Stubbornness and Compromising

I don't think that there is any doubt that I can be a pretty stubborn person.  This manifests itself in a variety of ways, some good, others bad.  It makes me perseverant, which is usually (but not always) a good thing.  I am fairly resistant to change, which is a rough one, because I have faced a whole lot of change over the past year, and I am sure there is a lot more coming.  I can be pretty rigid, but I think I am growing a lot in that regard.  I like to do things a certain way, and while I have my reasons, that doesn't mean it is the only option available.

My brother is similar, in that neither of us ever gives up.  That was a pretty big problem when we were younger, since conflicts would never really get resolved.  His reaction to conflict would frequently be physical.  While I was older, he was bigger and probably stronger, but I had much more experience, courtesy of years of violent recesses at St. Joseph's school.  So the usual pattern was that if he started to get violent, I would pin or restrain him in some way within a couple of minutes.  I was usually cool and deliberate, while he was out of control, both emotionally and physically.  But he would continue to struggle and fight, regardless of whether I had the upper hand by a little bit, or a lot, usually until my parents appeared to deal with us.  That could take anywhere from a minute to over an hour, depending on the situation, but he would never just give up.  Now admittedly I am the same way.  I can only remember him besting me once in that way, but the idea of giving up never even crossed my mind, even though we were rolling around in the gravel.  As I recall, my Dad showed up within five or ten minutes, which ended that, otherwise we would probably still be there.

You'd almost feel sorry for my parents having to deal with us all of the time, until you stepped back to examine how we became that stubborn.  It is pretty obvious to me how I got that way, having two parents that exhibit different aspects of that trait, and I definitely have a combination of both.  That was been brought to light recently in a number of conflicts between us that are relatively minor, but none of us are willing to compromise.  (I am of course right, but that basically is the definition of being stubborn, isn't it?;)

This lack of willingness to compromise creates an interesting dynamic when it comes to conflicts of principles and beliefs.  Once again, I am convinced intellectually that this can be both good and bad, depending on the situation, but I realize that will always appear to be good from my perspective.  So I try to be conscious of that predisposition when conflicts arise, but even then it challenging to compensate for that.  The big question is: “How much does God want us to compromise?” and there is a lot of potential debate around that answer.

The Dangers and Benefits of Routine

So I haven't done my regular evening reading for over a week.  I have a continuous path through the Bible that I have been on, plus whatever other book I am in the middle of.  That is the longest I have let that lapse since I started making it a priority in January 2008.  Now traveling has a way of interrupting routines, but my deliberate nature usually has a way of overcoming that phenomenon.  Even if I get back to my hotel room at 2am, I usually read a little, just for the sake of making some progress.  Staying with other people is a little more challenging.  I am not the type of person who is going to ask to be left alone to read when some else is letting me stay with them.  I kind of figure that I owe them my attention.  So couch surfing my way through LA all last week is the practical reason why that happened, but this week I have a nice peaceful room to myself.  I am instead writing this, because in an out-of-character lack of logistical planning, I don't have my books with me.  They are across camp, safely tucked away in my truck, which is a dirt-bike ride I will not be taking tonight.

Writing on here is its own routine, and that has been maintained, among other reasons because my laptop is always available to me.  It probably also reveals a shift in priorities, as I have been focusing a lot more on writing than reading over the last few months.  Verbally, in a conversation, I try to do a lot of listening before I start speaking, so on paper, the process is stretched out a little more.  After six months of extensive reading, I am finding it more important to write as a step in processing what I am learning.  In a similar way, I have only started taking a role that involves much speaking after having been there listening for over a year.

Reading the Bible is important, but the more you do it, the fewer new things you learn.  There is always more depth to explore, but having been all the way through it multiple times, I am rarely surprised be something I had missed or forgotten.  I have read NIV and ESV so now the new factor I have been throwing into the mix for the last few years are the Study Bible's extensive commentaries. (Which is why I won't really consider reading the Bible online this evening as fulfilling my routine.)

Some people make a habit of reading the Bible because they experience some direct psychological benefit from doing so.  I rarely am conscious of anything like that, although it is interesting to see how where I happen to be reading applies to the things that are happening elsewhere in life at that point in time.  I have also had numerous occasions where the New Testament passage I am reading quotes the Old Testament passage I just finished.  (I aim to read "about" a chapter a day in both Testaments, but don't follow any external "Bible reading plan.")  So God clearly has a sense of humor.

I aim to read the Bible consistently as a methodical approach to better understanding God, but that is not the only way to understand him better.  Missing a few days is not going to kill me, and may be a good way to break the routine, and re-evaluate why I do things the way I do.  Doing things purely out of habit removes most of the meaning from them, and being consistent just for its own sake is not necessarily a good thing.  Routines being kept for their own sake should probably be broken on occasion, if for no other reason than to evaluate their value.

Online Dating

My initial reaction to the idea of online dating is: "that is the definition of desperate."  At first glance, it would appear to be right up my alley, as a technically literate individual who best expresses himself in writing.  But I am not too good at meeting new people and getting to know them, which is all that online dating really is.  The only two girls I have ever "dated," I had been friends with long before then.  I definitely prefer that approach, both philosophically and practically.  So then how does online dating end up being the topic of conversation?  My two forays into the world of online dating were initiated for other reasons, or at least  that is how I justify that experimentation.

My first exploration of online dating options started by reading a very interesting blog called OKTrends that was getting attention for publishing some surprising findings.  By combining advanced statistical methods, good data visualization, and a giant dataset, and some true creativity, the author was coming up with quantifiable descriptions of romantic relationships.  Being a guy who likes to break most of life down into logical equations, I was intrigued.  I think this post is my favorite, specifically Rule #3, vindication at last!  Anyhow, he was coming up with some interesting conclusions, so I investigated where he was getting his source data.  He was one of the founders of OKCupid.com, so I signed up, primarily to see how he was extracting all of this information from people.  I answered a lot of interesting questions, which provoked a lot of new thoughts and ideas in the process.  As someone who is always trying to better understand relationships, we will chalk that one up as a success in that regard.

Now I never really had the intention of "dating" people on there, and only every directly communicated with two or three other users.  OKC is very open, and similar to Facebook in many ways, but with a deliberate focus on developing romantic relationships.  It aims to present people as they really are, and you decide if you think they meet your needs.  Browsing through there I learned a lot about what people (presumably) really think about things, and the wide spectrum of values and principles that people hold.

After reading some relationship book a while back, my Mom has been after me to check out eHarmony.com, because of their "29 Dimensions of Compatibility" and other such claims.  I put that off for about a year now, but...it rained a lot last week.  I had some time on my hands, so I figured: "Why not?  What will it hurt?"  Well unlike OKC, most of the "dating" features cost money, and more than I would have guessed, to access.  So I took the free "personality test" that my mom was all excited about, and learned that I am: "curious, steady, focused, reserved, and take care of others and myself."  With that amazing bit of insight, I am now ready to go find the perfect wife.  I probably learned more about myself from the process of answering the questions they asked, since it caused me to think about things from a different perspective than I normally do.

So once you have told it all about yourself and your preferences, eHarmony decides who it thinks would be a good match for you.  It presents a couple new potential "matches" everyday, but those are the only options available to you.  This is as opposed to OKC, where you can browse everywhere, based on characteristics that you think would be suitable for you.  On top of that, because it is trying to get money from you, you can't see anyone's photos unless you are a member.  (But they can see yours if they are.)  Also, you can only communicate at certain times unless you pay, but that is where it gets interesting.  It guides you through your first few communications with someone new, by asking and answering from a selection of multiple choice questions.  Now the part of me that did well on the SAT likes bringing that approach into developing relationships, but part of me knows that you can't totally control the development of a "real" relationship. (Trust me, I have tried.)  But I have to admit, it does lower the risk threshold of initiating communication.  The second step is a series of fill in the blank type questions, followed by open ended questions, before you are given free reign to...well talk.

So eHarmony tightly limits who you can even access on their site, the next step would be to add parental control to a teenage version.  One step further, and we are at the old custom of arranged marriages.  Maybe I can start an online betrothal site, where parents can choose their children's future spouse.  It could be the next big thing; all I need is to come up with a catchy .com name.

Climbing with Weights

I have had an interesting experience in the spiritual realm over the last week or so, that has been quite powerful.  It is kind of hard to explain in that context, so I will try to use an illustration from the physical world.

Imagine that life is like trying to climb a really tall rock face, and you have been climbing with a huge weight hanging from you.  It’s like there is bag hanging from you that catches all of the little rocks that you break loose when you aren't being careful.  And over time that weight begins to add up, until you can barely hold yourself in place, let alone keep climbing upward.  That is the way things have felt for quite a long time, and nothing seemed to improve the situation much.

It’s not like I don't know that those rocks are landing in the bag, and weighing me down.  Because of that, I try to be careful, but it still happens, and there were a lot there before I even noticed what was happening.   I don't know what to do about it, and I recognize that it is only getting worse.  It's not an uncommon problem, everyone deals with it to some degree, but I had a whole lot of rocks down there.  I pray about it, read about it, and try to do all sorts of things to solve the problem, but nothing seems to help.  My response to that over the years has been to fight it constantly, clawing my way upwards regardless, dragging the weight behind me.  This has resulted in me becoming a very strong and disciplined individual.  I have a very deliberate and methodical approach to persevering through struggles.  The development of these characteristics has led to success in many other aspects of life, but has not allowed me to overcome the original problem, only to survive it.

And then one day, suddenly the weight is gone.  I can’t tell if the bag broke free, or it just got emptied of rocks, or if it is still there and someone else (God) is lifting it to take the weight off of me.  I don't know exactly what happened, but it is no longer pulling on me, dragging me down.  Now I still plan to be careful, and avoid dropping anymore pieces of rock, but I can now resume climbing unhindered.  It makes me much more productive, and gives me a whole new perspective on what is possible.  I didn't do anything different to trigger that change, so I can't take credit for it.  It gives a whole new meaning to the idea of "not me, but Christ through me."

The fact that I don't control the solution is a little unsettling, what if the problem comes back?  One thing is certain, I now know that it is possible for the weight to be removed, and I know exactly what that feels like to have that happen.  I had gotten to the point before, where I could no longer imagine what life would be like without it, and didn’t think it was possible to totally get rid of it.  So if I ever find myself in a position like that again, I will know exactly what to be praying for, and know that it can happen.  “Through God all things are possible,” and I always knew that, but it is different to see it happen than just to believe it.

Reconciling Injustice with God's Perfection

One of the fundamental premises of Christianity is that God is good and just.  In order to reconcile that with the obvious injustices we see here on earth, it is believed that all of those will be balanced out in heaven. (The first shall be last and the last shall be first, etc.)  All hope for justice is placed in the future, which is the only way that we can defend the idea that God is good and just.  And that idea should be comforting when someone is going through an "unfair" difficulty, that they will be rewarded in the future.

Clearly life is not inherently fair or just, even at the most basic levels of life and death.  Some people are born in the USA, and others in Somalia, with no apparent basis for that distinction.  On the flip side, death can happen at any time, regardless of all other factors in someone's life.

That idea doesn't resonate well with those in our culture who desire instant gratification.  A popular criticism of the idea of future justice, from that perspective, is that it is just a wishful hope that all of our current problems have meaning in a larger context.  That supports the concept that the idea of future justice is something that people conjured up in search of relief for their pain and suffering.  There is obviously no system of perfect justice on earth, begging the question: what would lead someone to believe that it would be any different in the next stage of life?

On the other hand, we could view it as a theory based on delayed gratification.  What else in life operates on a similar principle?  Are there any other times in life where putting off something in the immediate leads to greater benefits in the future?  Of course, so it is not like the Christian view of justice in the spiritual world is out of line with the principles we observe at work in the physical world.

Those who work hard in school and at their jobs are usually more successful in the long run.  Putting in that effort is not as enjoyable as partying your way through school and/or life, but that eventually catches up with you.  As a general rule we find this to be the case, but there are always exceptions, and that is the injustice that we have to find a way to reconcile in the first place.

Authority over Labeling Right and Wrong

I have had an idea bouncing around in my head for awhile, that I haven't been able to solidify until now.  Basically, it is sinful to do something that you believe is wrong, even if that action was not inherently wrong for any other reason.  (Paul talks about this in 1Cor 8 in regards to eating certain meat.)  But believing something is right obviously doesn't automatically make it right, certain things are inherently wrong, regardless of what you believe about them.  The lack of symmetry or balance in this concept has been bothering me.  Since most things in life are not so one sided, I assumed something wasn't right about that.

I was looking at right and wrong as two existing groups of actions, and seeing that we as humans had the authority to move possible actions from one group to the other, but not the other direction.  What if we instead look at all actions as inherently potentially right?  Things only get assigned the label "wrong" if someone (including God) decides to label them that way.  In the beginning there was only one action with that label, eating from the forbidden tree.  If Adam had slapped Eve, would that have been sinful, I don't know?  Even if there is an underlying natural morality that exists outside of the Biblical commandments, (being the truth that the Bible merely describes) that would just be one more source for those labels.  The Bible adds many more of those labels throughout the Old Testament.  Jesus seems to have removed many of those, and added different ones in the New Testament.  The new labels are much more subject to interpretation than the old ones, but far broader in their scope.

So mankind has the authority to add those "wrong" labels in a variety of ways, but not to remove ones already placed there by others, especially ones from God.  The government has the authority to place those labels on certain actions, and they become wrong. (Romans 13)  But things don't need to be illegal to be wrong, take abortion for example.  But if the government tries to remove those labels that God has clearly placed, like the Chinese approach to forced abortions, the government is clearly overstepping its authority.

It is the same with individuals, in that we have the authority to label actions as wrong, if we believe they are.  This usually happens based on our varied interpretations of the principles presented in the Bible, that aren't specific commands.  But we don't have the authority to remove the labels that were added by others.  Underage drinking is wrong because it is illegal, regardless of what you believe the Bible says on that specific issue.  But it may not be wrong if you are in another country, that hasn't added that label.  But if you happen to believe that it is wrong to kiss someone you aren't married to, and then in the heat of the moment you do that, it is sinful.  But someone else doing the exact same thing may not be sinning at all.

Parents have the Biblical authority to place those labels on actions for their children, similar to the government.  These labels are usually based on their interpretations of Biblical principles, and they apply regardless of their children’s interpretations.  This is one of those times where we see the tremendous amount of responsibility placed on parenting.

When viewed from this labeling perspective, it appears more balanced for two reasons.   Even if our labels were irrevocable, if all actions are initially right, we are just narrowing the infinite set of options, as opposed to removing from a limited number of "right" actions.  But the real symmetry comes from the fact that we can remove the "wrong" labels that we place, if we later learn more specific truth in that area.  The government can remove the labels they place as well, as in Prohibition, but not ones we place on ourselves.  Even if they specifically make it legal to do drugs, if we interpret the verses abut our body as a temple to prohibit that action, then it is still wrong for us.

The key thing to remember is that: while the labels that we ourselves place do apply to us, they do not necessarily apply to others, unless we have authority over them.  It is wise to avoid offending others by respecting the labels they assign to certain actions (1Cor 8), but we should not judge others actions against the labels that we ourselves have created.

Spiritual Perspective on Human Authority

While the question of the scope of human authority over creation isn't totally cut and dry, it is much less complicated than the issue of people having authority over one another.  Since humans are by no means perfect and frequently making selfish decisions, this authority will eventually be abused in some form.  This is why the American government has many limits on the authority of the government, as government is one tool that people use to exert authority over each other.  The church is another form of organization where this can happen.  Historically the Catholic Church specifically has a pretty bad record in that regard, but nearly all churches face that issue to some degree.

Authority can be used to help people, or to exert control over them.  Parents have authority over their children, a concept which is very explicitly laid out in the Bible.  The Bible's principles about respecting the authority of parents or governments or church elders implicitly condone believers living within a hierarchical structure.

I recently heard an explanation of how spiritual authority works, and while I can not confirm that it is entirely accurate, it includes some interesting ideas.  Every time someone overcomes temptation, they receive a bit more grace.  People who are older will naturally have accumulated more, but those who live irresponsibly will not.  This is the system behind the Bible's value for respecting one's elders.  That grace can be bestowed on others through a prayer or blessing, passing it on from one generation to the next.  This is illustrated in Isaac blessing Jacob instead of Esau, and Jacob blessing Ephraim over Manasseh.  While on one level these blessings appear to simply be some eloquent encouraging words, they are actually changing things on the spiritual level.  Once Esau returned to his father Isaac, it was too late, his grace and blessing had already been bestowed on Jacob, and could not be taken back.

I am not sure exactly how that all works, but that limited explanation does seem to fit the events I see described in the Bible.  In a similar way, God anoints people for certain tasks, and gives them the authority to perform them.  Moses passed his mantle of authority to Joshua when he died.  Samuel led Israel, and passed that anointing on to David.  Elijah passed a "double portion of his spirit" to Elisha, anointing Elisha to continue his ministry.  This is just one of many possible examples of how simple actions in the physical world can have significant impact in the spiritual world.  In the same way, handing someone a large check is a simple action in the physical world, but immense value can be changing hands in the financial world, depending on the specifics of what is written on that slip of paper.