Tag Archives: being bold

What Do You Really Value?

Why do so many people find it easier to follow Jesus in the breach than to actually attempt to truly live what he preaches? In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus says this: “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” (Matthew 6:24)

Jesus brings up the problem of competing loves many times. In Jerusalem he silences the scribes and the chief priests by simply saying give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to God what is God’s. What he says sounds so right but putting that precept to work in everyday life is difficult for many people and impossible for some. Someone once asked me  “Do I really have to give things up to follow Jesus?” The answer is clearly yes. You do have to relinquish the love of the things of this life to follow Jesus wherever he might lead you.

It was this idea of “giving up” that made me so reluctant to commit myself fully to following Jesus. I did not want to do it, and while I studied the Bible everyday and came to know the New Testament very well and even taught small group Bible studies, I could not get over the idea that Jesus wanted to separate me from the things that I loved in this life. Even to this day, I hate the idea of letting go of the clutter I have accumulated. It boils down to what do I really value in life?

Jesus understands how hard giving up is. In the parable of the sower he explains to his followers how concerns of this life can easily separate us from the love of God and His Word: “They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desire of other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.” (Mark 4: 18-19) Jesus says you cannot serve both God and money. He is not saying that you must take a vow of poverty. He is saying that the love of money will separate you from the love of God. “But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things.” (Philippians 3:8)

How One Man Made a Difference

May 20, 1940. The army of the German Reich was sweeping across Northern Europe; four hundred thousand English troops were trapped on the northern coast of France; Neville Chamberlain had just resigned as Prime Minister and Winston Churchill had replaced him.

The English government was torn between fighting on against impossible odds or, perhaps more sensibly, signaling to foreign intermediaries an openness to discuss with Hitler terms of a truce.

Could Churchill, with all the odds stacked against him, make a difference? He himself describes the apparent hopelessness of the situation this way: Europe was sinking into “the abyss of a new dark age, made more sinister and perhaps more protracted by the lights of perverted science.”

If some of the leading figures in the British government had their way, including Lord Halifax and Neville Chamberlain, Britain would have winked at the evil they saw for the false security that their trembling hearts demanded.

Churchill saw the nature of the encroaching evil and he decided only a firm “no” was possible. He said he would prefer to die while trying to save the world from falling into a new dark age. “And I am convinced,” he said, “that every one of you would rise up and tear me down from my place if I were for one moment to contemplate parley or surrender. If this long island story of ours is to end at last, let it end only when each one of us lies choking in his own blood upon the ground.”

Facing these odds, Churchill’s decision and subsequent actions were heroic by any measure. If he had not been present at that critical moment of history; the darkness of Hitler’s malevolent empire would have, in all probability, spread to all corners of the globe.

Boris Johnson has recently written a biography of Churchill and describes these dark days of May 1940 as a crucial moment where one man changed the course of history. Here is how Johnson put it:

I don’t know whether it is right to think of history as running on train tracks, but let us think of Hitler’s story as one of those huge and unstoppable double-decker expresses that he had commissioned, howling through the night with its cargo of German settlers. Think of that locomotive, whizzing towards final victory. Then think of some kid climbing the parapet of the railway bridge and dropping the crowbar that jams the points and sends the whole enterprise for a gigantic burton-a mangled, hissing heap of metal. Winston Churchill was the crowbar of destiny. If he hadn’t been where he was, and put up resistance, that Nazi train would have carried right on. It was something of a miracle-given his previous career-that he was there at all. (The Churchill Factor p.30)

Johnson goes on to speculate about what would have happened if Churchill had not become Prime Minister in May 1940. He calls this ‘counterfactual’ history, but it is an interesting question nevertheless. It might seem fruitless to speculate about the world without Winston Churchill standing athwart history, but this particular case, the timely appearance of one man in a certain moment in human history made all the difference in the world.

A Light in the Ruins

An American friend, who lived in Ukraine as a missionary, told me an interesting story about an encounter he had with a young woman during his time there.

She was comfortable living in a godless world. Quote from Light in the RuinsThe story goes that this young woman was giving my friend a tour of the city of Odessa. As they walked from place to place, she began to open up a little and at one point she professed that she couldn’t understand how people believed in something so silly, archaic, and irrational as the existence of God. She was not belligerent; she was merely firm in the belief that her worldview was enlightened and progressive. There was no room in her world for what she considered to be an ancient and discredited myth. She was comfortable living in a godless world.

As they continued, they came to an area of town that starkly revealed the remnant ruins of the devastations of World War ll. The splintered bricks and hollowed out structures were fragments of a once populated and noisy place where families raised their children and lived normal lives. Now this area was nothing more than a wasteland where grass gripped the soil for dear life.

As they gazed on this desolate scene, my friend turned to the young woman and gently said, “Take a look at these shattered buildings. If you want to have an idea of what the world really looks like without God, here it is.” She surveyed the ashes of a city that once was thriving without uttering a word. My friend wondered whether she was linking this picture of the fruits of war with the political and intellectual effort to banish God once and for all. The woman lingered.  Asking herself the same questions many of us would be at that exact moment: Why did this happen? Why is there so much death, disease and suffering in the world? Is this a world without God?

My missionary friend told me that he believed that moment in Odessa touched the heart of this young woman. He did not preach to her, he merely allowed the surroundings to paint a contrasting picture of the fullness and abundance of a world filled with love to a world absent of everything most people consider good.

Man without God is a war zone.

Man without God is a war zone. Quote from Light in the Ruins

 

A Walk in the Woods:
The Book, the Movie, the Appalachian Trail and me

RedfordNolte-ftrAs someone who has hiked the entire Appalachian Trail (2,185 miles), I looked forward to seeing A Walk in the Woods, the new Ken Kwapis film based on the Bill Bryson book. Bryson’s tale recounts the adventures of two middle-aged guys (44 in the book) who set out on what turns out to be a comedy of errors from their first steps out of Amicalola Falls in Georgia to the Smoky Mountains and beyond.

In the movie Robert Redford, now 79, plays Bryson, and Nick Nolte, 74, plays his sidekick, the pseudonymous Stephen Katz (based on Bryson’s real life ne’er-do-well high school pal Matt Angerer). Katz and Bryson stumble through the trail and even though both succeed in struggling up the nine miles to the summit of Springer Mountain, their pain and suffering is only a comedic appetizer to what follows. As spun by Bryson, an infectious and inquisitive storyteller, the book is fun, hilarious and informative.

bryson2 outdoorsThe movie tries mightily to replicate the charm of Bryson’s narrative. Sometimes, though, what’s funny on the page is difficult to translate onto the screen and good literary humor becomes slapstick and pratfalls. Unfortunately, this is often what happens with this film. Hopelessly out of place on the trail, Nolte is actually quite funny, always just one small step from total collapse or meltdown.

As Bryson, Redford has the straight man role. He participates in the action but the trail experience doesn’t appear to have much of an impact on his character. That is not my recollection of Bryson’s character in the book. I recall him as terrifically observant: He learns about his unfamiliar environment and wants us to learn with him as he bumbles along. That’s what makes his book so popular with trekkers, even though the two hike a mere fraction of the trail.

Max Patch on the Appalachian Trail at 9pm on June 21, 2007The movie does capture one aspect of the AT that made it worth the time and price of admission. The grandeur and beauty of the southern half of the trail are on full display. Although the film was mostly shot in Georgia’s Amicalola Falls State Park (where the trail begins), there are also breathtaking views of North Carolina’s Smoky Mountains and Fontana Dam. One aerial shot pans over Max Patch in North Carolina where on a good day a hiker can pause and marvel at the majestic mountains within the borders of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Another reason I enjoyed the movie, despite it shortcomings, was my own relationship with the trail. After college, I hiked 115 miles of it in New Hampshire and then left the trail for almost 30 years before returning in the 1990s. I then “section hiked” the entire trail finishing in Maine in September, 2011. Along the way I had some amazing experiences, including one night lost in the rain on a mountain ridge shivering miserably in a soaked sleeping bag.  I counted every hour as I waited stoically until the morning light allowed me to find my way to warmth and safety.

Sunrise in the Smokies in North CarolinaFor the next several weeks, I plan to share some of the highlights of my own adventures on the Appalachian Trail. It should be fun.

Watch the trailer for A Walk in the Woods

 

A Walk in the Woods: The Book, the Movie, the Appalachian Trail and me

RedfordNolte-ftrAs someone who has hiked the entire Appalachian Trail (2,185 miles), I looked forward to seeing A Walk in the Woods, the new Ken Kwapis film based on the Bill Bryson book. Bryson’s tale recounts the adventures of two middle-aged guys (44 in the book) who set out on what turns out to be a comedy of errors from their first steps out of Amicalola Falls in Georgia to the Smoky Mountains and beyond.

In the movie Robert Redford, now 79, plays Bryson, and Nick Nolte, 74, plays his sidekick, the pseudonymous Stephen Katz (based on Bryson’s real life ne’er-do-well high school pal Matt Angerer). Katz and Bryson stumble through the trail and even though both succeed in struggling up the nine miles to the summit of Springer Mountain, their pain and suffering is only a comedic appetizer to what follows. As spun by Bryson, an infectious and inquisitive storyteller, the book is fun, hilarious and informative.

bryson2 outdoorsThe movie tries mightily to replicate the charm of Bryson’s narrative. Sometimes, though, what’s funny on the page is difficult to translate onto the screen and good literary humor becomes slapstick and pratfalls. Unfortunately, this is often what happens with this film. Hopelessly out of place on the trail, Nolte is actually quite funny, always just one small step from total collapse or meltdown.

As Bryson, Redford has the straight man role. He participates in the action but the trail experience doesn’t appear to have much of an impact on his character. That is not my recollection of Bryson’s character in the book. I recall him as terrifically observant: He learns about his unfamiliar environment and wants us to learn with him as he bumbles along. That’s what makes his book so popular with trekkers, even though the two hike a mere fraction of the trail.

Max Patch on the Appalachian Trail at 9pm on June 21, 2007The movie does capture one aspect of the AT that made it worth the time and price of admission. The grandeur and beauty of the southern half of the trail are on full display. Although the film was mostly shot in Georgia’s Amicalola Falls State Park (where the trail begins), there are also breathtaking views of North Carolina’s Smoky Mountains and Fontana Dam. One aerial shot pans over Max Patch in North Carolina where on a good day a hiker can pause and marvel at the majestic mountains within the borders of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Another reason I enjoyed the movie, despite it shortcomings, was my own relationship with the trail. After college, I hiked 115 miles of it in New Hampshire and then left the trail for almost 30 years before returning in the 1990s. I then “section hiked” the entire trail finishing in Maine in September, 2011. Along the way I had some amazing experiences, including one night lost in the rain on a mountain ridge shivering miserably in a soaked sleeping bag.  I counted every hour as I waited stoically until the morning light allowed me to find my way to warmth and safety.

Sunrise in the Smokies in North CarolinaFor the next several weeks, I plan to share some of the highlights of my own adventures on the Appalachian Trail. It should be fun.

Watch the trailer for A Walk in the Woods