Bread for Betrayal

“…the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread.” 1 Corinthians 11:23. 

This haunting passage reveals a remarkable depth to the person of Jesus.  We call this the “Last Supper.”  Jesus is in his favorite place to gather with his disciples.  From our vantage point, we know that Christ in now entering his week of passion—his capture, mock trial, crucifixion, burial, resurrection, ascension and glorification.  His disciples were not certain, but they were beginning to comprehend the purpose and plan of Jesus. 

The significance of the time setting cannot be overstated.  “…the same night in which he was betrayed took bread.”  Paul, in recounting this incident, did not call it Monday night or Tuesday night.  He did not specify the fourteenth of the month—or whatever.  He associated Jesus’ gesture of breaking bread with the night of betrayal.  This piece of irony has profound meaning.  In other words, this supreme, magnanimous act of Jesus took place against the backdrop of the worst act of betrayal in the annals of history.  It is often in the worst of circumstances that the best responses transpire.  In the darkest night, the brightest beams of God’s grace and glory shine forth. 

The body of Jesus was about to be broken; the blood of Jesus was about to be shed.  Then, Jesus makes a statement that has caused much anxiety to the church over many centuries.  “Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.” 

The caveat is perplexing.  In a larger sense, this searing statement finds application to all of us who would take the Lord’s Supper in succeeding centuries.  But, specifically, Jesus had someone in mind.  If you recall, he referred to this person in the foot washing episode.  “Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head.  Jesus saith to him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not all.  For he knew who should betray him; therefore said he, Ye are not all clean.”  John 13:9-11.

Adversity.  First, let’s talk about adversity.  How do we handle it? Paul Stoltz, in Adversity Quotient, says we are quitters, campers or climbers. Some of us fold the tent at the first sign of adversity and just quit. Others find out where their level of tolerance to normal adversity fluctuates and learn to live within that range. They are campers. The most successful among us, however, never discover anything that stops them. They keep climbing, battling against the most brutal opposition, until they plant their flag at the top.

Whenever you see spiritually successful people, don’t admire their brilliance or covet their favorable environment. Instead, examine their adversity quotient. No saint achieves a consistent prayer life without adversity standing in the way. No parent enjoys victory in their home without adversity. No godly man or woman lives an overcoming life without adversity challenging every moment. No flaming evangel witnesses for Christ without adversity showing up at every opportunity. None of these people have a superior strain of the Holy Ghost. They don’t have a better plan. They don’t command more angels as ministering spirits. They simply refuse to allow adversity to win.

The Apostolic church has the best plan in the world. We preach the life-transforming gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. We teach the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. We know that repentance, baptism in Jesus’ name and the infilling of the Holy Ghost constitutes full Bible salvation. We not only know these things theologically, we witness them experientially. Everything we need and want is in our relationship with God. If any of us have a problem, it is not in our plan, but in our diminished capacity for adversity.

Expect adversity. “Be sober…for your adversary, the Devil, walketh about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.” Jesus said, “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33. Every trap, snare and stumbling block is before you. Sickness, tragedy, trouble, rejection, human failure, temptation and opposition of every brand, stripe and form will menace you. Many foes are real. Many are imaginary. Many are unrealized threats. All constitute adversity. Every great revival was spawned in adversity. God may never take away the adversity, but he will do two things:

He will give you an increased capacity to absorb it! There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. I Corinthians 10:13. Paul said, “None of these things move me.” Acts 20:24 .

He will show you the way to victory over it! I John 4:4 says, Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.” By going on the offense, by committing yourself to spiritual disciplines, by looking to your goals rather than your goblins, you will destroy the material sources of your failures. We cannot improve our plan. We can, and must, improve our adversity quotient!

What did Jesus do?  If you read through the remainder of John 13, you will know precisely what Jesus knew about Judas.  But the most amazing thing about the reaction of Jesus was that in the very presence of a traitor, in the unsettling revelation of who was going to be responsible for betraying his trust, Jesus did not act to protect himself.  He did not curse Judas.  He did not disrupt the plan of God from playing itself out.  Instead, Jesus acted in accordance with Bible prophecy.  “Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me.” Psalm 41:7-9.  Yet, even though he knew what was happening, he still had options. 

1) He could have called out Judas and stopped him from the act of betrayal.  That’s what most of us would have done.  We don’t like to be hurt, we don’t like to be threatened, we don’t like it when someone does something against us.  We scream, fight and counterattack.  We demand that they cease and desist; we get up in arms; we call 9-11, call out the National Guard, the media hot-line, whatever.  We do know that we are not going to sit back and take it.  We believe in the old saying “Don’t get mad, get even!”

2) He could have ignored him.  Jesus may not have done anything proactively to stop Judas, but he could have ignored him.  He could have shut him out from the banquet.  Many people react to adversity or personal attack by our enemies by a self-righteous exclusionary technique.  The individual we don’t like—or that we know doesn’t like us—we treat as a non-person.  They don’t even exist as far as we’re concerned.  “I’m not going to hurt you—I just going to draw a circle around me and my friends and leave you on the outside.”

3)  He could reach out to him.  This was His choice.  And, in case Judas didn’t respond, Jesus proceeded to break bread with his disciples.  Breaking bread meant that Jesus continued to minister to people.  Jesus marched to the beat of a different drummer.  This was no personal problem with one man.  There was a much bigger plan at stake here.  The betrayal of Judas was going to launch the very drama of redemption.

Jesus did not question His betrayal.  Some of us weary God with asking foolish and unlearned questions.  Why?  Why?  Why?  Why did this happen to me?  Why can’t things be better for me?  Why did this person do me wrong when I didn’t do anything to deserve it?  Why did this one get cancer and this one didn’t?  Why did this person find a husband or wife and I didn’t?  But, the danger of these kinds of questions is that we tend to supply answers for them when the answer is not forthcoming.  And, our answer is usually accusatory against God! 

But, dismissing offense and reaching out in love and grace has always been the Christ way.  Matthew 5:43-44. “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.  But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”

When Jesus came face to face with the man who would betray him, he disdained the dagger.  He broke bread.  In the face of his greatest adversity, he held out the bread and the cup.  In fact, I am convinced that Jesus was tested by his encounter with Judas the traitor to a far greater extent than he ever was with Caiaphas, the high priest, Pontius Pilate or the Roman executioners. 

When you are given betrayal, offer bread.

When you are threatened, maligned, hurt or attacked, offer bread.

When you have absorbed all the punishment your enemies can throw at you, offer bread.

Jesus knew that by offering bread, he was giving salvation to the world. 

By offering bread, you are saying “Grace is all I have to give.”

Moment of Mercy

Are We Coming to the End of the Age of Grace? 

“And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.”  Luke 21:28 

Church, get ready.  As time goes on, the cost of being a Christian is going up.  Sheep will be divided from the goats, real saints from the sunshine patriots, and truth from falsehood.  We have been living in a cozy, comfortable bubble.  In the world at large, our convictions have gone unchallenged, our doctrines undisturbed and our lifestyle tolerated.  Change is coming. We will not be ignored by the world much longer. Enemies of the cross are moving into the power and control rooms of our society. Bible prophecy warns us that we are on a narrowing pathway to the end time and the fulfillment of all things.  

One of these prophecies concerns a very interesting gap of time that appears between 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel’s prophecy. (Daniel 9:24-27)  After this gap will be a final seventieth week (week of seven years, not days). This leads up to the second coming of the Messiah.  The first sixty-nine weeks terminated with the first coming of Messiah. The seventieth week will terminate with His second coming.  The times of the Gentiles will then be over, signaling the end of the Age of Grace.  (Luke 21:24).  When the door in heaven opens to receive the church, the door to grace will close on earth.

Yes, people scoff when they hear “the end of the world.”  But, we cannot dismiss the parables of Christ which foretell this very thing.  In Matthew 13:39-40, Jesus describes a scene which he declares is the end of the world.   “The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world.”  Neither can we deny the event of the rapture.  “ For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”  1 Thessalonians 4:16-17.

Other events of the end of time establish the church in heaven, the judgment seat of Christ, the marriage supper of the Lamb, the church as the Bride of Christ, the Great Tribulation on earth, and the revelation of the Antichrist.  As we march toward the fulfillment of these events, we are given signs and indications along the way. Just as a house is not built without excavation and a foundation, these last days will not come upon us without a period of preparation  It will not be business as usual. The balance of power is shifting in America and the world.

In the world, China and India are steadily gaining geopolitical power. The price of gasoline will continue to climb as we compete with these nations for oil. The encroaching influence of radical Islam is a worldwide phenomenon.  In America, freedom continues to erode. In fact, freedom itself is being redefined as a concept. Reams of legislation designed to strip us of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press and the right to bear arms are now in the hopper. All of this is in the name of diversity, tolerance and minority rights.

History is full of examples of tyrannical governments persecuting Christians. Some think that if we just do our own thing while our country falls into the depths of anti-Christ paganism, they will leave us alone. We must not be blind as we go about our daily lives, or be so taken with temporal things that we render ourselves incapable of seeing the spiritual battle at hand. All around us we see the increase in anti-Christian behavior.  The only group of people that it is found acceptable to speak against are Christians. The spirit of anti-Christ is growing in America while at the same time there is a call for “understanding” when it comes to every other religion imaginable.

Look at this is a critical statement made by Jesus: “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 now reality.  After a constant barrage of Christian-intolerant teaching in the public school system, academia and media/entertainment establishments, Bible believers are now seen as narrow minded fools. An increased drumbeat for “hate speech” legislation may now be heard. This legislation is a precursor to fully outlawed Christian speech. The day is almost here when we cannot speak against homosexuality, abortion and same-sex marriage.  No public stand against sin will go unpenalized.

According to Christian minister and author, David Berman, there will be an increase of the following:  We will be called the worst vile names. We will be marginalized and seen as holding back “progressive ideas.” We will be persecuted physically for our stand. The government will try to increase its authority over our children. Parents who stand for their faith and teach it to their children will be accused of child abuse. There will be increased employment discrimination. Tax exempt status will be threatened based on a church preaching so called “hate speech.” There will be government regulation of churches and Christian schools. Confiscation of church property with bogus eminent domain claims will happen.  There will be selective application of the law without due process.

What should our response be? “Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.” (Matthew 5:11.)  The time is near when standing for truth may cost you privilege, friendship, money, job, property, status and quite possibly your very life. Unless we as a nation have a revival through repentance, the future will not be Christian-friendly in America.

I am compelled to sound the alarm.  As the Apostle writes, if the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who will show up battle-ready?  When the Lamb becomes the Lion, when the Savior becomes the Judge, when the throne room of grace becomes the court room of eternal justice, a seismic shift will change the message of grace which the church now preaches. 

The most moving photograph in my possession depicts a scene which took place moments before the Berlin Wall officially shut off the escape route to freedom from East Berlin into the West.  A guard, anxiously looking around, spread the strands of barbed wire for a child to join his family in the West.  I call it the “Moment of Mercy” picture. Today, the church, as ambassadors for Christ, holds back the judgment of the end times, desperately hoping that more souls will be saved.  At some point, however, the barbed wire will close and the opportunity for grace will disappear.  Salvation is time-sensitive. “Today is the day of salvation; now is the accepted time.” 

Script for Personal Liberation

First, some dull, but very important facts.  Personality evolves in stages, and almost all of them involve people.  Specialists in early childhood education say that the first stages of learning involve relationships and interaction with people.  The nurturing stage makes up the first two years of life, during which a baby forms a bond of security and trust.  Somewhere between four to six months of age, a baby begins the social stage.  Recognition of the mothers face usually develops first, then, at seven months, a baby learns the first social games, like grasping objects and then giving them away, playing “patty-cake,” and “peek-a-boo.”  At nine months, babies start to tell the difference between faces, especially from known to unknown. As they enter the toddler stage, they begin to express wider ranges of emotions, speaking their first words, communicating with others. 

Since infancy and childhood marks the start of your core personality development, learning to rewrite your script starts here too. The values you have today, the raw, underlying reasons why your life is what it is and the unarticulated, shadowy background from which you emerged were primarily the result of your social maturation, and it has now formed into major governing forces in your life.  Biographers try to reconstruct these developments in subject’s lives to discern why they behaved in certain ways.  Comparing the background of Winston Churchill to that of Adolf Hitler, for example, is highly instructive in determining why each of them turned out the way they did.  We cannot truly understand these gigantic personalities that shaped world history without knowing who their parents were, what their cultural realities were, and how their social development progressed.  

Neither can you understand yourself without exposing the dominant forces in your past.  Until they invent time machines, changing your childhood will be impossible, but you can understand what happened, who contributed to your identity and how you arrived at your present state.  This knowledge pries the fingers of fate from around your neck, and helps disarm the feeling that you are helpless to change.  You need to be free from your past if you want to move forward to the person you want to be.  

The most critical aspect of your personal history, therefore, concerns people.  Are you uncomfortable around certain people?  Do you change your plans, your conversation or your demeanor because of their influence?   Do you sense that you are a different person when they are in the room?  Do your judge your own significance in terms of other people?  Without plunging too deeply into the psychology of personality (and I assure you that this could get extremely complicated), your viability as a person has less to do with who you really are and much more to do with who others think you are.  The criteria are many: looks, talent, intelligence, money, connections, etc.  When you locate these key factors, you will have the clues you need to write your personal liberating script.

Speak to a person who has always intimidated you. 

Ever hear of the term “pecking order?”  A German zoologist, Thorleif Schjelderup-Ebbe, introduced it in his doctoral dissertation.  He found that in any group of chickens, a hierarchy exists that establishes the top chicken, the second from the top and so on, all the way to the bottom chicken.  They use their beaks to arrive at their place in the order.  The order determines who gets the food first and who has to wait their turn.  Sociologists soon began to apply this study to humans and discovered that the same behavior shows up in groups of people such as elementary school classes, church congregations and even within families.  Fairness rhetoric aside, we all tend to operate within unspoken, yet very evident pecking order protocols.     

So, what does this mean in terms of your script?  Your script tells you to fold in the presence of certain people.  Sometimes it is attributed to the Alpha Male, or even the Beta Male dominance.  Whatever it is, it turns you into the Omega Male!  (Or, the female equivalent.)  The antagonists take many forms:  people who are super-extroverted, people who are judgmental and harsh, people in authority, people who threaten you with physical harm, people who are lawless types, people whom you have mistakenly stereotyped, members of your own gender, people who are extremely intelligent, and more.  But parsing behavior shows something more complicated going on.  It is one thing for someone to actually be superior to you.  It is another thing for you to perceive that another person is superior to you.  Both views lay out a script that you follow, whether you are aware of it or not.  

Sometimes, you can make changes through careful and deliberate thought.  Other times, you have to start by action, because thinking about it may lead to more inaction.  Since feelings are more intuitive than logical, you need to act first.  This is action time.  Open up a dialogue between you and someone who intimidates you.  What you talk about is not as important as starting the conversation.  Remember, you have never lacked the capability of addressing this person; you have only lacked the boldness.  However the conversation goes, you have taken a major step by establishing dialogue.  

Force yourself to speak to an intimidating person.  Several things will happen.  First, you will prove to yourself that you can do it.  Each successive time you initiate a conversation, you will feel increasingly at ease.  Second, you will be surprised at the response of the person who caused you such anxiety.  The aura of intimidation that you imagined will most likely evaporate and you will see this person as a real human being just like yourself.  Third, and most importantly, this breakthrough transfers to other people problems you may face.  A win in one area makes you feel and act like a winner in all areas.  

And, speaking of biographies, read about Theodore Roosevelt, C. S. Lewis, Thomas Edison, Orville Wright, Albert Einstein, Eleanor Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson, Barbara Walters, Julia Roberts and Elvis Presley.  Every one of them wrestled with and overcame shyness.  Each of them made a decision to fight back and write their own script.  You can too.  Dr. Clif Ford writes: 

“In Hans Sachs’ book, ‘Masks of Love and Life,’ there is a chapter title I’ve never forgotten – ‘Locked in a Room with Open Doors.’  The story behind the title is told in the chapter’s opening paragraph.  Says Sachs, ‘In a family of my acquaintance were two brothers, the younger of whom had a dread of opening doors. The older one became impatient, as older brothers will be, and wanting to break him of his habit, he threatened, ‘One day I will lock you up in a room with all the doors open.’

‘Locked in a room with open doors.’ What an image those words conjure up. They suggest that a person can be immobilized by inner weaknesses as well as outer obstacles. To be sure, there are people in our society who are locked in rooms with shut doors. That’s what most of the noise is about these days — people trying to open doors. Doors to more adequate education, doors to decent jobs, to good health, to better housing, to equal treatment, to a fair share of political and economic power.  But the fact remains, a person can still be a prisoner when all the doors are open. The enemies are not all out there. Some are on the inside. No reduction of obstacles on the outside can guarantee freedom within.” http://thecabin.net/stories/081001/rel_0810010028.shtml 

If there is a lock on the door to personal liberation, it exists only in your mind.  And, that’s precisely where the key is stored as well! 

Start a relationship that you never thought you could begin. 

A more advanced form of shyness may keep beating you up:  fear of relationships.  This script keeps many people locked into a loner mentality.  On a website called Social Anxiety Support, an eighteen year old man wrote, “I feel helpless with finding friends.  It’s rare for me to feel comfortable around a person.  I really want to help myself with my [social anxiety] though.  I’m just thinking of joining small groups I would be interested in but it seems hard and I have no money to do anything.”  The inability to form meaningful relationships is becoming an epidemic, and the onset of the technological age with television, personal computers, cell phones, video games, iPods, etc. has only exacerbated the problem.  Some people suffer from this problem so acutely that ending their lives seems like the only solution.  One can only imagine how the widespread use of robots will impact the sociology of future generations.  As it is, twenty-first century people can function in their silos with little need to bridge or bond to others.  This might be convenient, but it is hardly fulfilling.  

Fear of rejection tops the list of reasons for social anxiety.  Others loathe competition or any situation in which they are compared to someone else.  Still others were hurt so badly in a former relationship that they vowed never to let it happen again.  Isolation seems like the only protection.  Also, consider that you are your own problem.  Your expectations may be so unrealistic that you instinctively ride the brake and stop short of starting a relationship.  Where are you in this scenario?  Are you terrified of a relationship that you desperately want, but it appears to you that it could never happen?  It’s time to take another look at the script you have been following.  

If you have a history of negative episodes within your family as you were growing up, or while progressing through your school days, then that script was shaped by immature, undeveloped emotions.  Think about it.  A nine year old pre-pubescent mentality still wields the pen that writes out the way you are to behave as an adult!  In your mind, a ten year old bully continues to call you names.  In terms of your emotions, a fourth grade classmate who wrote an “I hate you” note may as well have written it yesterday.  The spiteful voice of a brother who called you “fatso” or a snotty sister who said you were ugly resonates in your head today.  

(Disclaimer: If a psychiatrist or other health care professional has diagnosed you with a clinical problem, you should follow his or her orders.  The advice given here is to supplement, not substitute, that of a medical practitioner.)  

Enough about the problem.  The way to a new you is to tear up the script that was written for you a long time ago and, as painful as it may be, to craft a new one.  Three things make sense here.  1) Confess your deep need for relationships.  Admitting it helps you suppress petty annoyances that you have allowed to sabotage your past attempts.  2) Understand that other people need relationships as badly as you do.  Quit assuming that others aren’t interested in you.  Relationships and friendships really travel a two-way street.  3) Relationships will cost you some freedom, but the rewards far outweigh the costs.  In mathematical terms, happiness shared is happiness squared.  (Happiness².) 

To paraphrase John Maxwell, the leadership guru, when the pain of staying the same outweighs the pain of doing something different, you will change. 

Speak up in a situation in which you have always suppressed your opinion. 

Do you often wish that you had spoken up during a discussion, but kept your mouth shut? Does it seem like the dominant participant voiced an opinion that you not only disagreed with, but it was based on a false premise?  You knew more than the person that did all the talking, and you had information that could have totally reversed the outcome.  Afterwards, you could have kicked yourself for not speaking up. 

“Silence is not golden.”  So writes Margaret Heffernan of Inc. Magazine. She explains that many corporations, organizations and associations of every kind complain that many of their members fail to speak up, even when encouraged to do so.  Heffernan tells this story: 

“Elizabeth Morrison and Frances Miliken are both academics at New York University. One day they had an experience many of us can relate to: A new initiative was being proposed and all the commentary, in hallways, lunchrooms, and by the water cooler, was universally negative. The new idea was bad. Then, at the faculty meeting, when the subject came up, nobody said a word.

‘Nada. No one raised one word of complaint. It just sailed on through. And that’s when we thought: I wonder if that happens everywhere.’

When they asked a broad range of executives whether they had ever had issues at work that they had not voiced, fully 85% said that they had, at some point, felt unable to discuss their concerns. Morrison and Miliken called this ‘organization silence’ and their research demonstrated that there is a lot of it around.”  (Inc. 4/9/2012.) 

The relevant question is why?  Why do people refuse to talk?  Here are some of the reasons: 1) It’s a waste of time and energy to say anything when it won’t make any difference; 2) My voice doesn’t count; 3) I’ll get shut down by other people in the room; 4) I can’t explain myself very well; 5) I’m not interested; 6) I hate conflict and confrontation; and 7) People who talk all the time have oversized egos.  But, isn’t it ironic that people who don’t speak up during the discussion usually have a lot to say after the decision is made?  The reality is that somebody is going to talk and someone’s opinion is going to shape the ultimate decision.  Say what you want to about the so called movers and shakers, but they are the ones who make things happen. 

If you are following a script that includes some of the foregoing reasons, why not tear it up and write a new one?  You do have an opinion and, until proven otherwise, it is just as good as the next person’s opinion.  If you indeed have information that others lack, you owe it to them—and to yourself—to speak up.  You can’t control how they will take it, but you can give them a chance to know what you know.  

Our focus here, however, is not the discussion per se, but your participation in it.  Your personal liberation is tied to the script that is now yours to write.  You have been scripted to acquiesce to the voices around you, as though your opinion has always been inferior.  It’s time to recognize the voice within you and give it the expression it deserves.  Your passion, your zeal, your insight, your intelligence and your right to speak has to come front and center.  So what if others try to shut you down?  Regroup and speak up again.  Wayne Gretsky, the legendary hockey player said, “You miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take.”  Likewise, you miss one hundred percent of the speeches you don’t make to influence a decision! 

Become vulnerable in areas that you have always tried to keep hidden. 

A leadership book I wrote several years ago, “Living and Leading in Ministry” contained several chapters in which I described a failure or a mistake that I made in my ministerial career.  One instance related a time when I disbanded a youth chorale, but was instructed by the pastor to reverse my decision and get the group back together.  Another time was putting out a financial report that was seriously flawed.  Yet another was failing to follow through on a capital campaign and having to finance a building project for much more money than was necessary.  Little did I know that these would be the incidents cited by readers as the most impacting chapters in the book!  They were not nearly as impressed by my successes as they were interested in my blunders.  

Should you risk exposing your weaknesses in human interaction?  Will it be embarrassing?  Probably.  Dangerous?  Sometimes.  Honest?  Always.  But pretentious maneuvering around the truth comes across as hollow and unrealistic.  Those traits are weaker than the weakness you may be trying to cover up!  It turns out becoming vulnerable takes more strength than hiding yourself.  

Once again, David illustrates the point.  Despite his sordid affair with Bathsheba and his murderous scheme to cover it up, he remains a compelling figure.  When the prophet Nathan exposed David’s sin, David took full responsibility for his actions and repented so completely that he wrote a psalm about his failure and his restoration.  Read it a ask yourself if this is the work of a weak man or a strong man. 

  Psalm 51:1-19 (NIV)
¹ Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.
² Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
³ For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.
⁴ Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.
⁵ Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
⁶ Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.
⁷ Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
⁸ Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
⁹ Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.
¹⁰ Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
¹¹ Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.
¹² Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
¹³ Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.
¹⁴ Save me from bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
¹⁵ O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.
¹⁶ You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
¹⁷ The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
¹⁸ In your good pleasure make Zion prosper; build up the walls of Jerusalem.
¹⁹ Then there will be righteous sacrifices, whole burnt offerings to delight you; then bulls will be offered on your altar.  

Has your script called for you to hide your mistakes?  Have you followed that script to the point where you have been disingenuous about your actions?  Have you mislead people, or even orchestrated a cover-up in order to deflect questions about your faults and failures?  That course of action may have been intended to preserve your strength, but instead, it underscored your weaknesses.  

A word of caution: becoming vulnerable does not mean celebrating your weakness, condoning wrongdoing or exploiting sin to gloat in prurient interests.  Your confession and repentance should not be a graphic tell-all story.  It should only be as revealing as is necessary to admit any sin on your part, and then to focus on the love and mercy of God to forgive and restore.  

It is time to be human, to be honest and, consequently, to be strong.  

These steps, simple in principle but difficult in practice, will be extremely liberating to your personal view of life.  Speak to a person who has always intimidated you, start a relationship you never thought you could begin, speak up in a situation in which you have always suppressed your opinion and become vulnerable in areas you have always tried to keep hidden.  The personal liberation you sense will change your life.

Script for Self-Empowerment

I must confess that I have held the term self-empowerment in contempt ever since it evolved into a popular buzzword like paradigm shift, core competency, or globalization.  It always seem like false bravado to me or, at the very least, a petulant little protest by a whiney little crybaby, like “Hey, that’s not fair!”  Or, “Nobody every pays any attention to me!”  

As it turns out, this impression is spot on, which is why a new script is absolutely necessary.  Someone has written a script for you (or maybe you did it yourself!) that defines you as inadequate and incapable of producing a credible result.  The script has become a self-fulfilling prophecy.  You failed to succeed, or you failed to even try because, in your mental assessment of the task, you were never programmed to succeed in the first place, everybody is against you, you never get dealt a good hand, God hates you, yada, yada, yada.  Thus, whenever you contemplate a major project, an unmanageable sense of inadequacy shapes your mental imagery long before it materializes on paper or in real life.  

Tackle a job that you never thought you could do.   

In the genre of mother-in-law jokes, behind every successful man is a surprised mother-in-law.  This may be class-deprecating humor, but I find it useful because it illustrates the point.  If you internalize someone else’s negative opinion of you, you will always confirm their expectations and disappoint yourself.  But, the reason you internalize their appraisal of you is because you have empowered them to define you!  Think about it.  Do you care what a Chinese man who lives 10,000 miles from you thinks about you?  Of course not.  You don’t know him and he doesn’t know you.  Neither do you care what a woman whom you’ve never met thinks about you, even though she lives around the block.  You don’t give these people the power to influence you.  

To whom do you give this power?  You give it to people who know you (friends), people related to you (your mother-in-law) and people you respect (your coach).  Sound reasonable?  It’s not!  These people are only acquainted with a narrow slice of your life.  There’s much more to you than any of them see.  They do not see your dreams, your aspirations, and your ambitions.  They may be unaware of your successes at school, on the job, on the baseball diamond or in your one-on-one relationships off their radar screen.  The point is that their opinion of you is based on limited and insufficient data.  And, even though you may have made some glaring mistakes, it’s ludicrous to allow your life to revolve around them. 

Back to David.  Why were his older brothers so dead set against their kid brother going out against Goliath?  Were they afraid that he would be killed?  Not so much.  The real reason revealed the complicated internal workings of a dysfunctional family.  

“David asked the men standing near him, “What will be done for the man who kills this Philistine and removes this disgrace from Israel? Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?” They repeated to him what they had been saying and told him, “This is what will be done for the man who kills him.”  When Eliab, David’s oldest brother, heard him speaking with the men, he burned with anger at him and asked, “Why have you come down here? And with whom did you leave those few sheep in the desert? I know how conceited you are and how wicked your heart is; you came down only to watch the battle.”  “Now what have I done?” said David. “Can’t I even speak?”  He then turned away to someone else and brought up the same matter, and the men answered him as before.” 1 Samuel 17:26-31 (NIV)  

David’s brothers applied a totally different template to him than any other would-be challenger to Israel’s enemy.  Look at their negative attitudes they held towards him:  anger, resentment, low esteem, mockery, ridicule, hatred, condemnation, accusation, and more.  Besides that, they may have been nervous about a kid brother’s courage showing up their cowardice.  The basis for their negativity may have been David’s birth status.  Some Bible scholars believe that David’s statement in Psalm 51:5, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me” was an admission of an illegitimate birth.  David’s own father, Jesse, was dismissive of him when Samuel came to anoint one of his sons to be king.  At any rate, David was targeted by his brothers for resentment and cruel treatment.  His response indicates that he refused to let them have this kind of power.  Had he internalized their assessment of him, David’s history—and Israel’s—would have been vastly different. 

Empower yourself.  Do something that your script says you can’t do.  Tackling a “job” doesn’t have to refer to making a living.  It is anything that beckons you to come and conquer it.  Do it.  Bring your best effort to the table—your problem-solving skills, your artsy flare, your wildest imagination, your courage to commit, your indefatigable energy and your highest level of endurance.  Bake a cake.  Experiment with a new recipe.  Sew a quilt.  Be a mentor.  Volunteer at a hospital.  Help out in a day care.  Serve in a soup kitchen.  Take a class.  Teach a class.  Blow glass.  Mold a piece of pottery.  If you don’t play the piano, learn.  If you already play, learn a much tougher piece.  Re-decorate a room.  Plant a garden.  Compose a song.  Install a new kitchen.  Dismantle and rebuild an engine.  Act in a play.  Paint a picture.  Compile a history.  Coach a team.  Acquire expertise on a computer.  Remodel a house.  Build a house. Learn a new language.  Write a book. Find out how investments work. Start a business.  Do something—anything—worthwhile, something that will make a difference in your life and the lives of others.  

Accept a challenge that you have always avoided. 

When challenges come, whether they gradually appear on the horizon, or suddenly rise up in front you, or track you down as you run from them, they put you on the spot.  What are you going to do?  Ronald Reagan said, “We must never lose the sense of adventure that thirst for knowledge or that determination to explore the outer limits of our own abilities.”  One of the most inspiring speeches in American history centered on a formidable challenge.  President John F. Kennedy stood behind the podium at Rice University in Houston, Texas and said:

“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

“It is for these reasons that I regard the decision last year to shift our efforts in space from low to high gear as among the most important decisions that will be made during my incumbency in the office of the Presidency.

“However, I think we’re going to do it, and I think that we must pay what needs to be paid. I don’t think we ought to waste any money, but I think we ought to do the job. And this will be done in the decade of the sixties. It may be done while some of you are still here at school at this college and university. It will be done during the term of office of some of the people who sit here on this platform. But it will be done. And it will be done before the end of this decade.

“I am delighted that this university is playing a part in putting a man on the moon as part of a great national effort of the United States of America.

“Many years ago the great British explorer George Mallory, who was to die on Mount Everest, was asked why did he want to climb it. He said, “Because it is there.”

“Well, space is there, and we’re going to climb it, and the moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God’s blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked.”

Choosing which job to tackle originates out of your own mind and heart, but accepting a challenge originates out of your environment.  You can choose your job, but you can’t choose a challenge.  It’s voluntary versus involuntary.  It just comes at you, sometimes without warning, and usually without instructions.  You have to improvise, guess and react instinctively to whatever it puts up.  Four paths are possible:  you can accept it and win, accept it and lose, avoid it and regret it or avoid it and breathe a sigh of relief.  In any case, if you always avoid your challenges, your life will remain an unopened package.  As Frank Crane wrote, “The human heart is an undiscovered country; men and women are forever perishing as they explore its wilds.” 

You should also note that the overwhelming majority of success stories in history are the result of people refusing to avoid challenges. Abraham Lincoln (Sixteenth President), Buzz Aldrin (Astronaut), Jim Carrey (Actor), Princess Diana (Princess of Wales), Ludwig Van Beethoven (Composer), Mike Wallace (News Anchor) and Winston Churchill (British Prime Minister) all suffered from mood disorders.  Vincent Van Gogh (Painter) and Sir Isaac Newton (Scientist) were epileptics.  Agatha Christie (Novelist), Albert Einstein (Scientist and mathematician), and Alexander Graham Bell (Inventor) had dyslexia.  They are just a few of many famous people who faced down the challenge to just get up in the morning and function, not to mention the phenomenal achievements credited to their names.  Wise King Solomon said, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick.”  (Proverbs 13:12)  Their hopes were not about to be dashed by their disabilities.  

Has a chance for a better job just surfaced?  Are you in line for a promotion that may demand more out of you but will kick you into a higher salary range?  Have you just learned of an investment opportunity with an element of risk but promises to be extremely rewarding?  Obviously, I’m not recommending a foolish move; all the factors in any decision must be sensibly weighed.  But, if it’s the same old cold feet syndrome that always nixes your challenges, then you will cheat yourself once again.  Don’t let another challenge paralyze you into inaction.  

Embark on a venture that has always struck fear in your heart. 

Fear is an adversity of a different stripe.  You may know how to do a job, and you may not be avoiding a challenge, but you still cannot move forward.  Your problem may be an irrational fear that stands between you and your achievement.  It may even cause panic attacks or other anxiety disorders.  Psychologists call these fears phobias, and have identified scores of them, like claustrophobia (fear of being closed in), acrophobia (fear of heights), agoraphobia (fear of marketplaces or open spaces), xenophobia (fear of strangers), etc.  Treatment usually involves some form of cognitive psychology like reality therapy.  The important fact to remember is that there are great success stories out there in which people have confronted their fears and scored huge triumphs in a host of fields. 

Alan Sheppard could have cut short an amazing career by succumbing to the fear of a physical problem.  “Alan Sheppard is known as the first American in space and the second worldwide. Shepard had a fulfilling career which was at its peak when he was diagnosed with Meniere’s disease, a disorder of the inner ear which also affected the famous painter Vincent Van Gogh. Meniere’s disease causes nausea as well as dizziness and disorientation, so Sheppard could not go into space anymore and was assign a ground position. However, as the other famous people in this list, he did not let his disability to ruin his life: some years later, after having suffered an operation, he was able to resume his career and get back in the space, being the oldest astronaut in the program (at 47) when he was named commander of Apollo 14.”  www.disabled-world.com 

A sampling of websites indicate that fear of public speaking is one of the most common phobias that prevent many people from advancing in their careers.  Is this your problem?  Are you afraid of taking tests?  Flying?  Failure?  Loneliness?  People?  The list seems endless.  The single, most important step you can take to confront your fear is to identify it and admit that it is keeping you from happiness and success.  A rational analysis of the problem reveals that nothing else prevents you from doing what you want to do except this inexplicable fear.  You are smart enough.  You are skillful enough.  You are strong enough.  You are capable of success in every way.  Now, you have something substantial to work on.  As long as your desire to succeed is greater than your fear, you can overcome. 

The phrase “fear not” appears sixty-three times in the Bible.  For example, we read in Genesis 15:1, “After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.” Also, we read “Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the LORD thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.”  Deuteronomy 31:6 (KJV).  This is highly significant in that the premise of “fear not” is that fear is something you can control.  If you cannot stop yourself from fearing, the scriptures would not admonish you not to fear!  Therefore, do not allow your fear to assume omnipotence or rise to dominance in your life. 

Writing Your Own Script

You know what happens when you shake up a can of soda just before you open it, but you may not know why.  In the manufacturing process, soda cans are infused with carbon dioxide.  At rest, the gas collects at the top of the can and makes a mild hissing sound when the can is opened.  If you shake the can just before you open it, however, the gas mixes in with the syrupy contents causing the liquid to spew everywhere when it is released.  The explosion doesn’t require new ingredients to be introduced; forces acting on the can from the outside will change the dynamics on the inside.  Think of yourself as a can of soda in need of a good shake-up!  New, different and even radical thoughts converging from the outside creates an explosive impact on you, shaking up the monotony and predictability that has benignly collected on the surface of your life. 

Creativity, inspiration, innovation, fresh perspective—all of this potential exists inside of you.  It is possible that the main difference between you and some brilliant person lies in the fear level.  That’s a discussion for another day, but understand that fear is a suppressant.  While it focuses on external threats, it effectively keeps a lid on your internal effervescence.  I dare to say that you do not really know the potential locked up inside you until it is awakened.  Decades ago, Frank Crane wrote the following elegant piece about the human heart.  (A bit of literary melodrama by today’s standards, but still worthwhile). 

The human heart is a wide moor under a dull sky, with voices of invisible birds calling in the distance.

The human heart is a lonely lane in the evening, and two lovers are walking down it, whispering and lingering.

The human heart is a great green tree, and many strange birds come and sing in its branches;

a few build nests, but most are from far lands north and south, and never come again.

The human heart is a deep still pool; in it are fishes of gold and silver, darting playfully, and slow-heaving slimy monsters, and tarnished treasure hoards, the infinite animalcular life; but when you look down at it you see but your own reflected face.

The human heart is an undiscovered country; men and women are forever perishing as they explore its wilds.

The human heart is an egg; and out of it are hatched this world and heaven and hell.

The human heart is a tangled wood wherein no man knows his way.

The human heart is a roaring forge where night and day the smiths are busy fashioning swords and silver cups,

mitres and engine-wheels, the tools of labor, and the gauds of precedence.

The human heart is a garden, wherein grow weeds of memory and blooms of hope, and the snow falls at last and covers all.

The human heart is a meadow full of fireflies, a summer western sky of shimmering distant lightnings,

a shore set round with flashing lighthouses, far-away voices calling that we cannot understand.

The human heart is a band playing in a park at a distance; we see the crowds listening,

 but we catch but fragments of the music now and again, and cannot make out the tune.

The human heart is a great city, teeming with myriad people, full of business and mighty doings,

and we wander its crowded streets unutterably alone; we do not know what it is all about.

The human heart to youth is a fairy-land of adventure, to old age it is a sitting room where one knows his way in the dark.

The human heart is a cup of love, where some find life and zest, and some drunkenness and death.

The human heart is the throne of God, the council-chamber of the devil, the dwelling of angels, the vile hearth of witches’ Sabbaths, the nursery of sweet children, the blood-spattered scene of nameless tragedies.

Listen! You will hear mothers’ lullabies, madmen’s shrieks, love-croonings, cries of agonized terror,

hymns of Christ, the roaring of lynch mobs, the kisses of lovers, the curses of pirates.

Bend close! You will smell the lily fragrance of love, the stench of lust, now odors as exquisite as the very spirit of violets,

and now such nauseous repulsions as words cannot tell.

Nobilities, indecencies, heroic impulses, cowardly ravings, good and bad, white and black — the mystery of mysteries,

the central island of nescience in a sea of science, the dark spot in the lighted room of knowledge,

 the unknown quantity, the X in the universal problem.

Read, read, read! 

The obligatory place to start writing your own script is with your reading.  If you are not willing to do this, you are not serious about controlling your own script.   It has been said that a man is the sum total of the people he has met and the books he has read.  Expansive knowledge, life-changing ideas, transformative concepts and intriguing stories exist all around you within an arm’s reach.  That knowledge must enter your mind by intentional, directed reading.  Whatever hurdle you need to get over to make this happen, get started!  

Have you ever read one of the really good books, like Moby Dick or David Copperfield?  War and Peace?  Before you snicker at the idea, remember that many of these books have received such acclamation that they have been labeled classics.  That means they were thought to have enduring value, written about subjects intensely relevant to life, and in a style and quality of writing that represented the best of their era.  If you have never read one of these great books, why not?  I’ll tell you the most likely answer: someone (maybe a peer group) put it in your head that you would a) hate reading it, b) find it too hard to understand, or c) be considered weird if people knew you were reading it. 

You must read, but be sure to read a book that seems too hard for you.  Don’t waste your time with the pabulum of pop culture or rehashes of rehashes.  If you read the title and chapter headings of many books, you’ve comprehended the author’s entire message.  (I could mention a few that are currently making the rounds, but discretion forbids it.)  Instead, struggle (if you must) through a book that engages concepts unfamiliar to you, uses words you’ve never heard of and forces you to crank up your own intellect into an RPM range you’ve seldom visited.  Your head may hurt for a while, but you will grow as a person.  

In the last few years, I have been intrigued with Nassim Nicolas Taleb’s books, The Black Swan and Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder.  He is one of the most difficult authors I have ever read.  I will not pretend that I understand everything he says, nor do I condone every belief he espouses, but he makes me think.  In fact, one way I measure the worth of a book is whether or not it makes me think.  Taleb attacks conventional wisdom, pokes holes in institutionalized ideas, and uses obscure words in a way that you know no other word would fit.  Other authors that fall into this category are Clay Shirky, Cognitive Surplus; James Gleick, Chaos: Making A New Science; John Eldridge, Wild At Heart; and Tom Peters, Re-Imagine.  A great author will lead you into neighborhoods of ingenious people you never knew existed; explain formidable concepts of which you have always been paranoid, and use metaphors and examples that convey his unique thoughts in amazingly precise ways.  

Eat.  That’s right, eat! 

Growth is growth, and it doesn’t have to be all intellectual.  Some of it needs to be experiential.  It should involve your sensory perceptions that you think are non-negotiable—signed, sealed and delivered, off the table, out of the realm of possibility and a few other clichés that I can’t think of right now.  Nonsense.  I’m talking about food.  It’s time to try a food that you have never liked.  Your taste buds need to be stretched.  It’s a safe realm to experiment with your daring side. 

Few experiences fit the scripted definition for humans better than our reaction to food.  We either hate a particular food or we love it, and not much exists in between.  In addition to the four basic tastes (sweet, sour, salty, bitter), we have a sensitivity to food’s flavor, texture, smell, spiciness and even color.  But there’s more.  We also recognize a psychological dimension to food that sometimes contradicts our more intuitive responses.  For example, some cultures consider certain foods as delicacies (insects, worms, decadent flesh) that would make people in other cultures nauseated.  Food can also be confusing in that some foods that are good for you taste terrible and other foods bad for you taste wonderful.  

Okay.  What does food have to do with ripping the script?  Because what you eat is intimately aligned with your identity, your sense of self, and your essential self-perception.  It’s the reason young people traditionally have wacky eating contests in which they dare each other to eat foods that they consider disgusting.  It’s not about eating; it’s about proving who they are. We use food as a standard to measure the macho factor, i.e. extremely spicy foods like jalapeños, habaneras and Naga Viper pepper.  An American pharmacist, Wilbur Scoville, devised the Scoville Organoleptic Test to chemically determine the piquancy or “hotness” of chili peppers.  He discovered that a chemical compound capsaicin was the active ingredient that made peppers hot.  The number of Scoville heat units (SHU) specified how much capsaicin was present. Capsaicin stimulates chemoreceptor nerve endings in the skin, especially the mucous membranes.  The more capsaicin you can take, the more manly you are! 

 And in case someone thinks all this talk of food is silly, I submit to you the description of a course offered at no less an institution than Yale, entitled, Psychology 123: The Psychology, Biology and Politics of Food.   The synopsis says, “This course encompasses the study of eating as it affects the health and well-being of every human. Topics include taste preferences, food aversions, the regulation of hunger and satiety, food as comfort and friendship, eating as social ritual, and social norms of blame for food problems. The politics of food discusses issues such as sustainable agriculture, organic farming, genetically modified foods, nutrition policy, and the influence of food and agriculture industries. Also examined are problems such as malnutrition, eating disorders, and the global obesity epidemic; the impact of food advertising aimed at children; poverty and food; and how each individual’s eating is affected by the modern environment.” 

Your eating habits reveal far more of your character and personality than you might imagine.  When I urge you try something new, then, I am jumping on a vital nerve that defines your very psyche.  That, in turn, raises the prospect of eating different foods to a highly significant level.  Your acceptance or your refusal both speak volumes of who you are. 

Nevertheless, some people may think the forgoing challenges of reading and eating are somewhat superficial.  In that case, let’s venture into some other areas of jobs, assignments, relationships, confrontations, problems and personal politics.  There are miles to go before we sleep.

Ripping the Script

Have you ever read a book and didn’t like the ending?  You may have been so disappointed in the way it turned out that you wish you had never started it in the first place.  Like, why didn’t the author make the girl fall in love with the rugged, steady ranch hand in North Dakota instead of the empty suit in New York?  Why did the handsome young corporal have to die from a stray bullet two minutes before he was about to win the battle?  There is really no good answer as to why something did or didn’t happen, but the inexorable truth is that the entirety of ending was in the control of the script writer.  The hero or heroine had no choice in the matter; he or she was scripted to life or death, happiness or despair, triumph or loss. 

You are writing your life’s script.  Of course, I grant that much of whom and what you are at present were simply handed to you.  You didn’t choose your parents, your DNA, or many of the circumstances of your beginnings—place of birth, school, relatives, race, status, station in life or your basic personality, etc.  But these hard-wired circumstances may be only as limiting or liberating as you deem them to be.  Most of us cede far too much power to life’s givens, and the pay-off is considerable.  We exempt ourselves from responsibility for our status, plus we comfort ourselves with the convenient excuse that we couldn’t help it.  

Not so fast.  You are not boxed in nearly as much as you think you are.  A diverse panoply of possibilities, choices, options and decisions spread out before you.  Your courses of action are nearly limitless, each one with the potential of injecting your life with meaning and excitement that you think only works for other people.  For starters, you choose the words you speak, the books you read, the clothes you wear, the places you go, the music you listen to, the food you eat, the friends you have, the hobbies you enjoy, your leisure activities, your place of residence and the stuff you buy.  Going further, you choose your spouse, your job, your church, your associations, your commercial investments, the stores you where shop, your barber, manicurist, doctor, dentist, lawyer, painter, pet—or you may choose not to engage any of these people or make these any of commitments.  Nearly every reality in your life today has accrued to you by the choices you have made.  And, these are only the superficialities of life. 

A deeper pool of prerogatives exist that I call super choices.  They represent the true core, the control panel, the black box of your quality of existence, the strings that attached to your marionette manipulator.  Many mistakenly think that the forces that determine the results spelled out in the preceding paragraph are also hard-wired.  When you cut to the nitty-gritty, however, you will see your own fingerprints on their controls!  Whether or not you understand how they work or have taken advantage of them, these choices belong to you.  You choose your attitudes, your moods, your beliefs, your tastes, your preferences, your convictions, your likes, your dislikes, your reactions and responses to life.  Your confidence level, your self-esteem, your determination, your perseverance qualities, your adversity quotient, your desires, lusts and motivations have handles on them that you may never have fully grasped.  The essential person you are today is a result of selections you have made out of all the possibilities that were within your reach.  You wrote the script.  If you are not happy with the outcome, the good news is that the final chapter has not yet been written.  Things can still be different. 

Why are you here? 

Oblivious 

Before we move on, however, you still need to understand why you are where you are today in your journey.  There are three primary causes for your present status.  First, you may have been oblivious.  You had no idea that your tomorrows were going to be the sum total of your todays.  You have just proceeded through life without a plan, without a purpose, much as a rudderless ship gets pushed and tossed wherever the wind and currents will it to go.  Things just happened and you reacted spontaneously to forces and events with the best decisions you thought you could make at the time. Immaturity, debilitating hubris and intellectual dishonesty contribute to an oblivious state as well.  In Greek tragedy, hubris leads to conflict, if not punishment or death.  The Greek myth about Narcissus, who stared at his reflection in a pool until he wasted away and died, introduced us to the term narcissism. “I am self-absorbed, self-centered, grandiose and god-like, and you are nothing. I am good, and you are bad. The most extreme form of a narcissist is a psychopath, who has no conscience, no guilt, and sees everyone as a thing. When serial killers (who are psychopaths) are interviewed about killing and mutilating people, they answer, ‘It’s like working on a doll.’”   http://www.liferesearchuniversal.com/hubris.html 

Securing an illustration of an oblivious person turns out to be elusive precisely because a person like this seldom does anything noteworthy enough to attract attention.  A television show named “Oblivious” aired in the early 2000’s featuring a host who asked questions of unwitting people, trying to get them to give correct answers.  It was billed as the “game show you didn’t even know you were on.”  Its short run suggests that being oblivious ranks near the bottom of entertainment choices.  Solomon’s proverbs use the term fool to describe the oblivious person.  “A fool has no delight in understanding, but in expressing his own heart.” Proverbs 18:2 (NKJV) 

Uninformed 

Second, you were uninformed.  You had poor or even disastrous ideas about the nature of your choices.  Miscalculation, mis-information, incomplete processing, maybe a little stupidity as an ingredient in the process, have produced the outcome that you have on your hands today.  (Black swans, or totally unpredictable occurrences may also have come into play, but don’t assign too much blame to them because many people have negotiated better outcomes out of far worse situations.  Sorry!)  Too many people are ignorant and proud of it!  

Jesus expounded on this aspect of following the wrong script: “For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it—lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going to make war against another king, does not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? Or else, while the other is still a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks conditions of peace. So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple.”  Luke 14:28-33 (NKJV).  This is not a reference to the victim of a lie.  This depicts that lazy, indolent or reckless person who doesn’t have a clue about reality. 

Co-Opted 

Last, you were co-opted.  Someone else has been writing the script for your life.  You have stood by helplessly (or so it seemed) while a parent, a brother, a coach, a teacher or a counselor mapped out for you the kind of life he or she thought was best.  Like a docile lamb, you have tried to follow through with what you thought they wanted, but having no true control over your own decisions.  Your mistakes were actually their mistakes, but you got the blame for them. By the same token, your successes have actually been their successes, but, in a predictable twist of irony, they took the credit for them.  You have been co-opted, not always by direct action, but also by indirectly or unwittingly assuming another person’s set of values.  He didn’t like seafood, so even the smell of it makes you sick.  She didn’t like mingling in crowds, so you believe yourself to be a loner.  He hated to read, so you just know you don’t like books either.  You have internalized your scriptwriter’s soul. 

A small disclaimer is in order here.  You can look to others for inspiration, affirmation, confirmation and example.  Role models have a vital place in the way society works, and all of us know outstanding persons to whom we are indebted for their leadership in our individual fields.  The widely acclaimed song written by Jeff Silbar and Larry Henley captures the essence of this sentiment: 

Did you ever know that you’re my hero,
And everything I would like to be?
I can fly higher than an eagle,
For you are the wind beneath my wings. 

This hero crosses the line, however, when his or her influence translates into control.  Much of this involves the intentionality of the role model (the purpose for creating the inspiration) and the locus of decision-making.  Whenever you let someone else make critical decisions for you, you are in a dysfunctional relationship.   It’s best when the situation reflects the first verse of the Silbar and Henley song: 

You were content to let me shine, that’s your way.
You always walked a step behind.

You may recall in the story of David and Goliath, that David begged King Saul for permission to face down the giant.  (1 Samuel 17:31-53)  Saul said yes, but immediately put his armor on the youth—his helmet, coat of mail and sword.  Saul’s perspective as a man of war triggered a response straight out of his military training.  The script called for outfitting David with the proper gear for soldiering.  But David knew he could not reach into Saul’s background and assume an unfamiliar, awkward role that belonged to the king.  Instead, he strode confidently into the battle with his own script, one that he developed on his own while fighting off bears and lions, guarding his father’s sheep.  (One must also wonder that, if Saul’s script was so good, why didn’t he answer Goliath’s taunts?)  But, come on; a sling, five stones, no sword and no armor?  Insane.  The remarkable truth is this: no one else would have or could have possibly written the script that David actually used in his triumph over the profane Philistine.   

Reclaiming the Script 

The scripted pattern of your life, however it may have been written, will force you along the same behavioral routines unless you dismantle it line by line.  Breaking out of the routine demands a new and fresh understanding of who you are and what you are made of, and it will take a death-defying boldness that will undoubtedly make waves in your world.  What we’re talking about here may not be an extreme makeover.  It may not take a radical change of direction in your faith or convictions.  It may simply mean elevating yourself to the next level in efficiency or effectiveness.  Whatever it means, it should represent an emergence of a person who is not oblivious to the forces of life, not uninformed of the nature of the forces, and, above all, not co-opted by someone else in executing the business of life in your name.  

So, let’s concern ourselves with our true prerogatives, a range of activities and behaviors much broader than we realize.  We often find that a relatively small group of traits often transfer across the borders and boxes of life, so if you determine that you have an unsatisfactory outcome in one area, you may find the reason for that influences outcomes in other areas as well.  Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his book Antifragile, calls this tendency domain independence.  He posits that the phenomena that drive research, discovery and innovation in the medical field, for example, also show up in investment banking, automobile manufacturing or geophysical sciences.  Fear, hesitancy, affection and other basic motivations show up across an entire range of personal behaviors, not specific to one realm.  Addressing that one trait, therefore, can produce exponential benefits when considering all the possible applications, even in the context of a single life.  

It is time to write your own script.  Next, that’s exactly where we’ll go. 

When Will the Healing Start?

(For the sake of honest and clarity, don’t read just part of this article without reading it in its entirety.  Thank you.)

The reaction of liberals to the appointment of Tim Scott, an African-American, to replace Jim DeMint who is leaving the U. S. Senate deserves an equally vociferous pushback from conservatives—indeed, from all Americans.  It is clear that racism is no longer about skin color, culture, or even race itself.  It is pure ideology.  A person can meet all the criteria necessary to be a bona fide, black to the core, African-American, and still be rejected by black minority leaders.  Why?  Because he is not getting down with “the brothers.”  Because he’s not sympathetic with the hardships of being black in America.  Because he is running with “whitey.”  Because he is allowing himself to be used.  Because he is just a “token” black for the conservatives.  These are some of the purported, superficial reasons why Tim Scott is meeting such strong resistance from the liberal establishment, both white and black. http://hotair.com/archives/2012/12/19/nyt-op-ed-tim-scotts-just-a-token-for-the-gop/ 

Blackness is not a function of skin pigmentation in twenty-first century America.  To be a true black, you must align yourself with the three hundred year plus struggle of blacks with whites.  If you make that alliance, you can be white, red, yellow or brown. No matter.  You would still be considered black.  Remember, Bill Clinton was the first black president, not Barack Obama.  And, if you don’t identify with this cause, you can be as black as the nineteenth century blackface minstrels, and still be denounced as pretending to be authentic.  

The foregoing statements are not merely opinions.  You can check it out yourself by doing some online research on conservative African-Americans like Herman Cain, Condoleezza Rice, Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell, Mia Love, J. C. Watts, Walter Williams, Michael Steele, Ken Blackwell and many others.  Most of them have more black blood in them than President Obama, yet they are opposed, ridiculed and trashed by the African-American community headed by Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and the like.  The criteria, then, is clearly not race.  It is politics. 

If the problem is politics, then there is no solution short of changing sides.  If you are a white conservative, you are white.  If you are a black conservative, you are white.  It you are a white liberal, you are black.  If you are a black liberal, you are black.  Forget specific issues.  Forget overtures of niceness and negotiation.  If Al Sharpton’s America stands for black solidarity, no political diversity can be tolerated.  “Here is what we believe.  If you don’t believe this, get out.  Don’t even think about calling yourself black!” 

This sounds unreasonable to the uneducated mind.  Not educated in the sense of formal degrees and accreditation, but educated about the mindset of Sharpton’s minions.  Familiarize yourself with the Black Liberation Theology of James Cone and Jeremiah Wright.  You will come to understand that they preach a gospel of grievance.  Jesus Christ and the cross were highlights in the war against the rich, white oppressors.  Whiteness is evil, not because of lack of darker skin pigmentation, and not even because of the race of an individual.  Whiteness is evil because of what it represents.   A white person can never be acceptable in a just world, because he symbolizes evil and oppression to the black race.  Ironically, neither can a black person be acceptable on any individualistic scale for the same reason!  If a black person can trace his ancestry back to Africa with no intermingling with white blood, and yet does not have the “correct” political philosophy, he is just a white man in black skin.  No one is judged on the basis of individual merit.  

http://www.amazon.com/God-Oppressed-James-H-Cone/dp/1570751587/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1356103286&sr=1-2&keywords=james+cone+the+cross+and+the+lynching+tree 

http://www.amazon.com/Black-Theology-Liberation-James-Cone/dp/1570758956/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1356103705&sr=1-2&keywords=james+cone+black+theology+and+black+power

Let’s give some anecdotal context to these assertions.  Currently, a black ESPN contributor, Rob Parker has been suspended for comments he made about Robert Griffin III, the sensational black quarterback for the Washington Redskins.  

“Is he a brother or a cornball brother?  I’m just trying to dig deeper as to why he has an issue. Because we did find out with Tiger Woods, Tiger Woods was like, I’ve got black skin, but don’t call me black. So people got to wondering about Tiger Woods early on.” 

Later, Parker issued an apology which I’m sure will be acceptable to ESPN so he can have his job back, but one has to wonder if the political position that spawned the comments have changed.  Personally, I doubt it.  

Remember Gabby Douglas?  She was the sixteen year old gold medalist in the Olympics that was criticized by members of her race for wearing a “white” hairdo.  Tiger Woods, as mentioned by Parker, was criticized for dating white women.  In the early 2000’s, Bill Cosby voiced harsh criticism of black culture, especially that of the youth.  For this, he was excoriated in a blistering comeback book, “Was Cosby Right? (Or Has the Black Middle Class Lost Its Mind?)”, by Michael Eric Dyson.  In it, Dyson does everything but call Cosby an Uncle Tom.  He basically says the famous black entertainer and celebrity was articulating the bigotry and racism of the white and elite black communities. 

“Usually the sort of bile that Cosby spilled is more expertly contained, or at least poured on its targets in ways that escape white notice. Cosby’s remarks betray seething class warfare in black America that has finally boiled over to the general public. It is that general public, especially white social critics and other prophets of black ethical erosion, that has been eager for Cosby’s dispatches from the tortured front of black class war. Cosby’s comments let many of these whites off the hook. If what Cosby says is true, then critics who have said the same, but who courted charges of racism, are vindicated. There’s nothing like a formerly poor black multimillionaire bashing poor blacks to lend credence to the ancient assaults they’ve endured from the dominant culture.” 

On and on it goes.  I am not oblivious to the enormity of the racial problem that exists in America.  I do maintain, however, that Dyson, Sharpton, Jackson, Cone, Wright and other leaders, defenders and apologists for black racism do little more than exacerbate the animosity and tension that already exists.  Much of what they say is absolutely correct, especially when they define prevalent attitudes of the races.  But their solutions only urge the black race to dig in, to become more entrenched in their hatred of the white race, to strengthen their ties with their cultural past, and to continue to focus on the racial problem as a function of huge social forces which can neither be forgiven nor changed.  Their diatribes contain no conciliatory tone, no glimmer of hope, no admission that progress has been made and no concrete plans or even suggestions as to how true solutions can be forged. 

My voice is tainted.  I am an old white pastor who grew up in the fifties and sixties, and so I am sure most blacks read my background into everything I say.  I know enough not to talk about all my black friends.  I know enough not to brag about the opportunities I have given to black ministers and leaders in ministry by virtue of my various positions.  I may not know enough to keep from saying a few things, though, like establishing and maintaining a parochial school for thirty-four years that has enrolled 40-50% black students.  In fact, Apostolic Christian Academy services the community at large with a higher percentage of students who are non-members of the church, and again, a large majority of them blacks and minorities.  We are a multi-racial church, although the congregation does not represent nearly the percentage of minorities that it should.  Before the bussing ministry was hit with debilitating regulations and expense, we literally bussed in hundreds of black children and teenagers from all neighborhoods in Toledo.  Many of them, now grown, meet us on the streets and in the stores today and thank us for reaching out to them.  

But, Dyson says Cosby let whites “off the hook.”  Evidently, we should still be on the hook.  What does that mean?  How can that be rationalized, codified and implemented?  Diversity initiatives, affirmative action, social programs, including the War on Poverty have all been tried.  The Cato Institute released a study this year stating that our government spends over $1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion) each year on poverty.  http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/PA694.pdf.  Of course, many whites and other minorities benefitted from much of these funds, but a disproportionate slice of the pie went to black Americans living in poverty.  

The poverty rate for all persons masks considerable variation between racial/ethnic subgroups. Poverty rates for blacks and Hispanics greatly exceed the national average. In 2010, 27.4 percent of blacks and 26.6 percent of Hispanics were poor, compared to 9.9 percent of non-Hispanic whites and 12.1 percent of Asians.  Poverty rates are highest for families headed by single women, particularly if they are black or Hispanic. In 2010, 31.6 percent of households headed by single women were poor, while 15.8 percent of households headed by single men and 6.2 percent of married-couple households lived in poverty. http://www.npc.umich.edu/poverty/ 

Here is my problem:  None of us can undo the past.  I am deeply sorry for the gross injustices done to people of color, especially black people, by white people.  I am ashamed to learn about the lynchings, torturings, kidnappings, and all other forms of cruelty in the name of and by the hands of people who called themselves Christians.  I am sure that I am not the only one who has expressed this shame and has asked for forgiveness.  Is this enough?  Again, I cannot undo it.  It happened.  It should not have happened.  Neither can I undo all the suffering these despicable acts caused to the descendents of those who endured the pain first hand.  

If there is no forgiveness for these acts done by my forebears, then what?  Getting even?  Retribution?  The subjugation of the white race to the black race?  Should the same treatment now be meted out to white people?  Are white people to be lynched, tortured, kidnapped and made just as miserable as were the blacks a hundred and fifty years ago?  I doubt that most blacks want these things to happen, yet the animosity persists.  Discrimination has become institutionalized and both blacks and whites now define themselves by the stereotypes and hyperboles of hatred on steroids.   

Is it money?  Are the current leaders of the black community trying to get repayment through reparations?  I’ve done the math on that and it cannot be done without the end of the United States of America.  If you pull all the white owned or controlled money out of all the banks in the country and give it to black America, this nation would sink into chaos and anarchy in a week’s time.  You would suddenly have two hundred and fifty million Americans without jobs, without any means to live.  And, if America collapses, the world collapses.  

My further problem is that we can’t talk about racism without being branded as racist.  Certain leaders of the black community have injected such hypersensitivity into the conversation that nearly every word has a double entendre.  This article is extremely risky for me to write.  I am not a brave person.  This is far more indicative of stupidity, ignorance or naiveté than courage.  I am only one person looking at the world through a pitifully small window.  I understand that.  What I am hoping for is to extend an olive branch for peace, for forgiveness, for some kind of collaborative effort to lay down our swords and talk to each other.  All of this must be done in good faith or it will be worthless.  

For example, Rob Parker should not have been suspended.  ESPN should have staged a debate (no, discussion) with people, both black and white, reasoning with him and showing him and the world that inflammatory remarks do not serve blacks or whites well.  Our president should have seized this opportunity to make something like this happen.  Instead of being a polarizing event, it could have been (as of this writing, it could still be) a fabulous teaching moment for the country.  The Gabby Douglas and Tiger Woods episodes should be center stage of a national forum instead of fodder for right and left wing groups to spew out hatred and bigotry.  Without exposure, the status quo will never evolve into something better than racial warfare. 

But, I’m just and old white guy.  I am an old white guy, however, who was alive to hear Martin Luther King, Jr. give his speech on “I have a dream.”  I am an old white guy who memorized parts of that speech as an oratorical declamation in high school.  I am an old white guy who mourned his assassination like so many millions of others in 1968.  Unfortunately, his influence which tended towards reconciliation has been eclipsed by the more militant elements of the civil rights movement like that espoused by Malcom X and Louis Farrakhan.  Had Dr. King lived, I am confident that race relations in this country would be a thousand times better than they are today.  

For what it’s worth, we share this country.  Some may say it’s a white man’s world.  Others may say it is becoming a nation where color is king.  I say it belongs to all of us, in the sense that we are here, living in close proximity to each other and trying to live peaceably.  

I am reminded of the response of Jesus to the Jews who caught a woman in the act of adultery.  “So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.” And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, “Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.” John 8:7-11 (NKJV)

In our race to condemnation, we have rushed past forgiveness.  It’s not everything, but it is the only place we can really start to heal.

The Gray Swan of Newtown

The soul of America grieves over the tragedy that struck Newtown.  We cannot imagine getting this kind of news about beautiful, lively kindergarteners that we all have in our own home towns, and that we all were at one time.  We can do little more than weep for the Sandy Hook victims and their families, and hold their hands, if only figuratively, as they walk numbly through the next few days, weeks, months and years. 

But we will do more.  We will think about this.  We will talk about it.  Discussions will cover every possible aspect of the horror it was, and the conversations will run the gamut from dry, scholarly dissertations to reasoned debates to shrill and nasty arguments.  My voice will fit in there someplace, although I’m not quite sure where.  At any rate, I hope we can prevent horrific crimes like this in the future, and also try to mitigate as much of the devastation as possible when they do occur.  I am convinced that if emotion, anger and fear dominate the discussion, we will accomplish neither of those two objectives.  

Was Newtown predictable?  If so, was it then preventable?  If not preventable, was it at least manageable (in the sense of reducing the impact to the lowest possible level)?  This approach is now cast in the light of black, gray and white swans.  If you are not familiar with these metaphors, read the next two paragraphs closely.  

Black Swans are events with extremely low probability but have highly significant impact.  Gray Swans are events with somewhat low probability and relatively high impact.  White Swans are random events that we know, have high probability of occurring and create little implications in our lives. Since most Black Swans have never happened before, we cannot predict their occurrence; we can only try to lessen their impact.  Usually, we try to figure out why they happened after the fact.  Black Swans are events like 9/11 and the spread of the AIDS virus.  As fascinating as they are, it is useless to predict Black Swans.  Those who do are liars preying upon the gullible or the self-deceived. 

Gray Swans, however, may be predicted with some regularity, given certain factors of time, culture and demographics.  A Gray Swan is a FaceBook start-up or Storm Sandy.  While we may not accurately forecast their date, we know they will occur.  White Swans happen all the time, like falling in love, getting a new job, or, to a lesser extent, an economic recession or downturn.  The predictability of a White Swan is so great that thousands of people have achieved expert status lecturing or writing books about them.  The benefit of looking at events this way has to do with predicting, preventing and managing their occurrence and impact.   

http://www.asiliconvalleyinsider.com/asiliconvalleyinsider/Blog_A_Silicon_Valley_Insider/Entries/2008/11/26_Black_Swans_Gray_Swans_and_White_Swans.html 

Newtown is a Gray Swan and needs to be treated as such.  We owe it to future generations to analyze mass killings more accurately, to understand why they happen, to know how and to what level they may be preventable, and to take effective steps to minimize their impact.  Unless we are honest enough to remove this inquiry from the arena of emotions to address these primary issues, we will cede the process to those who have an interest only in the secondary or tertiary issues.  By definition, they have THEIR best interests in mind, not those of the general welfare (although they will argue loudly that they looking out for the general welfare).  Obviously, the discussion is complex and covers a broad range of issues.  And, the solutions are probably just as complex.  I freely admit that my contribution lies mainly in the area of questions, not answers; of analysis, not solutions.  But if Newtown is indeed a Gray Swan, then we must start somewhere in order to probe the levels of predictability, preventability and manageability.  

Gun control.  This is where the liberal establishment wants to start.  It is the knee-jerk reaction, purely emotional, zero facts supporting it and a preponderance of facts militating against it.  Google is run by leftists, so you will have to dig deep in its pages to find pro-gun stories, but they are out there.  The reason the public doesn’t hear more stories about guns used to protect citizens and to prevent crime is because “guess who” is in charge of the media?  The National Rifle Association has a raft of stories proving that gun ownership, not gun bans, lead to less crime.  The second amendment group’s position is gun education, not gun control.  Gun control will never work as a national policy any more than disarmament works on an international level.  Those who contend that it works need to read “Less Than Zero:  Bursting the New Disarmament Bubble” by Josef Joffe and James W. Davis in Foreign Affairs, Jan-Feb 2011.  This is not even to get into the issue of constitutionality.  If anything, guns should be part of the preventative measures against future Newtowns. 

Mental health policies.  Psychiatrists are starting to speak out over the atrocious policies regarding the treatment of mental health patients.  As prominent psychiatrist E. Fuller Torrey wrote in the Wall Street Journal, “These tragedies are the inevitable outcome of five decades of failed mental-health policies. The solution to this situation is obvious—make sure individuals with serious mental illnesses are receiving treatment. The mistake was not in emptying the nation’s hospitals but rather in ignoring the treatment needs of the patients being released. Many such patients will take medication voluntarily if it is made available to them. Others are unaware they are sick and should be required by law to receive assisted outpatient treatment, including medication and counseling, as is the case in New York under Kendra’s Law. If they do not comply with the court-ordered treatment plan, they can and should be involuntarily admitted to a hospital. 

Fuller’s basic reaction was widely shared across the political spectrum. Expect it to be revived in a big way in the wake of Lanza’s shooting. In Time, Texas A&M’s Christopher J. Ferguson, a professor of psychology and criminal justice writes,  “Our country’s funding for mental-health services has only gotten worse since the 2008 recession. As the National Alliance on Mental Illness has been warning for some time, the existing level of funding is inadequate, so our nation’s ability to identify and care for the severely mentally ill has been hamstrung.” http://reason.com/blog/2012/12/17/prediction-fallout-of-sandy-hook-shootin. 

A more responsible media.  No institution is as rife with hypocrisy as the mainstream media.  They sensationalize crime while denying that they do it, they exploit victims while saying they are only trying to get the full story, they propagandize their views while claiming impartiality, they push their political agendas while saying they only want to serve the public, and they brutalize the privacy of their enemies while remaining amazingly incurious about the glaring faults (or even crimes) of their friends.  

The Media were at their worst covering the Newtown tragedy.  Some reporters stooped to interviewing five and six year olds, trying to get them to describe their experiences when they should have been helping them forget about the horrible ordeal they just went through.  From 24/7 wall-to-wall coverage, to pictures of the killer, to using terms such as “body count,” to turning the killer into an anti-hero hero (just the kind that other twisted minds in society want to emulate), all of this bears the predictable footprint of today’s media.  The media is turning the first amendment into everything they say is wrong with the second amendment.  If the media won’t police themselves, at least they should refrain from lecturing everyone else about the moral and ethical issues of the day. 

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2012/12/sandy-hook-the-corrections-begin.php  

Education.  I join with millions of others who believe that the public educational system of this country is broken, and that progressive philosophy and the insular teachers unions are the primary reasons why.  Hundreds of websites, books or magazine articles echo the same thing: it is a systemic woe, not just performance and low teacher pay.  The progressive ideology that drives the system shapes the teachers, sets the standards, chooses the curriculum, and determines the subjects to be either studied or forbidden.

So, what does the Newtown tragedy have to do with education (other than the fact that it happened in an elementary school)?  Because both students and teachers are so immersed in progressive tenets of faith like diversity, social consciousness, revisionism and post-modern philosophy that real life survival issues are ignored.  Kids are taught how to use condoms, but not how to use guns; how to assert themselves, but not how to defend themselves; how to be sensitive to minorities, but not how to think for themselves.  The only thing they know about evil is that it doesn’t really exist.  It is just an archaic term used for things we don’t understand.  When evil walks through the front door of a school, armed to the teeth, nobody really knows what to do.  http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/09/dreaming_up_a_new_america_progressive_education_and_the_perversion_of_american_democracy.html 

Moral training.  What kind of moral calculus functioned in Adam Lanza’s mind that led him to become a mass murderer?  Granted, he suffered from a mental disorder, but he possessed enough rationality to specifically target who he wanted to kill, to know how he would do it, to know where he could get the means to carry it out, to know that nobody had a weapon in the school to threaten him and to know when to stop shooting so he could pull out a handgun and take his own life.  He was capable of carrying out a refined, premeditated crime, complete with all the necessary details in place.  What he lacked was a moral conscience to stop him from inside his own mind.  Some very basic building blocks of moral character were missing from his life. 

A society that aborts millions of babies each year and that has a significant number of people who advocate for euthanasia cannot speak against killing with absolute conviction.  A society that rationalizes its way around lying and creates logical scenarios in which lying may be preferable, cannot forcibly condemn lying.  A society that imposes punitive taxes on some of its people in order to redistribute wealth to other people cannot denounce stealing.  A society that sees nothing morally corrupt with fornication, cohabitation, adultery or perverted lifestyles and condones these activities through the entertainment industry, the educational curricula, and the courts cannot speak with any authority against sexual crimes.  Finally, a society that rejects the existence of God, that does not believe there is soul consciousness after death, that openly ridicules the idea of a final judgment in which each person will be held accountable for his or her actions cannot create a strong enough deterrence to crimes to stop the perpetrators.  If people do not fear God, why should they fear man? 

Better security.  From an immediate and practical standpoint, this is where we should start.  I am appalled that an armed man can walk off the street into an elementary school, find his way down the hall, and go into a room full of kids.  For much less than the price of a school bus, or the salary of a union leader, a school can be made far more secure than that.  Rather than spending millions of dollars for a gun control lobby, spend a few thousand dollars to install electronically controlled doors, surveillance cameras and viewing stations, along with other technologically advanced state-of-the-art systems to keep our kids safe.  We can at least darken the feathers of this Gray Swan until we make it almost impossible for an atrocity like Newtown to happen again. 

Bottom line:  If I am, by law, forced to send my child to a government school, the school should be obligated to keep my child safe while in the care of the school.  While nobody expects 100% effectiveness, we certainly should not accept 0% effectiveness!  Furthermore, I guarantee that parents will gladly ante up more money for security, even in cash-strapped school districts that can’t get a one-tenth point millage passed!  The next step would be to permit concealed weapons to be carried in schools by responsible, trained individuals (not students).  

These are my thoughts on the unconscionable tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School.  I grieve at the loss of precious lives.  Much of my grief is rooted in the fact that it may have been prevented.  May God help us to wake up and get busy before another Newtown.