Aggressive to Learn (Friday Devotional)

“Good and upright is the Lord; therefore He instructs sinners in the way. He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble His way.”

- Psalm 25:8-9

Michael Jordan, asked once about his secret to success, didn’t give the answer you might expect. It wasn’t natural talent or stellar teammates or hard work that set him apart in his mind (though these all surely had a part to play.) “My best skill, he said, “was that I was coachable. I was a sponge and aggressive to learn.” Even the greatest basketball player of all time was always ready to learn more about the game.

That’s a lesson that every believer should take to heart in their walk with the Lord. After all, it’s easy, once you’ve learned all the important Bible verses and been a church member for a while, to mistakenly thinking you’ve got this Christianity thing all figured out. And when self-satisfaction sets in, it doesn’t take long for self-righteousness to follow.

The psalmist reminds us that God is, among many other things, our Teacher. Out of an abundance of grace, He “instructs sinners in the way,” guiding His frail creatures toward eternal life. What is required of us is the humility to be willing to learn. Teachability, an openness to God shaking up your preconceptions, does not indicate a weakness of character, but a desire to grow.

Every day you encounter situations, issues, controversies, and people that test you and force you to decide what matters to you. Faced with such tests, fight back against the defensive urge to plug your ears and close off your heart. God wants to see you grow in Him, and He just may be using those situations to show you a perspective you’ve never seen before, a new corner of the kingdom He needs you to see. God is always ready to be your Teacher, so may you always be ready to learn.

The Never-Ending List (Friday Devotional)

“I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless you, and praise your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; his greatness is unsearchable.”

- Psalm 145:1-3

On a shelf in our living room, I keep a handwritten list of every book I own, with the ones I’ve read crossed out in pencil. As of today, 46 of the books on that list have yet to be crossed out, thousands of pages of history, biography, fiction, and graphic novels still waiting to be read. In my office, I keep a similar list (excepting reference books), this one recording 32 owned but unread books, everything from dense theological works to sermon collections to Christian bestsellers. There’s one more ongoing list I should mention, this one in a note on my phone. Instead of a record of titles I already own, this one is a constantly growing list of authors, titles, and genres I want to read, just so that if I stumble into a bookstore (that tends to happen pretty regularly) I’ll remember what to look for. All I can give is an estimate on this one, but it’s safe to assume that, all told, that list includes several hundred books.

I try not to think about this too much, but when I put these three lists side by side, then add in the number of books which haven’t even been written yet but which I’ll want to read once they have been, I can reach only one conclusion: I’m never going to be able to read everything I want to. There’s too much interesting writing out there, and I simply don’t have the time to get to it all. A man could spend every waking hour of the day reading, do that every day of his life, and he still wouldn’t make a dent in the collective canon of world literature. So logically, I realize I’m never going to be able to read it all. But boy is it fun to try.

As impossible as it would be to read everything, in Psalm 145 David addresses a much more overwhelming task: fully describing the greatness of God. He promises to extol the praises of God every day forever and ever, for “great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised.” Nevertheless, he acknowledges that the greatness of God is “unsearchable,” impossible to completely understand or describe. David could very well write psalms about every blessing God had extended his way, every angle of God’s glory he’d witnessed, every attribute of God he could imagine, and everything he came up with would still only cover a fraction of God’s fullness.

But faced with such a challenge, David doesn’t throw up his hands and give up. Instead, the depth of God’s mercy, justice, and love compel him to spend as much time as he can in worship, constantly pursuing a deeper relationship with God. David understands he will never learn everything there is to know about God, that he can never fully grasp His greatness—but his joy is to know God a little better every day.

In your own walk with God, may you possess that same passion for encountering God daily, not frustrated by His mystery, but emboldened by it. Understanding that you can always know God more intimately and follow him more faithfully, press on to win the prize for which God has called you heavenward. You’ll never learn everything there is to know about your Father in heaven—but boy will it be fun to try.

The Rules of the Road (Friday Devotional)

“Their heart was not steadfast toward him; they were not true to his covenant. Yet he, being compassionate, forgave their iniquity, and did not destroy them; often he restrained his anger, and did not stir up all his wrath. He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes and does not come again.”

- Psalm 78:37-39

Imagine you’re at a stoplight behind one car, patiently waiting for the light to change. Suddenly it turns green, so you ease the pressure on the brake, ready to shift your foot to the accelerator and get moving. A full second goes by, and yet the car in front of you remains stationary. Another second goes by, with the lead car still motionless, and you drum your fingers along the steering wheel and lean forward a little, almost as if to will the other car forward. As the third agonizing second ticks by, you crane your neck to figure out what’s going on—are they on their phone, or dealing with a child in the back seat, or are they just not paying attention? By the time the fourth second passes, only one question remains: how much longer until you lay on the horn?

Driving is full of little moments like that, when your patience is tested in an incredibly short period of time. It may happen in a traffic jam when you see a motorcycle weaving between cars at a high speed, dangerously flying through the makeshift parking lot of the interstate. I may happen at a four way stop when somebody jumps their place in line. Perhaps most commonly, it may happen when someone pulls out in front of you and cuts you off. In each instance, your frustration behind the wheel comes from a feeling of unfairness, from a sense that the social contract has been violated. You and everyone else on the road played by the rules, you did what you were supposed to do, and this jerk upset the balance.

Psalm 78 reminds us that on the road of life, we are that jerk. The psalmist sings of Israel’s repeated failures at upholding their covenant with God, and we cannot help but remember that, even under the new covenant of the cross, we remain just as disobedient. We are, to quote the old hymn, “prone to wander…prone to leave the God [we] love.” Called to faith, we still flee at the first sign of danger; called to hope, we still despair in times of trouble; called to love, we still find ourselves consumed with bitterness and anger. We can’t seem to follow the rules of the road.

Yet even in our repeated failings, God is compassionate and merciful, slow to anger and quick to forgive. Instead of raging against our weaknesses, the Lord took them upon himself and bore them on the cross, transforming our most miserable failures into his greatest victory. Where we were faithless, Christ was faithful, and by the grace of God our iniquities are forgiven.

That kind of mercy is not only our gift, but should serve as our inspiration. When fairness dictates harsh judgment, Christians can call for compassion. When the social contract requires punishment, Christians can call for forgiveness. In a world that demands law and order, Christians can aspire to grace and truth. Don’t miss your opportunities to live like Christ, meeting the cruel unfairness of life with the gracious unfairness of love.

What Do I Owe You? (Friday Devotional)

“Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.”

- Romans 13:8

I hovered the cursor over the “Pay Now” button, took a deep breath, and clicked the mouse. A congratulatory message appeared on the screen, but I didn’t need it to know what I’d just done: after more than 5 years of diligent budgeting and regular payments, my student loans were completely paid off. A wave of relief washed over me at the realization that I could remove loan payments from our monthly budget, that there was one fewer bill to pay each month, and that our savings account could finally start to grow. But more than from those practical considerations, my relief came from a more existential feeling of liberation—for the first time since graduation, I wasn’t in debt to anyone. I was free.

One of the first tips any financial advisor will give you is to avoid debt whenever possible. They tell you this because of how it affects your financial flexibility, your ability to invest, etc. But the advisors who go beyond the numbers will also warn you about the effect debt can have on you emotionally, even spiritually—the knowledge that you are not truly free, that your future is, at least in one regard, bound to someone else, can be suffocating. If you’re looking out for yourself, they say, you’ll stay away from debt.

Paul seems to echo this sentiment in the first part of Romans 13:8, telling believers to “owe no one anything,” advice that would earn him a gold star in any Dave Ramsey seminar. But then he follows that rule with a notable exception: “except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.” Love, Scripture tells us, is the one obligation we always owe one another, the one debt that we never stop paying.

What is unusual about this debt of love, however, is that it works differently than all others. When you pay down on it—when you show kindness, or give without thought of return, or extend forgiveness—instead of feeling chained, you feel free. When you acknowledge the love that you owe others, that obligation and duty doesn’t suffocate you, it brings you life.

With all other debts, you want to be rid of them so that you can look out for yourself. But when you embrace your debt of love to others, you look out less for yourself than for your brothers and sisters—and paradoxically, in doing so you find a far greater kind of freedom. If you want to know that sort of freedom, freedom that money cannot buy, then set aside your own selfishness and look first to the interests of others, loving them with the sacrificial love of Christ. You might say you owe it to yourself.

August Reading Log

Lots of reading this month, but not many completed books...I'm midway through three right now. Besides, as you'll see below, one of these four books occupied quite a bit of my reading time all on its own. Nevertheless, I did manage to finish 4 books in August, so enjoy my reviews below and don't forget to let me know what you're reading!

EAT THIS BOOK: A CONVERSATION IN THE ART OF SPIRITUAL READING by Eugene Peterson

Reading the Bible can be hard. For all the well-meaning platitudes about how God's Word is something that anyone can understand and apply to their lives, the truth is that there are times where you read something from Scripture and, instead of walking away changed, you walk away confused. The Bible is theologically complex, diverse in form, and (depending on your translation) stilted in style...which means that while most Christians highly value it, there are a lot who don't read it for themselves.

Stepping into this situation is Eat This Book, the second book in Peterson's five-part series on spiritual theology. In this volume, the title of which is drawn from the memorable image of John the Revelator literally eating the written revelation given to him by an angel (something God also commanded Ezekiel and Jeremiah to do in the Old Testament), Peterson argues that Scripture is something meant to be read differently from a novel or the newspaper. We are trained in school to read for information or analysis, but Peterson says the Bible is meant to be read as God's Word to you, as something you take to heart instead of as data to be interpreted.

While not a textbook or manual on how to read the Bible, Peterson nevertheless offers a series of helpful tips to readers as to how to enter into the text you're reading and make it come alive, how to read as though the words within the Bible are for you...because they are! The book concludes with the inside story of how and why Peterson wrote The Message, his colloquial translation of the Bible. Particularly for those who don't like The Message or think it diminishes Scripture, I encourage you to read the translation's origin story--it may change your mind.

What comes through in every page is that Peterson is a lover of the Bible, someone who, as the title indicates, feasts on Scripture and is nourished by it. The desire of Eat This Book is for readers to stop trying to master the Bible and instead allow the Bible to master them, and Peterson gives both the justification for doing so and the tools to walk down that path. I definitely recommend this book both for those who love to study the Bible and for those who want to, but find it too intimidating.

TRUMAN by David McCullough

Being a history buff without having ever read anything by David McCullough is a little bit like being a Beatles fan and never having listened to Sgt. Pepper's...it's possible, I guess, but you should be embarrassed about it. So this month, after half a dozen instances in which I considered starting this 992 page monster only to be intimidated by its size, I decided it was finally time. And guess what: it turns out this David McCullough guy is pretty good at what he does.

With Truman, McCullough manages to do what I thought only Stephen King was capable of, which is write nearly 1,000 pages and somehow leave me wanting more. With a keen understanding of his subject, a gift for narrative, and an easy-to-read writing style, McCullough makes Harry S. Truman come alive. Beginning with the migration of Truman's grandparents to his beloved Missouri and ending with the death of Harry's beloved Bess, this is a true biography, missing no period of Truman's life. There are lots of interesting anecdotes, memorable quotes (Truman had plenty), and important decisions to get through, and the book doesn't seem to miss any.

But despite its size, this biography is remarkably cohesive...it really does feel like you're reading about the same person from beginning to end, whether on that page Truman is a failed haberdasher, a senator, or the President of the United States. That's a tribute both to the writing and to the man, a president who managed to simultaneously rise to the level of his office and leave it as the same decent, common sense, Midwesterner he had been the day he received word of FDR's death.

What wowed me most about reading this book was the historical importance of Truman's presidency. I suspect most people remember him for two things (as I did prior to reading): succeeding FDR and dropping the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And while those two things are certainly fundamental to his legacy, there was so much more: the Potsdam Conference with Stalin and Churchill, desegregating the armed forces, the Marshall Plan, the containment doctrine against Communism, the Korean War, firing General Douglas MacArthur, an assassination attempt...just to name a few things. Little did I know, but Truman faced nearly as many hard decisions in his nearly 2 terms as his much-lauded predecessor did in 3. The steady flow of event after event, decision after decision, made for fascinating reading.

For any history buff, especially if biographies are your thing, I'd definitely recommend Truman. Rare is the biography that can be both informative and entertaining, but this one pulls it off with seeming ease. Don't let its size intimidate you--it'll take you a while, but it's worth every minute.

DC: THE NEW FRONTIER by Darwyn Cooke

The 1940s and 1960s, a.k.a the Golden and Silver Ages, are indisputably the greatest periods of creativity and popularity for superhero comics. The 1940s saw the creation of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Captain America, and many others. Superheroes back then fought all manner of monsters, mad scientists, and costumed crooks...but mostly they fought Nazis. The 1960s saw the birth of the Marvel Universe, from the Fantastic Four to the Hulk to Spider-Man to...you know what, name any Marvel character and there's a 95% chance they were created during the 1960s. Over at the Distinguished Competition, the Trinity (Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman) suddenly found themselves joined by enough new heroes, like Flash, Green Lantern, and Aquaman, to form a Justice League. The foundation of comic book history is these two eras: the Golden Age of the 1940s and the Silver Age of the 1960s.

So the logical question is, what about the 1950s? The real-life answer is twofold. First, the popularity of superheroes simply faded after the end of World War II. As Indiana Jones 4 taught us, it's simply more fun to watch heroes punch Nazis than to watch them punch anybody else. When reading comics was no longer a patriotic exercise, kids (and the parents who bought the comics) started to move on. But the second reason comics seemed to disappear was the work of one man, Dr. Fredric Wertham. In his bestselling book, Seduction of the Innocent, the psychologist argued that stories found in comic magazines led to juvenile delinquency, pointing to the violence, homoeroticism, and sexual themes that he believed pervaded comics. His crusade against comics was successful, leading first to a Congressional inquiry and then to an independent organization called the Comics Code Authority, which served as a public arbiter for which comics were child-friendly and which were unacceptable. If the CCA (which had a laughably puritanical standard) didn't approve of your book, it was dead in the water. By the mid-50s, the industry was all but dead, with only the most popular heroes surviving.

So that's what happened in real life. But how, within the fictional Marvel and D.C. Universes, was that missing decade explained? What happened to all those old heroes, and what sparked the new age of superheroism in the 1960s? 2004's DC: The New Frontier, with the beautiful retro art and writing of the late Darwyn Cooke, answers that question in style for D.C.

In six oversized issues, Cooke unites D.C.'s most beloved heroes from all genres (war, adventure, science fiction, and eventually superheroes) against a living island in the Pacific so powerful that even Superman cannot take it on alone. Along the way, readers get new or reinterpreted background information about some beloved characters such as Hal Jordan, the original Green Lantern, written here as a hotshot pilot haunted by his experience in the Korean War. The story ends with the formation of the Justice League, interpreted here as the true birth of not only the Silver Age, but the unified D.C. Universe.

The story is fine, honestly nothing special...but it's really not trying to be. What makes this book excellent is not its plot, but the commitment to its time period, the decision to embrace instead of run from the era in which the D.C. universe was born. Instead of trying to make the characters feel cool and relevant to the 2004 audience, this book tackles their origins as a period piece--characters say "golly," women wear pearls around the house, and the War is still the defining event of everyone's lives. The art is done in the style of an old Max Fleischer cartoon, cartoony and full of bright colors. Most of all, the entire tone of the story is optimistic, full of promise that the future is bright and in the hands of heroes.

I don't know that a story like this would work for Marvel, which has always prided itself on being cool and new, but it's a perfect fit for D.C., which has traditionally found its identity in the unapologetically earnest heroism of characters like Superman and Wonder Woman (someone should tell that to Zack Snyder and the rest of the architects of D.C.'s grim movieverse.) When Andrew starts reading comics instead of chewing them, this will be one of the first I'll put in his hands, the rare comic book that is truly for all ages, from sophisticated adults to small children. In an age of cynicism, there's something refreshing about unfiltered heroism, and that's what New Frontier offers.

ESSENTIAL DEFENDERS VOL. 4 by David Kraft, Ed Hannigan, Herb Trimpe, et al.

No batter can hit it out of the park every time up to the plate. Even Babe Ruth had slumps. Essential Defenders Vol. 4 marks the first prolonged slump for a series no one would call the Babe Ruth of comics. It's not terrible...but it's not great.

The writing duties for these 30 issues were entirely shouldered by David Kraft and Ed Hannigan, with the art mostly coming from Herb Trimpe and Don Perlin. If you've never heard of any of those people, that should tell you something...I'm a pretty knowledgeable comics fan, and Trimpe was the only one I was familiar with before reading this book. The Defenders has never been a premiere Marvel series (including today, where it hit the small screen of Netflix instead of joining the Avengers at the multiplex), and that's apparent by the B-level talent this book had on hand in the late 1970s-early 1980s.

That's not to say that the stories they put out were bad, because they're not. They're just...fine. Whether facing the Mandrill and his Femme Force (yep, that was a thing), traveling to Tunnelworld in pursuit of Lunatik, or crossing over with the short-lived Omega the Unknown, the Defenders is the epitome of both the delightful corniness and eye-rolling overreaching of the Bronze Age. Sometimes it strikes the balance of humor, action, and drama just right...but more often than not, it misses the mark by a hair.

There are highlights, though. In one issue, "Defender for a Day", a college student named Dollar Bill (just roll with it) who has befriended Valkyrie airs a documentary about the Defenders that ends with a recruitment pitch, prompting a crowd of C-list Marvel heroes to show up at Defenders HQ looking to join the team, with equally diminutive villains attacking New York and claiming they are Defenders too. In another story, the Hulk goes to the grocery store and returns with about 100 lbs of nothing but beans. Hulk like beans. And while the team is comprised mostly of C and D-list heroes (Nighthawk, Valkyrie, Hellcat, and Hulk for all 30 issues), they do have chemistry, which is ultimately more important than star power.

But on the whole, it was kind of a chore to get through this one. I do plan to buy the fifth volume in a month or so (there are seven in all), but if it's more of the same, I may not finish the whole run. There are lots of fantastic comics out there...I'd start with those before you pick this book up.

The Best Sharpener (Friday Devotional)

“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.”

- Lamentations 3:22-23

One of the underappreciated miracles of modern technology is the electric pencil sharpener. Admit it, you haven’t given much thought to these in a while—they’re just part of the package in an office or classroom, no more notable than tape dispensers or staplers. But for anyone who’s ever mangled a pencil in a cheap manual sharpener, much less tried to whittle one down with a pocketknife, you’ll understand my respect for the electric variety.

In goes a blunt pencil, presently good for nothing but the pink eraser on the other end. But when the pencil is pushed far enough into the electric box, suddenly a motor whirs, blades spin, and you feel the pencil vibrate in your fingers. After 2 or 3 seconds you pull it out, and behold: suddenly your worthless stick of wood and lead is a writing instrument again, sharp and ready for work. With little fanfare, electric pencil sharpeners take that which is dull and make it sharp again, transforming something worthless into something worthy.

God does the same thing in our lives every day. With unrelenting grace, He takes terrible circumstances, sterile faith, and broken people and offers redemption, bringing fire from ashes and life to dry bones. His mercies are new every morning, Lamentations says, his steadfast love unceasing. God is continually in the business of empowering the powerless, encouraging the hopeless, and loving the unlovable.

There are days when life has you feeling dulled and unusable—dulled by heartbreak or anger or depression or apathy. In such times, it’s tempting to believe that God has abandoned you for the moment, that His grace can be found only in occasional, spectacular surprises instead of in daily, humble blessings. But the truth is that God never leaves you nor forsakes you; He walks beside you whether you are on the mountaintop or in the valley of the shadow. So when you are at your lowest, remember the promise of God’s mercy and redemption—from your present trouble, God will sharpen you into an even more worthy instrument.