What the ALS Bucket Challenge, ISIS and Ferguson Have in Common (and why it matters)

You know what I’m sick of?  

For the last couple of weeks ISIS, Ferguson and now the ALS Water Bucket Challenge (along with the occasional TSwift awkward dancing music video) have been blowing up my Facebook feed… but that’s not what I’m sick of.  

Sure, I’m tired of the bad news, I’m tired of hearing about Christians being murdered and run out of their countries.  I’m tired of how the media has taken Ferguson and turned it into a dramatic spectacle to meet their word quotas.  I’m tired of the diatribes about whether it was a race issue or a corruption issue.  I’m tired of people arguing passive aggressively by posting articles about how the ALS Ice Water Challenge is killing babies or saving lives or a Facebook fad or a meaningful way to fund research.  Yes, these are all serious issues.  

But here’s the deal…
ISIS is not the problem.
Religious persecution is not the problem.
Obama’s level of engagement with the problem is not the problem.
Corruption of the justice system is not the problem.
Racial profiling is not the problem.
Facebook is not the problem.
A debilitating disease called ALS is not the problem.
Ignorant people who jump on bandwagons are not the problem.

There is only one problem.

Sin.

There was a time before ALS was possible.  There was a time before religious factions, before religion itself.  There was a time before we needed a justice system.

There was a time when things were perfect.  The world was beautiful.  Relationships were whole.  There was never a miscommunication or a doubt about good intentions.  There were no I’ll miss you’s or goodbyes.  People lived forever.  The air was clean, and no one worried about GMOs or the state of the polar ice caps.  People talked with God because they knew Him personally, and He talked back, and it wasn’t weird.  

All that changed when we took what was good and broke it.  There was a flicker of doubt that maybe God didn’t know best, that maybe we knew best.  The disobedience driven by our own pride of thinking we were independent drove a chasm between us and everything else.  Goodbye, perfect communion with God.  Goodbye, deep, untarnished relationships.  Goodbye, responsible stewardship of creation.  

Fast forward through a lot of war, plague and famine.  God shows up, literally, in Bethlehem and starts saying some crazy things.  

The Romans are not the problem.
Tax collector corruption is not the problem.
Nationality is not the problem.
Poverty is not the problem.
Even cultural norms surrounding prostitutes attending dinner parties is not the problem.

There is only one problem.

Sin.  

It’s in your eyes, in your words; it pervades every inch of your insides, and I’ve come to set you free from it.  And when you pray, the next thing out of your mouth after “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name” needs to be “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven”.  

Know why He said that?  He knew as soon as our eyes were opened to the stench of sin and death and the freedom of grace, we would understand what beauty is.  The discord between what was and what is would make our souls ache for something better.  It would break our hearts to see the ravaged human landscape with fresh eyes.  As soon as we had tasted the truest love, we would want to do something about all the counterfeits.  He says we aren’t the only ones.  In Romans 8, He says everything else on earth is waiting with baited breath until things are forever set right, until pain and fear don’t even exist, until people know that Jesus is the only one who makes life good and He’s coming back to finish what He started.    

So what does this have to do with you and ISIS or you and Michael Brown’s death in Ferguson or you and your personal policies about raising awareness on social media?  That second little line of The Lord’s Prayer?  The one that you usually breeze through -  “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven”?  Yeah, it doesn’t just mean Your will be done on this CT scan, though it does mean that.  It doesn’t just mean Your will be done on my decision on whether to take this job or not, though it does mean that.  

It means crying out, Father, we know you love us and You are the source of every good thing, make things like they should be, how they were meant to be before we broke what You made!  It means begging for wisdom to know what is right and the guts to do it.  It means thoughtful, active engagement in dealing with the real problem, not just the symptoms.  

Practically speaking, maybe “Thy kingdom come” means taking a day off of social media to ask God to slice through your calluses and show you how you can serve people.  
Maybe it means getting the names of ten terrorists and asking the One who made them in the first place to change their hearts and open their eyes to what is right.  (I know, it’s a little unconventional.)  
Maybe it means dumping a bucket of water on your head and committing to find and encourage a real person who has ALS.  
Maybe it means listening to people who disagree with you and treating them in such a thoughtful, respectful way that it encourages thoughtful, respectful conversations in the public arena.  

I don’t know what it will look like in your zipcode for your 8-5.  

What I do know is, if not us, then who?  

Love,

Little Miss Sunshine

How You Know He’s the One

OK, folks.  Here it is.  The blog post you’ve been waiting for, the answer to the question you’ve been agonizing over.  How do you know that guy you’ve been dating for the last 4, 9, 27 months is THE ONE?  You met at small group, things quickly escalated as you went from staring awkwardly across the Bible study circle to sitting next to each other, and from smiling in passing between church services to attending the same service. (Whoa.) You went on your first date to that one restaurant that everyone goes on their first date to, or maybe you went conservative and just “did coffee”.  

After a while of this slightly awkward “talking” phase (though how much actual talking it involves depends on the two people, more on that here), he asked you to be his girlfriend.  Whoa.  You felt like you had really hit the big time. (Whatever that means.)  At some point you brought him home to meet your family and held your breath hoping your dad wouldn’t interrogate him (in front of you, at least).  You got to know his friends, his past, his parents.  Maybe some of those were messier situations than others, but you stuck it out.  

You kept dating.  

And dating.

And alllll the while, you were (perhaps frantically) trying to decide THE BIG QUESTION.  

IS HE THE ONE!?!?!

[I will pause momentarily here and qualify the term “THE ONE”.  Disney may, perhaps, sue me, but I don’t really care.  Sometimes people (usually of the girl variety) get all wrapped up in this idea of THE ONE being one single, solitary human being in the universe that they must somehow find among all the other human beings who is their one and only match made in heaven.  I think that is a whole lot of stress-inducing, nonsensical hyper-romantic frippery.  When I say THE ONE, I mean the single, solitary human being you want to choose to love even when they decide that growing a mustache is a good idea, or they leave their dirty socks on the floor.  Now that we have that established, let us continue.]  

So, is he?  I mean, it’s kind of an important question, and goodness knows everyone and their mother is going to want to know if he’s THE ONE.  If he is THE ONE, they’ll want to know when you’re getting engaged and if he’s not, they’ll want to know why in tarnation you’re still dating him.  Because they love you, and they're nosy.  

Well, reader, I have one question for you.  Probably you should sit down for this one. 

Does

he

make

you

happy?

*Braces for impact of all manner of theologically sound backlash*

I know, I know, you don’t need to be happy, it’s all about joy, and marriage is about making you holy, not happy, and what about doctrinal compatibility and similar political alignment and and and… 

And are you finished protesting yet?

Ok, great.  

Yes.  You’re right.  Happiness is circumstantial and joy is a product of walking with Jesus.  Marriage tends to knock off your rough edges, and doctrine and politics matter.

But.

Isn’t that all understood?  Do I really have to tell you that you should be dating someone like that?  Do you need someone to explicitly say, look, since you’re going to be married to this person for the rest of your life, you should probably agree on the Big Four (religion, kids, politics and money).  Do you have to have it spelled out to you that if you have a reasonably normal set of family and friends and they don’t like who you’re dating, that’s a PROBLEM?  

So what’s left?  If you agree on red and blue issues, how much money you want to give away, that you like kids, and that chasing after Jesus is the most important thing, what’s left?

Does

he

make

you 

happy?

Because let me tell you, I know puh-lenty of guys that I agree with about the Big Four, but they don’t make me happy.  They don’t include me on adventures or make me laugh or take me dancing or sit and listen and hold me when I’m a blubbering mess.  I don't wake up thinking about them, and have fun just doing whatever with them.  They don't make me melt with the words they say or the things they do.  They don't give me internal fireworks or heart palpitations or any other signs of really liking someone.  They just agree with me about how the country should be run and whether or not John MacArthur is a good author.  That's all fine and dandy, but there's no convincing me that just because we agree on those things, they're THE ONE.  So assuming you’re not on the other end of the spectrum and an idiot dating a bad boy thinking you can reform him or something, the only question you really have to answer is:

Does

he 

make 

you 

happy?

Yeah?  Then probably he’s A GOOD ONE and probably you should marry him if he asks you.  [He’s not really THE ONE until you walk back down that aisle hand in hand having promised to love him on Thursdays and Christmas Days and days when he wears purple socks and every other kind of day there is.]  Rest easy, dear one, it’s simpler than you thought.  

Much love and in love,

Little Miss Sunshine