilities a great deal. Even my piano playing strengthens my hands, which I did not previously realize.

Likewise with exercise, we frequently ignore small nuances to our full body wellness. While young, we know we can recover from prolonged and protracted overindulgences such as sleep deprivation, stimulant use, and extreme physical exertion. However, at the micro level, these load up our bodies with toxins, microfractures, and chemical imbalances that impact us later. Most people skate through life reliant on good favor. They party and revel and think nothing of tomorrow because they don't realize as I didn't at that age either that if your life endures you'll want to live well when you are old. Whereas once we could eat and go and withstand what we pleased, our bodies break down in the twilight years, and too many of us turn foolishly to drugs once more as an avoidance mechanism rather than a solution. I wish I could go back and convince my younger self to keep up an athletic regimen, because it's harder to do it now than it would have been if I already had those habits when my metabolism slowed down at 26. Many other people rely on genetics and youth to compensate for their bad habits. We quickly lose our health later because we abused our bodies when we were young.

Whole heath consists not only in avoiding danger but in setting good habits. As soon as we set exercise, sleep, and nutrition schedules that promote good health, we find it easier to keep habits. The people who gorge themselves on narcotics and alcohol and junk food find it hard if not impossible to change their diets once atheroschlerosis confines them to a hospital suite. Whole wellness begins there however as the psychological, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual facets of wellness beckon our attention as well. I know it can seem overwhelming, but setting small habits when young helps a great deal.

When I was young, I took good care of facets beyond the physical. As a youth, I retired early so that I could arise before my early morning religious seminary class to pray and read. While sometimes I fell asleep again during prayers, the habits continue to this present day. Morning is my most productive time, as I arise, pray, read, meditate, exercise, and prepare for the day all before some of my coworkers rouse themselves from their beds. Franklin Covey taught me principles of prioritization and planning, and I made sure I did things that mattered to me. I know that it promotes my wellness, because I haven't seen a doctor beyond regular checkups mandated by the state health program for almost a decade.

Our bodies and souls consist of amazing parts. As in life, some of the most amazing parts of our bodies might be some of the smallest and simplest of things. I can feel as I type this that I exercised my wrists today, because they are tired, but I know that it will enable me to do things that other people can't and that they can't change because they don't know how to get better at them. We do often only what we know, and so we are kept from the truth because we know not where to find it. In my class, I give a series of tips, which I will reproduce in a subsequent blog, because they are simple first steps to changing your life in a powerful way. Once you start the basics, you can improve your life dramatically by paying attention to small things like your wrists that will enable you to do things others can only dream.

As we work on our bodies, it behooves us to work on our minds and souls as well. Since they work in concert, your body's health ultimately pairs up with the health of your mind and spirit. For this reason, education and meditation and morality matter so much. If you put garbage into your mind or soul, even if you eat perfectly, you will still get garbage out. You have heard that inner ugliness eventually works its way outside; inner immorality eventually appears on the countenance as well. You cannot live a debauched life and continue to benefit from good looks and good health. A quick glance at recent photos shows that Charlie Sheen is finally reaping what he sowed. Even little things can wear away gradually at us and discomfit our wellness just as the pea disturbed the sleep of the princess in fable.

In essence, what we nourish gets strengthened. As we nourish major muscles, they improve in capacity. As we nourish our souls, they help us withstand challenges of character. As we nourish our minds, they help us solve problems. There are minor nuances that make a huge difference in whether or not we can accomplish things we undertake to achieve. Just as you have a physical wrist, there are mental and spiritual wrists on which your ability to wield words and principles may rely. By strengthening them you can increase your control and power in other facets of life as well.

Gossip, Bullies, and Abuse

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Even as people prattle the philosophy of peace and love, far too many of them hypocritically live the other way and attack those with whom they disagree or whom they don’t like. Usually attacks on one group by another arise from enmity- from envy, malice, hatred or jealousy. This is an ancient phenomenon, which shows up in the Bible with the children of Adam, one of whom slays his brother because the brother’s sacrifice was acceptable when his was not. Paradoxically, and perhaps most tragically, any kind of personal attack usually results in a lose-lose, because in order for the aggressor to succeed, he must abandon whatever virtuous activities in which he is engaged in order to press the campaign against his fellow, and usually, as this film that I saw Saturday depicts, what remains when the dust clears is mostly ruinous.

With the rise of technology, the speed of the bullying mentality has accelerated. Whereas once we had to encounter by chance these attacks, in their haste to be popular, most people will spread retribution when they are annoyed or angered without a second thought. Even when judging others poses no threat to a person physically, it is always contentious, even when those who perpetrate it claim it was intended as a joke. That claim is only true if the target finds it entertaining, but usually the target finds it debilitating, denigrating, and defeating. Since it takes some minutea about one person that is probably common and not a character fault and mocks it, it mocks humanity in general. How many young people have committed suicide of late because of slanderous and libelous memes spread by social media or rumors or other kinds of personal attacks? They need not be propagated by an army with swords and staves; the pen (and now the iPAD) truly can be mightier than the sword.

The number of victims and the severity of victimhood come from the fear of others to likewise be ridiculed. Even nations make treaties thinking to have secured peace in their time without recognizing that the aggressor, which is usually a weaker personality, can only endure if it cuts down those whom it perceives to be stronger. Even worse, sometimes the aggressor finds allies who help spread their terror around and create a single target around which they can unite. Sometimes, we continue to propagate it so that we do not become a target ourselves, because those who rise up and stand against bullies usually gain the full attention of the abuser.

As this film depicts, sometimes the attacks are done anonymously, but that’s not always the case. Sometimes, the people who hurt us the most are those whom we believed to be closest to us. Sometimes, and police will corroborate this, the worst abuse comes from people in our own homes and in our own families. That’s when it becomes the most difficult to conquer.

Dr. Phil McGraw once said that “The first tool of an abuser is to isolate the victim”. This works because if you feel like you are alone, then you constitute less of a threat. Your family is supposed to be a refuge, and if, when you leave work or school or whatever other activities and you return home to an abusive situation, it can feel hard to resist. I know from my own personal experience how much I hated “going home” in graduate school to a wife who seemed unable to see any virtue in me at all.

Whether from peers or from kin, the abuse of a bully threatens the livelihood of the victim. When there are no physical repercussions, such as in my case, emotional scars remain that hinder our ability to love and trust and get close to others. Some of the people you see walking around are among the so-called “walking dead”, having already been carved out from the inside by repeated emotional, psychological, and verbal abuse, who are hostage to the bullies around them and who feel isolated and helpless.

We lose the high ground when we refuse to turn the other cheek. We adopt the behavior and disposition of the bully if we exclude, banish, or punish others because of what they have done, because of what they might have done, or because they share some trite commonality with someone who once wronged you or those you love. Judgment with condemnation is a position very anti-Christ, for only God knows our hearts and thoughts and intents sufficiently to justify those behaviors. Even during his incarnation, Christ always welcomed “publicans and sinners” who came to Him. Finding another guilty by association, without investigation, or “by words without knowledge (Job 38:3)” invites the Judge of Quick and Dead to judge us with the same mercy we extend to others- ZERO. Judging others for the disparaging remarks made of them by others without any investigation on our own makes us fit ridicule before the mercy of Christ. Perhaps, as I have, you have also had to pay for the sins of others.

Frequently, the bullies will hold their targets captive to their wills. Even if not in gulags or ghettos like the genocides of the 1940s, you probably know people who stay in abusive relationships. Since these often involve adults, even though it doesn’t legally count as a kidnapping it does constitute a form of hostage situation. Like in hostage situations, the bully will do everything he can to isolate the victim- moving them to a strange location, cutting off lines of communication, separating them from friends and family either geographically or by vilifying those they love, and by standing watch over them at all times. They are not free to move around at will, to eat what or when they like, or even given access to the tools to handle their own lives.

In other cases, the bully will isolate the victim while he is surrounded by people. This diabolical design pushes people into expulsion and exile, not literally, but socially or economically or even grammatically. How many people do you know who exclude people because they dress differently, like different music, use different vocabulary, or ignore any other number of social conventions? My car has been a litmus test for years, and I have discovered that it is almost 100% efficient at weeding people out of my life who judge quickly. Either way, the bully wants the target held hostage to the will and timing and opinions of the bully.

Sometimes, Stockholm syndrome results, in which the captive comes to “appreciate” that the abuser has “Killed them with kindness” by doing things “for their own good”. In a few cases, I have had to hold back what I thought because although I might have revealed to the person that they were being abused, it would make me look like the bully. I do not desire to drive them closer to the abuser and find virtue in his vices. Sometimes, when we point out that someone is in emotional, physical, or psychological captivity, they lash out and accuse us of slander and gossip, even when what we point out to them is true. They are right to lash out; if they cannot see it, they will not leave it. You cannot rescue someone who refuses to come with you to a place of safety. All you can do is invite them to go with you instead.

At the end of the day, abusers are not your friend. Even when they excuse their means based on the ends, I have already discussed the logical fallacy that immoral means can lead to moral ends. Virtuous ends come only from virtuous means. Otherwise, there would have been no problem with Lucifer’s plan to exalt himself and take credit for forcing us all to obey as we ought. God’s plan was about both the means as well as the ends. Yet, I see at church regularly people compelling those they claim to love to obey against their wills, unaware apparently that gifts given grudgingly avail them nothing. Wickedness, even in your attitude, never leads to happiness. Forcing your spouse to attend church with you or to participate in any way is a form of abuse and tyranny and contrary to your happiness and theirs. If something is good, the only win-win comes when they decide to do it of their own free will and choice. There is no virtue in using the Adversary’s method to achieve the Father’s plan.

The Father’s plan furthermore consists in the quest of choice. Each of us has an opportunity to show whether we really intend to follow Him and then for those who do whether they intend to avail themselves of grace by turning to the Savior. Most bullies view themselves as the most powerful force in the universe, and consequently both they and their captives feel eventually that they have no need of a Savior. For this reason, the Iron Rod of God is a tool to which we may cling to help hold our way rather than a truncheon for use in our punishment. The bully Adversary seeks souls that can become food while the Father desires to fill the universe with copies of Himself (CS Lewis- Screwtape letters), because only Sons can succeed a Father.

Bullies grow up to become tyrants, and some people who think they mean well establish fiefdoms of oppression sometimes in their own homes. Governments too typically attract bullies who desire to dictate to others what they will do, when they will do it, with whom they will associate, and what they will do during those associations. These small people move into positions of power in law enforcement and legislation because they like to be in control. They do not care about the ends; they are interested in the means, because as long as they dictate to others, it makes them feel worthy and powerful and validated. Government bullies do not like us to do anything for ourselves. Sadly, there are some who mean well and intend to force us to be good, but they in the end intend to rule us even when they are obviously unqualified to rule even themselves. When possible, they will seek to isolate us and make us dependent on them. They will lock us up like hostages and take from us any tools they can that we might use to handle our own lives.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is the Gospel of Freedom. You don’t have to follow it. When you choose to, you have ZERO authority to impose your will on others. Most men, as soon as they obtain the least scintilla of power as they imagine immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion on others. Look at Christ instead; He persuaded, encouraged, suffered long, waited patiently, invited gently and forgave frankly when the sinner turned. He isn’t interested in control. You cannot tempt to virtue as you can to vice. You can only invite. You cannot force people to love you. You can only be true.

The best sermon, the only sermon, and the most impressive sermon applicable to this situation came from the Master Himself. Love thy neighbor as thyself. When we do not defend others, particularly those whom we say we love, we in essence betray them. When we do not love them, we do not love God. When we assume the bad, we open the door for our Maker to judge us with justice rather than mercy. When we impose our will on our brothers and sisters, we hold them back from chances to grow and learn and improve. Out of fear of failure, we prop up the weak rather than allowing their faith to grow and make them stronger. Each of us has failed or fallen short, including the bullies, and perhaps they abuse because they have no hope, because they feel themselves hopeless. For this reason, the bullies need our love and care and concern the most, especially since they deserve it the least. Forgiveness can be difficult, particularly when we are abused. Dieter F Uchtdorf reminds us in this film: "In the end, it is the merciful who obtain mercy."

Doing Things Well

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This week, we worked intensively with acid-base chemistry in class. This section of the course is difficult for almost everyone because it requires them to reach back into their atrophied math skills and use logarithms. I spend time, although I am not obligated too, showing different students how to do the calculations on the varied calculators that they have. Although the math is different, each calculator has a different order of operations, and we only get a useful answer when we use the calculator the right way. I desire that my students succeed, and so I invest the time and effort for those who desire to help them do as well on the exam as they are able.

Students faced various problems with this exercise, and that's very common. Many of them didn't really understand logarithms in math to begin with, and some of them took algebra and trigonometry years ago. A few pushed the "subtract" button rather than the "minus" button. In one case, I could not find the option to compute a logarithm at all! Mostly, I spent time figuring out in what order to push the buttons in order to not only get the right answer but to get one that makes sense. You see, there's no point in calculating the pH if you don't understand the scale or if your number doesn't fit into it. There is an overarching principle here that it's a system of relative chemical potential that ultimately balances to either your ruin or your benefit.

Years ago, I read Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, which did color my perceptions of the world. He takes a very logical approach and suggests that we do the following:

“Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones.”

When I feel low on faith, I default to this position because it's a win-win. If the people who do not believe in God are wrong, then living a life of debauchery will be their only reward. Living a good life is a win-win. A just God, of which I testify there is one, will welcome you back for living true to principles of truth and righteousness and reward you accordingly. If we are wrong, then the people who knew us will thank us for making their lives a little easier and more pleasant, and in that way we win long after we die.

Such a philosophy remains unpopular because it doesn't validate self. It calls for us to sacrifice our selfish desires and be good people. I know plenty of people, particularly students, who think you can be good by doing justice to others while doing injustice to yourself or to some few, but that is not true. They do kind things for people they like while they rejoice when their enemies get "their just desserts". They think it's not hurting anyone to engage in lasciviousness behavior and other indulgences without counting the cost to themselves. Even if right now people do not feel hurt, that doesn't mean they are not; most people with cancer don't know they are sick for many months. This attitude my young friends believe to be a principled position- love your friends and hate your enemies, when that is anti-Christ. You really only stand for something when you stand up to protest injustice when it is done to people you don't know and in particular people you don't like. Being excited when karma punches someone who once wronged you in the gut isn't a position of principle; it's a position of selfishness that validates YOU. If we really believe in goodness, we look at people not for what they do but for who they are, and when we really see the hidden rudiments of the child of God in them, we change. We do not wish them ill, but we desire to cast their burdens on our backs. We do not excuse injustices done to them because they deserve it because we recognize that since we are fallen we also deserve punishment.

Most people I know who live good lives found their way there via good means. I already wrote about the fallacy that invirtuous means can lead to virtuous ends, because we reap what we sow. Men do not gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles. In the end, only by doing things the right way can we reap a good harvest. Instead, the Great Deceiver follows the pogrom Screwtape gives Wormwood in Letter #9: "All we can do is to encourage the humans to take the pleasures which our Enemy has produced, at times, or in ways, or in degrees, which He has forbidden." In other words, the devil and those who serve him create counterfeits, false justifications, and say that the order doesn't really matter because the things are not wrong. Yet, as my students can attest, if you type in the information incorrectly into your calculator, it will not give you a pH value that is useful, and more often than not, it tells you "Syntax Error" and fails. No student who gets that result on the exam will leave the room happily. Even if we do the correct things, if we do them in the wrong order or at the wrong timing or in the wrong fashion, things may not turn out well. I think it was Spencer W Kimball who said that "One chief cause of unhappiness is trading what we want most for what we want in the moment." By doing things out of order, it breeds regret, guilt, and ultimately unhappiness.

One final lesson from the calculator exercise is that each life can be a unique experience. Some things will not work in the same order for you as they do for others because the way your life has been calculated varies from that of others. There are a few different paths that lead to the same ends as long as certain key elements of the calculation remain true. Although not all roads lead to Rome, there are multiple roads depending on your individual circumstance that lead you to the right ends. While a large majority of students use the same kind of calculator (because it only costs $5), a few always have different models or manufacturers and necessitate a personalized tutorial by me in order to make relevance of the calculations. However, as I previously mentioned, some things are not acceptable substitutes. Pressing the subtraction button is not the same as changing the sign with the minus button. Logarithms differ from natural logs. If you're in the mode Radians instead of Degrees, the calculator might not accept your input. In other words, there are things that must be there and things that must be absent, and some things must occur in the proper order if you desire the calculation to work out well.

People like to use the cliche that "practice makes perfect". Only perfect practice makes perfect. My sister can tell you that although I can swim well and play the guitar with some skill, I don't do either of those things the correct way because I trained myself to do them. I lack the correct form. Ultimately, it limits my abilities so that I'll never win an Olympic medal or publish a grammy-winning album. I don't care about being perfect or pretend to be perfect at either of those activities. However, far too many people talk up their own virtues when they live lives of anything but virtue. You can push buttons on your calculator and get answers, but unless the answers are meaningful, they still won't win you points on the exam. A few students will never figure it out and, frustrated with syntax errors, will leave those portions of the exam blank. Only in doing things the right way can we obtain the prize. Whenever people persuade us that order doesn't matter, that the ends justify the means, that they love others while showing by their self-destructive behavior that they loathe themselves, it is folly and fit subject for ridicule. Those cliches sometimes work, but probably because of exigent circumstances, yet we assume due to coincidence that our actions caused the outcomes. That's not how math works, and ultimately it's not how life works either.

As Marcus Aurelius suggests, live a good life. When you are gone, the people who knew you will remember you with gratitude because you were a boon in their lives. When you are gone, if you lived well, there will be few who celebrate your passing and even fewer who can justifiably rejoice that you are out of their way. When you are gone and taken home to that God who gave you life, you may then hear the words, "Well done thou good and faithful servant." They say that anything worth doing is worth doing well. Since we're here and alive and still have an opportunity, let us decide to be good and do good and live well, and then if nothing else, in the winter of our lives we can bask in the warmth of a satisfied conscience and enjoy peace that only comes to the truly principled.