Split Personality

I left what could be interpreted as a rather cynical comment on Stephen Shields' blog recently, and I've received some constructive feedback, which is always appreciated.

First check out Stephen's post here. I'm not sure if the roles are the same, but apparently in a similar fashion to our friend Mac, Stephen has signed on with the One.org campaign. Since then he's been posting a lot of poverty-related statistics and information. Very similar to the stuff I put on 3Click.

The post has the title Facts Every Christian Should Know, and when I saw that I sort of lost it. To clarify, I think it is fantastic what Stephen is doing, and I'm behind him 100%. That is definitely not what set me off. With that in mind, here's my comment:

Stephen - I try not to be pessimistic but I think you may have caught me on a bad day... My experience has been that many, many Christians are not interested in hearing the stats you started off your post with.

I now have 2 blogs - Waving or Drowning, which deals (primarily) with faith issues, and 3Click, which deals with justice and mercy issues. I segregate them this way for a couple of reasons. First, there are those who are into the justice and mercy stuff but don't share our interest in faith issues. More power to them... I'm trying to provide a resource.

Sadly, there is a flip side to this coin. There are those who love to talk about faith issues who don't give a rip about justice and mercy.

I realize I'm painting with a broad brush here; there are many people I interact with who do not fit this mold. But if you figure out what to say to those who would rather believe in Jesus than do what he said, please let me know.

These two blogs have been a real dilemma for me.To make what should be a very long conversation much shorter, let me say that I believe that the "point" of following Jesus (yes, I believe there is a point to it, beyond going to heaven when I'm done down here) is love - love for God and love for others.

Once you come to that conclusion, there are countless opportunities to "practice" loving others, either down the street or across the world. We really don't have to look very long: HIV/AIDS, poverty, starvation, ethnic strife, urban issues such as homelessness, drug addiction, prostitution - the infrastructure of despair is in place and waiting for others to show up and supply the love. In other words, this world is made to order for followers of Jesus. (Funny how that works... what he told us to do, and how he told us to live, is exactly what is needed today.)

And yet...

******

Yesterday I attended a panel discussion at Regent College. Steve Stockman and Bob Derrenbacker were discussing - you guessed it - U2.

In a comment to them I reflected on the evolution of the "U2 problem". The original issue with a large segment of Christendom was, "Prove to me they are Christians." Now that even a cursory review of the lyrics of their last two albums has rendered that point moot, we've moved on. "OK, so they're Christians (maybe) but what I'm really concerned about is the way other Christians have put them up on a pedestal."

In response, Steve returned to a point he made in his public lecture last month. Some Christians - evangelicals in particular - seem to be preoccupied with proving who is "out" (and thus affirming their status as "in".) Some are more concerned about Bono smoking a cigar (or dropping the odd f-bomb, for that matter) than they are about the 6500 people who will die of AIDS in the next 24 hours.

I think Steve is right, and I have a hard time with that. And, admittedly, I'm becoming less tolerant of it. In this chapter of my life I'm feeling more and more that my purpose is to encourage and provide outlets for those who have come to the same conclusion about the point of following Jesus - that we are here to love others, and it is supposed to be an active love - and to light a fire under those who have not. The question is how to best do that.

******

Balance is a word I have a lot of trouble with. Sometimes balance is called for. And other times balance is the excuse we offer for not doing the thing we should. In his kind and thoughtful response to my comment, Steve Knight speaks of moving the conversation forward. There are days when I want to do that, and then there are days when I feel like flipping over some tables. (When it came to issues that seemed to be at the heart of his vision for the Kingdom of God, Jesus apparently sucked at balance too, so I figure I'm in good company.)

So, back to the original point: I have two blogs. Here's the thing - blogs are all pull and no push. If I don't feel like reading one, I don't, and there's nothing the writer of that blog can do. If I talk about Justice & Mercy issues on this blog as much as I want to, I risk losing the very people I'm trying to reach. So, I have 3Click, because we must talk about the subject, and more importantly, do something about it. And periodically I write a post and put it on both. Right now I don't know what else to do.

OK - enough rambling. The lines are open, so feedback, please.

Comments

[Shiz]

Mike, I'm with you. Loving Jesus means caring for the widows and orphans, fin my view. Yet the clarion call from the direction of some church groups seems to be, "Look at my cool new car! Jesus has certainly blessed me with this car!" or "Hey, have you heard [this band] on the radio? Well yeah, wait for it ... they're Christians! If you thought they were cool it's almost like thinking Jesus was cool, too!"

And I am losing patience. And I am tired. And I complain a lot. And then I look at myself and I think, "I may care, but caring and not doing anything looks a lot like not caring at all." So I'm looking for ways to make a difference, and I have some advocacy ideas, and I don't know where it's going to go, but when I do launch into some form of advocacy, there is no way I am going to target Christians for my help. I will not be going to churches to ask for manpower or volunteers or help getting the word out, because experience has told me what kind of response I'll get. I'm going to appeal to the community, and of those who do help, some of them will be believers in Christ. I hope.

I guess I'm saying that I'm more and more convinced than ever that the best way to be a light is to live in the big, real, scary world, and when someone notices that you follow Christ, they notice it. And God will work out what happens with the rest.

[wilsonian]

What can I say, Mike. Some days you forward the conversation. Some days you turn over tables. Some days you turn my world on its head.

I suppose you do this blogging bit because you've been given a voice, and a stage, and the message. But your responsibility lies with speaking the message and doing your part. You cannot convince anyone else to take up their responsibility.

Not even Jesus could do that. You're right. You're in excellent company.

And for what it's worth... I'm grateful for you.

[Reid]

I don't think it's a case of split personality. You are clearly living out your 1st "heresy" of May...which is extremely cool. Please keep on challenging us in both our faith and the way we live it. 'Cause you're right: loving others is the point.

[Steve]

It's too bad you have to fear losing the people you want to reach just because you address issues dealing with justice and mercy. I don't get it. It seems simple to me that faith without works is no faith at all. I have to say this because I think it provides a very good illustration: Booth's original vision of the church was to enter the world of others by way of justice/mercy type issues. Only after that entry point and action taken did faith seem to come up. It wasn't a hidden agenda type thing, he deeply cared for people. I believe his love for God fueled that and compelled him to action. It's been a challenge to see both streams of justice & evangelism flow as one. Why is that? Booth feared they would flow as separate streams and in many cases that's exactly what has happened. Why? How did we get so far from the original vision?

It's been on my mind these days too. I was getting at it in a recent post on Friendship: http://youlivewhatyouvelearned.blogspot.com/2005/06/friendship.html

While I don't fault you for two separate blogs, one of justice issues & one of faith issues. I do wonder why self-proclaimed followers of Jesus would feel more at home in the faith areas while not so much in the justice areas. There's gotta be something to that.

I appreciate what you have to say in both areas and find it helpful.

[Glen]

Mike, because I know you and love you and the stuff you are on about, I will play devils advocate for a moment.

Is the danger of you having the 2 blogs not that you reinforce the very dichotomy that you are fighting against?

In other words 'Christians' can keep on being "faithfull" on WoD but never get the social action bit and those with a social activism bent can carrying on being "activist" on 3click without ever addressing the deeper spiritual needs of pothers or indeed their own spiritual needs.

It seems maybe an new medium is needed. Oh I know, maybe you should write a book!!! ;-)

[Connie Knighton]

I think Glen has a point. And, you challenge me too.

Having said that, is the issue is over-simplified? Christians are not rigidly divided into "faith" and "works" camps. Here are some variants by a divergent thinker:

Christians as Consumers (Triumphalists, high on self-esteem, frequently nationalists rather than internationalists, heavy on a faith or fate, waiting for God to help them win the lottery, proselitizers)
Christians as Competitors (low self-esteem, fearful, shakey on both faith and works, sectarian, threatened by differing opinions, affirmed by every 'conversion,' encouraged by the fame of celebrity Christians)
Christians as Constructivists (right brained visionaries, high in self-esteem, long on works, trying desperately to rewrite the story, heavy into justice, desiring active faith, both self-aware and naive)
Christians as Co-Creators (left brained visionaries, perhaps more introverted than Constructivists, long on faith, lower in self-esteem but seekng creative ways to live and worship, overwhelmed by mega-church, attracted to small personal projects around justice, heavy into love and grace, often universalists, non-proselitizers)
Christians as Co-Operators (mature individuals with strong self-esteem and a balanced outlook on faith and works, on their knees, seeking any and all ways to bring about justice within and outside of the church, facilitators of dialogue, sometimes impatient for change)

I could go on but I am running out of alliterative words and it is late.

You and I both come from a place where "works" were emphasized (and Steve appears to have come from the same place, though he gives credit to Booth for trying to achieve balance between faith and works). How I have longed for more Amazing Grace and less Pathway of Duty!!! So I guess I am predisposed by my upbringing to yearn for and lean towards Faith. Which doesn't mean I never Work.

There are so many dichotomies, not the least of which is the difference between the way males and females function as Christians, the way we differ in thinking, the way our inherited personalities skew our being in the world.

This is a book and I'll just stop now. Blessings,

[Caroline Ramsey]

Some vague, unrelated thoughts:

(1)
Do you have see-saws in North America? a plank balanced in the middle where children (and adults when they think nobody's looking) can bounce up and down on. Well there are two ways of getting balance on a see-saw. First you can all pile into the middle and get perfect balance or you can go to either end and bounce up and down in balance - I know which is more enjoyable! :-) So keep pushing Mike, yes there will be brickbats, but I suspect that once the bruising heels, you can handle that.

(2)
E F Schumacher (who wrote "Small is Beautiful") once said "People call me a crank, well ok, what do you need to get a car going?" I'll be a crank to! A wheel doesn't role until it's unbalanced, so I'm going to do unbalanced (my students tell me that I'm pretty good at it - I don't think they mean it to be a compliment)

(3)
We must kill this divide between faith and works. The church has been trying to do so ever since James wrote his epistle in the first centruey CE. My minister said to me the other day that if we are going to be effective in witnessing in this crazy 'mixed economy', transitory, emergent church we're all in .. then we really need to be centred and filled with Christ, we need more than ever to have our spirits filled, restored and renewed in our relationship with Christ, our Father through His Spirit. There is no divide, Mike, bring back 3CLick to this fold, allow for a see-saw balance and keep your self as wonderfully unbalanced as you are! :-)

[Jim]

I find all your posts to be thoughtful, and your writing reflects a much needed humility in this self-aggrandizing world. I think those who wonder at the two blog approach have a very good point.

I must confess, while I check W or D every day (more than once), I have clicked over to 3Click only once, and then clicked away. Not because I'm not interested in poverty or social justice issues (I am keenly interested in those) but I'm also interested in other issues, particularly those regarding practical ways of loving others; including but not limited to those who are victimized by structural evil (see Ron Sider's oeuvre) that results in, among other things, poverty.

Because I work for a church in a small city in which there is a concentration of social services (meaning that clients of those agencies are all over the place, 24/7) I interact daily with those in poverty. I know that God calls me to love those. But I am under the "continuing debt to love one another" with many others too. My life is, as is most everyone's, a mix. Many times seeming unbalanced, as a previous commentator said so eloquently. So I'm okay with the mixed-ness of the lives of people I meet virtually through their blogs.

Don't know if this makes any sense, but it did in my head when I started writing. Ah, well. Keep up the good work--or should I say, do not become weary in doing good.

[chris]

One of the hard things about caring for children is that it is ultimately their parents who choose whether they live in poverty. You can provide all the money in the world but if the parents do not choose to spend it on the children there isn't much you can do. You can't force a mother to look after her child to the degree you deem necessary.

I can see how we might make a difference as individuals by opening our homes and feeding neighborhood kids that need food but I'm worried that further dependence on the welfare system is not a healthy thing for many of the poor.

[stephanie]

Working beside you Mike I see your head and your heart fully connected in this area of pursing faith issues and justice and mercy issues. For some time I have observed that you have the Father's heart for his children, his abandoned and lost children. Mike the Father's heart is so large in you and that is a heart that looks out at the whole world - nothing less. Like you, another apprentice was given instructions on justice, mercy and faith. This apprentice also learned from a passionate Father heart named Paul:
"Follow anything that makes you want to do right. Pursue faith and love and peace..."
Thank you for being an apprentice - I need powerful models to see the Father's heart for Justice, Mercy, and Faith of the Kingdom variety. We need to see those who will fight for Kingdom culture on every level.

[issachar]

I'm reluctant to post this as I'm out of my depth discussing global poverty generally, but I think there's another category: Christians who care about social justice, but end up in the "conservative" camp because they find the "liberal" solutions unworkable.

That's where I find myself. I do care about social justice, but the solutions I keep seeing impractical solutions proposed. Perhaps there are good solutions proposed, but I don't think I've heard them. The solutions I hear never seem to take into account the unintended consequences.

[issachar]

I should add something else...

I want to see solutions that work. I understand that nothing is going to work perfectly, but I simply don't believe that the solutions I hear are the best available. Am I not listening in the right places?

[Mike]

Hey Issacher - thanks for the comment. Can you elaborate a little? Personally I hate the labels "liberal" and "conservative". However, assuming I'm on the liberal side and you find yourself on the conservative side, can you put forward any suggestions that you would deem practical? That maybe too tall an order, but give us a feel for what you're thinking.

[issachar]

It seems we all hate the liberal/conservative labels, but we continue to use them because they're all we've got.

Actually a good deal of my thinking on the subject comes from domestic Canadian politics, and that carries over into the international. What do we do about poverty in the downtown east-side? In Wally? What do we do to provide medical care to everyone? What do we do about drug addiction?

The "liberal" response as articulated by the NDP is full of compassion. Poverty: Welfare. Medical Care: More money for the health care system. Addiction: Legalization, Regulation and/or safe injection. But then there's the consequences: Welfare: Welfare trap. More money for health care: Our flat-out inability to keep up with the rising cost of late-life care. Legalization etc.: Increasing drug use.

Bringing up these objections gets me dismissed by some as lacking compassion, but I'm not satisfied with solutions that don't work. At the same time it seems like "Conservatives" dismiss the problem as unsolvable. I don't buy that. There are solutions. They're just not simple. And like surgery, they're not always pretty.

For the international scene I think that we need to accept that compassion without results is not particularly valuable. Thinking about the situation in Darfur for the moment. How do we stop genocide? Words won't do it. They might make us feel better, but the fact remains that some people really do want to rape & murder other people. The only thing that can stop them is superior force. We have that. But if we use it we need to realize that we're going to have casualties and we will accidentally kill innocents. So what should we do? For Darfur, I really have no idea.

What about poverty? I believe that debt relief & aid are good, but they're merely band-aid solutions. The only thing that will solve the problem is if they have the same thing that makes the west rich. Working & productive economies. So how do we help them get that? By helping them start industries that can succeed in an international marketplace. Global trade maximizes production, so we need to help them succeed there. One such industry is agriculture. It has relatively low barriers to entry and they have the skills to do it. So where do we come in? We need to eliminate our protectionist subsidies on farming. I don't mean reduce, I mean eliminate. We're richer so we can undercut them easily and we need to stop doing it. Canada needs to get rid of them and import restrictions. The US has subsidies that make ours look small and Europe has subsidies that make the American ones look tiny. I think we should start by getting rid of ours and then putting pressure on other countries to get rid of theirs. This will hurt. Our farmers will suffer and we need to help them. There's no reason to have all the burden of this land on farmers. We spread the pain evenly. Agriculture is not the only industry we need to look at.

So that's just one thought for now. As I said, I don't know how to make a "Conservative" position work, but since "Conservative" economics seem to work, I want to find a way to make them work from Christian principles.

[rick]

I too responded to STephen's post. I actuially made a comment about the wristbands on my blog. I know that I shouldn't care, but sometimes I wonder if much of the war on poverty from the evangelical perspective is a "fad". It is "cool" to fight poverty, so here I go. I know that sounds extremely jaded, but it has become almost "hip" to fight the war on poverty. We have our wrist bands and now I am a "cool" Christian. I can even have a cigar once in a while. It is almost seems trendy.

I know this is unfair and extremely jaded, but I hope that our hearts have been transformed and we have been touched at a deep place in our soul and fighting world poverty is not a "fad" and the latest "in" thing for some Christians, like lighting incense and candles, but rather we see it as a call from God to follow Jesus and walk where Jesus was willing to walk. To proclaim the kingdom of God for the poor and oppressed. Recognizing that how we vote and who we vote for has impact on GOd's earth and God's people.

My prayer is that Jesus' call has truly captured our hearts as his church. I need you folks to help encourage me. You guys are leading the way and I am grateful. I need more guts and faith.

Thanks.

[Glenn]

Mike, I've thought about my earlier comment and think I was wrong. Some people are called to make a difference and sometimes the only way to do that is by embracing people in the place they are at.

We don't always do Jesus work in the church (as you are well aware) if we can embrace Kingdom principles by engaging those who are not interested in any spriitual or faith dimension. Also those of us who consider ourselves Christians need a good kick in the butt every now and then from someone who has his eye on the wider issues.

It may be a bad example but it's the best I can come up with. MLK. He had a "foot in the world and a foot in the church" I would suggest though that he had both feet in the Kingdom and that was what mattered most. It wasn't a universally popular stance but it got the business done.

[Reid]

Well said Glen. However, you were right about the book.

[Lorna]

You're going good. Somedays we turn tables, others we sit and rest.

[jen lemen]

it's funny, i'm as liberal as they come, but issachar's post is resonating with me for different reasons. i worry sometimes that our solutions to poverty will end up reinforcing white privilege and our internalized sense of superiority because we have the embedded privilege available to "do good" and help poor people. i worry that we will end up reinforcing the giver/receiver binaries and forget that we are the ones who are having trouble squeezing through the eye of the needle and that the meek will inherit the kingdom of god. all this said, i think we should keep throwing money and any solutions we find at the issue of poverty--we can't afford to wait one second. but how will we tend to our own souls who gain enormous reinforcement and personal validation by being the "good" person, the "capable" person who gives to the poor? i can't deny that it makes me feel great when i give and am active; i have to admit i know nothing of the discouragement and hopelessness of constantly being on the receiving end and the indebtedness that creates. some of the people i have given to the most will never tell me the truth about what they really want or need for their lives because they don't want to stop the supply of funds; they can't afford to displease me and i have inadvertently bought their lifelong loyalty and any help or service they can offer me. i end up determining the shape of their lives more than i should; i end up being an expert when i most need to be a humble learner. sigh.
this probably makes no sense, and don't hear me saying that we should stop giving because the need is so dire and many are so destitute, years away from any regret about the loss of dignity, survival is the thing. but i think about these things. and how power and our need for significance plays into how we give and serve the poor.
peace, brotha.
and i think you should merge the blogs. there's no separation in your life--why in your blog? just my two cents.

[Wes Roberts]

...ditto Jen's comments

[Wes Roberts]

...ditto Jen's comments