The Crow and the Pie or Some Thoughts on Humilty

Thinking about humility today. I'm wondering if it's something we value as a culture. To be honest, as I think about my close relationships, I don't think the topic comes up much. I know that humility is not something I possess in great measure but would really like to have more of. After all, it's one of those things we're supposed to "clothe" ourselves with (Col 3).

I think in terms of arrogant people, it takes one to know one. So I smile secretly to myself when I criticize and distrust other leaders for their pride. I'll know I've attained humility when I can let go of that critical impulse.

I also think humility can't be taught, only modeled. It has NEVER helped me to have people point out my pride to me. But it is endlessly helpful for me to watch humble people. They are my favorite types, the people I most admire. My ministry is full of them. When I'm around my WDA colleagues, I just want to be taught, to learn humility. They have all the passion, zeal, and knowledge that I have at 28 tempered with this amazing release of power and control and eyes looking toward a heavenly country.

Here's what I've come to believe in my culture: humility is for the weak, the vulnerable, the foolish. Humility is a temporary state for students. Once you have achieved expert status, you have to hold onto it. Don't show weakness or uncertainty. Hold your head high, speak boldly, be admired, don't take guff from anyone.

So even though I should know better, I've lived my Christian life trying to "outgrow" humility. Come to find, it's the biggest thing I have yet to "grow into."

How about you? What do you think?

Potty training and its implications for ministry.

“Daddy, I want you to close your eyes and not look where I’m going!”

“Hmmm….. okay. Where’s Annabel? Where could she be going?”

Thump, thump, thump, thump. Silence…… tinkle, tinkle….. “DAAAADDYYYYY!!! Come in here!!”

This followed a long dialogue about peeing before breakfast. She stalled, she cried, she ran away. Finally she admitted, “I just don’t want to go because you asked me.” I’ve been trying to get through this rebellious streak in my daughter; this firm resolve to NOT do as I say just BECAUSE I say it.

We have epic showdowns: hour-long timeouts over something as small as putting a single toy away, or giving an apology. With calm decisiveness I choose to break my daughters obstinacy. But she’s one tough little bugger and almost every time, the only thing that results is unresolved alienation. So I go back and forth between closing my eyes to give my daughter the illusion of free will and fiercely confronting her anarchistic attitudes.

It got me thinking about discipleship in an American context. Americans are born and bred to be rebellious. Free-thinking anti-authoritarian punks who hate nothing more than external control. Like our national idols, the American Revolutionaries, we buck hierarchies, expel expectations, and despise the rule of law.

Is that a problem for American Christians? Heck yeah! Daughters? Of course. Me? Oh crap.

I’ve been told in the past by pastors, mentors, and deans that I am “unteachable”. And to a degree they are right! I AM unteachable! I’m proud and defensive. I got that little habit from my ancestors, my parents, and my own arrogant choices. But the problem is, I see through people. I can tell when a leader is trying to consolidate his or her own power by exhorting their people to be obedient. I know the difference between a leader’s care and affection for people and his personal insecurities regarding his leadership. And only once in my life (here’s looking at you Mark Pavola) has that issue in me been confronted lovingly in the context of a trust-filled relationship.

I’m going to make a strong statement: I believe that leaders who spend their time worrying about and confronting rebelliousness in their ministries are wasting their time, playing into their insecurities, and sabotaging the effectiveness of their ministry. Sorry bub. You live in a culture where trust and authority are earned by love and by example, not assumed because of position or pedigree. There are FAR more effective ways to help people grow and mature than beating them up over those inborn attitudes. What I’m saying is that every parent KNOWS that it’s important to choose battles wisely. I believe it’s time for us spiritual parents to quit it with the “because I said so” line. It’s time to start working contextually in a non-authoritarian society to build trust and loyalty through relationships rather than power plays.

Isn’t this consistent with Jesus’ ministry? He didn’t get huffy when people didn’t respect his authority. But the gospels say the people observed that he “taught as one who had authority” and therefore they respected Him. The testimony of His teachings and personal example and miracles validated him, NOT his role as a Jewish rabbi. He didn’t waste his time consolidating His personal influence. He only discussed his authority with people who openly questioned it. But ultimately, I believe Jesus felt secure in His calling/annointing at his baptism and the personal charisma God had given him as a leader. Therefore, he let people make their own decisions about whether they could trust Him. He even went so far as to say, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

If you are a person with authority, please stop exercising it.

As I look back on the people I admire most in life, they are NOT the ones who confronted me, but the ones who encouraged me, who believed in me. They invested time and energy into me with kind and generous hearts. They showed me what a humble Jesus life looks like and made me want to be gentler, kinder, and yes… more submissive. They inspired rather than coerced. They built relational equity and earned the right to speak truth and address lies in my heart. For these gentle and respected individuals, I am infinitely teachable, an open door, a fertile field.

I told my men’s group last year that one of our ground rules was that we would not give advice unless it was asked for. I could see the men squirm as I said that and at least one man objected: How can “one man sharpen another” if we are deprived of the right to give advice and share our opinions. I explained that the safety built by NOT giving advice would yield trusting relationships which would ultimately allow for a greater “sharpening”. Even I was surprised by the results of this rule. For months, I listened, asked questions, and spent time with the guys. I resisted the temptation to share my studied opinions, my sage wisdom, my instructive experiences. Almost immediately, a few of these men began not only to share some of their most intimate struggles, but to ask for my feedback. They invited me into the heart of their decision-making process. That was an honor I neither sought nor demanded.

I suppose shepherding a 30-year-old is different than shepherding a 3-year-old. Though honestly, I don’t think it’s THAT different. Building rapport and showing love are the basis of effective transformational leadership in both groups.

I imagine I still have a few showdowns left with my daughter. There ARE non-negotiables (like safety) and she DOES need to learn to follow instructions even if the instructions aren’t given in an ideal manner. But I’ll work around those rebellious tendencies as much as possible. (Remember how King Rehoboam was poorly advised to tell his subjects, “My father laid on you a heavy yoke; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.”)  I’ll choose my battles and honestly I feel fine about that because I think the end result will be better.

So do I feel like I sold out or backed down when I closed my eyes and let my daughter think that she was choosing to sit on the toilet? Nope. Not at all.

This Little Harky had Healing: Leaving the Cult of Productivity

Last Friday morning to Saturday morning were the most profound and healing 24 hours I’ve experienced since the Holy Spirit Encounter 18 months ago. Outcome: I no longer have to live a productive fulfilling life. Here’s the story.

Friday morning, I met with my African friend for breakfast. We had been having conflict all week over the expectations in our friendship and the cultural baggage we bring to the relationship. The experience was jarring enough to shake loose a couple lies and fears I’d been hanging onto. Fear of being taken advantage of. Mistrust of other cultures. And a big one that we discussed: the uniquely Western idea that time is scarce and we must use it to accomplish our agenda with cutthroat efficiency. I confess that I  do tend to look to my productivity as a source of fulfillment. Most conversations and meetings are weighed and evaluated for their strategic value. Even with my African friend, I initially started our friendship with the expressed purpose of “learning what it means to be African and how to do effective ministry on that continent.” I thought he could teach me something. But he kept dodging my questions and instead sought to build a friendship free of purpose and agenda. He sought to build trust.

Friday afternoon, I had lunch with an American friend. He is a fellow dreamer, an idealist, a black-and-white visionary and most of our conversations in college had to do with our plans to change the world. But a few years have gone by and one of us must have changed (I think it was me). So the conversation turned on Friday toward these character traits. I told him bluntly that recently I’ve seen a darker side to his idealism: an opinionated rigidity that packs enough punch to do real damage to his close relationships. It served as a moment of clarity for me as I saw so much of myself in this friend, pursuing my ideals with resolve and do-or-die conviction. I remembered a covenant I made as a 16-year-old seeing the middle class culture for the first time. I swore to myself and God never to compromise, never to become complacent, and to suck the marrow out of every moment this life gives me. I became petrified by the apparent lure of materialistic stagnancy. Compromise became my greatest fear. But lately, that covenant has created stress as I’ve evaluated each day according to its productivity and felt keenly the quickening ebb of life as months and years speed by faster and faster and my ambitions go unreached.

I felt disturbed. I went to a little wooded spot tucked away by the Mississippi and prayed. And remarkably, God talked back. He spoke fluidly and clearly. And I listened carefully. He said a lot of things like, “That thing you dream of doing… it isn’t anywhere NEAR the hardest thing I could do through you. It’s a very small thing for me.” Over and over he drove in the fact that if I can believe that I’m a failure for Jesus, a quivering little mess in the palm of the Father, that he would do great things through me by his power. Unqualified, unsuccessful, unable: That’s just where he wants me. Not milking all this life has to offer by my strength and talent, but knowing that I’ve got nothing and God’s got everything and He loves me and he wants me to be fruitful and to do that, I have to let a lot of stuff just… die.

I went from there to Debra's and my mutual friends’ house and was treated to the best counseling session I’ve had in years as she encouraged me to dig deeper… and then deeper. “I’m worried for you,” she said. “You strive so much. Why do you do that?” I admitted my terror of complacency and compromise. I told her that I let my covenant as a 16-year-old continue to speak to me 12 years later because I desperately want to live the greatest, most adventurous and fulfilling and fruitful life possible and never just “settle down.” “Nate,” she responded. “I feel like the Father says that’s such a good idea… It’s a great idea but you can’t do it. You can’t make it happen.” I admitted to the stress and guilt it causes me every day when I look back on a whole day eaten up by feeding and dressing and entertaining children; where progress is painfully slow and just getting out of the house can take hours. At this point, it causes me more heartache that fruitfulness.

So Saturday morning, I let it go. I unbound myself from that covenant. Out loud. I recognized that the Father loves me more than I love myself and that HIS agenda for me to have a fruitful uncompromising life of mature discipleship and adventurous unsoldoutness was WAY stronger than my resolutions to have that life. So I resolved to quit it with my resolutions. I don’t trust the Father to guide my heart in good ways because I don’t like the way I see people around me living their lives. But the Father reminded me on Saturday first, that it’s not my job to judge the journeys of others (I have NO idea what’s really going on inside) and second, that He’s shown me enough of his character and heart toward me over the last year that it was time to trust Him with the kind of person he’s shaping me into. It’s time to stop trying to shape myself, to impress godliness on my heart by sheer force of will. It’s time to let the Holy Spirit do his job and to let go of the idol of the productive life.

Here’s the thing though… it’s still been hard. Even though in fitting form, I took half a week just to chill out and revel in the fact that I no long HAVE to life a full, productive life, there were immediately challenges. After Saturday morning, I got about halfway through my victory lap of emotional healing before a conflict with my wife brought me back to earth. SAME issues staring me in the face again… and again. Evaluate productivity. Judge. Criticize. Then, the next day came and more reminders of the weight of my issues along with some general unpleasantries. A criticism about my worship-leading. An accusing email from a friend saying I am prideful. Familiar guilt and annoyance… keeping me humble… reminding me that I’m NOT there yet. For about 3 seconds there, I thought I had summitted as I surveyed with satisfaction the sweat and tears of my most recent crux and the panorama of my progress. But when I turned around… there’s a whole heck of a lot more mountain ahead. But that’s okay. I think that means the experience and subsequent growth are real… not just ecstatic.

This is about as tender as I get. And that in itself is worth a lot to me. It means I’m willing to listen, willing to try new things, willing to entertain new ways of thinking. That’s a good spot for me.

An African, a New Box, and a Little Cash

I work with many Africans who are middle-class by their own standards, but desperately poor by mine. So when building relationships across cultural and socioeconomic barriers, I know I constantly risk a veiled appeal for my cash. In Zambia (2010), I came only to teach, but by the end I had a small catalogue of the Zambians’ ministry proposals that only needed a bit of startup money. In one case, a mere 120 grand for facilities, salaries, and SUVs would suffice. Other times, the needs are humbler and more urgent and my new friends are not afraid to ask.

As much as I want to say, “No! No! I’m just a poor missionary!” I know it’s not true. I have money in the bank. But I choose not to give because money is emotional for me. There are a million reasons in my heart for me NOT to give to those who ask. MAINLY, the fear of losing a relationship because of money and the fear of being taken advantage of are constantly with me in my nervous relationship with poverty. And yes, the irony of being a support-raiser who is terrified of giving support has not escaped me.

Late the other night, an African friend and I exchanged a volley of texts, which embodied all my fears about working across economic lines. His father was in the hospital in Africa with pneumonia. The doctors would not authorize the medications without proof of funds. He desperately needed to borrow some money. Would I help?

My stomach churned. My emotions raged. What could I say to my friend? I felt trapped in a no win scenario:

Option 1: Lend the money. If he fails to pay it back, harbor resentment. Relationship ends.

Option 2: Give the money. Risk appearing as if the action were manipulated. Risk future appeals. Risk being taken advantage of. Risk enabling a paternalistic relationship. If I find out the situation was not as urgent as he made it appear, harbor bitterness. Relationship ends.

Option 3: Withhold the money. Show concern, offer to pray, talk through other options, but don’t allow money to change hands.

I went with my gut. I opted for #3. I said I didn’t want money to corrupt our friendship, but said I wanted to pray about it more and process it with him later. Then I went back to watching TV. A quick volley of responses revealed his attitude descending from gracious understanding into alienation. He finally texted, “In my culture, after what just happened between us, we can no longer continue to be friends. If I cannot count on you when my father is sick, I cannot count on you when all is well.” Game over.

I was angry. Hurt. In my culture, the friendship ended the moment he asked for money. A wall went up in my heart. I suddenly felt as if our relationship was contingent on my giving. For me that’s not a far cry from being valued only for my money. I know this is not the case, but the conclusion seemed a jumpable one at the time.

The next morning I DID pray about it. God showed me an image of my friend’s sick father… not an emaciated caricature desperate for my life-saving dollars, but an ordinary man who could really use some help to get his meds. God seemed to shrug his shoulders at me as if to say, “why not help this man?” It wasn’t shame or condemnation. Just a gentle shrug that said, “is the money really that big a deal?”

No, the money is not a big deal. But the relationship is. I felt that any financial transaction would short-circuit my friendship. Again, God shrugged. “Yeah, it’s messy,” he seemed to say. “Is that okay with you?”

Is it okay with me? That’s the question. I decided then that I was willing to do messy, that I would give the money, and that if the integrity of our friendship was compromised because of it, that was an acceptable risk. A few verses came to mind:

“Freely it was given you. So give freely.”
“When you lend money, don’t expect anything in return”
“If someone asks for your jacket, give him your shirt too.”

My friend and I talked at length that morning on the phone and again two days later over breakfast. I shared my frustration and alienation with the way he shut down communication with me over text, the way he jumped to conclusions and judged me based on his own cultural assumptions. He shared some of his own frustrations with me as well.

“I wasn’t saying we could not be friends. But I was saying that I’m not interested in the kind of friendship that stops at money. I don’t want you to just ‘pray about it.’ I want you to help me when you can and I will help you when I can. I know we have a difficult cross-cultural friendship and that money is a sensitive issue, but I also felt that we were close enough that we could talk through those things together.”

But in my mind we were NOT that close. Underneath the amazing rapport we had achieved in 4 meetings was still a basic tension, a mistrust that at some point, this African man would disappoint me. As in all my cross-cultural friendships, there was a walking on eggshells that comes from not knowing the rules, not knowing when you might trigger a land mine, when your boundaries might be crossed.

The behavior of other cultures has at times been so mystifying to me that I’ve kept all my cross-cultural friendship at arms length. It’s not antagonistic racism, but a real fear of the unknown, and a sense that these relationships will be painful if I dive too deep. But here was a man who for the first time in my life was asking for a genuinely mutual, genuinely deep cross-cultural friendship and honestly I don’t have a box for that. But I WANT it.

I’m not happy with the American mold of friendship: low expectations, great relational fluidity, strong boundaries, slow trust-building. I have an African heart inside of me that wants to give and receive liberally, to feel relationships are secure and assumed, to be able to count on my friends and to have them count on me. But in this culture, I feel like Seinfeld’s Kramer, barging into other peoples’ spaces, opening the fridge, oblivious to the rules of engagement and being uncomfortably tolerated as a quirky individual.

I think my friend has a more biblical view of relationships than I do. The cultural context in which the bible was written is much closer to modern Africa than to middle-class America. Believers are constantly relying on each other for basic survival. The New Testament church community was interdependent, not individualistic.  If I have the cash and a brother in need. Why wouldn’t I help him? It may or may not be the most urgent need out there, but what does it matter? And if my African brother uses my money (which really isn’t mine at all) for something other than his father’s medications, how will I feel? Betrayed? Taken advantage of? Maybe. But does it really matter? Is it worth the risk? I mean if I thought giving would harm him, I wouldn’t do it! But I know this person well enough to know that he’s asking for what he needs, not manipulating me.

So I gave him what he asked for. More, in fact. I feared I was committing relational suicide even by giving him the money. I feared our communications would become stilted and uncomfortable. But something different happened. It broke a dam (not the money, but the whole situation) in our relationship and paved the way to open communication. We began to have open conflict with each other and I think we are both surprised to find that the other party keeps coming back to the table. I’m learning my friend can handle my bluntness and that he is willing to return the favor. And THAT new openness gives me tremendous hope for our friendship.

I accept that while his request for financial help was taboo for me, it was a normal part of relationship for him. And if I hope to be effective in relationship and ministry in Africa, that’s the first thing I’m going to have to grapple with. I’ll have to address my fear that if I give what I have, I won’t have enough for myself or my family. I’ll have to address my trust issues in these relationships and my fear of being used, chewed up, and spit out. I’ll still have to be shrewd. But I’ll also have to be willing to be messy, to speak openly, to give trust, to love deeply.

I’m a bit poorer now than I was. But I’m happy, hopeful, and growing. I think my friend and I have just BEGUN our friendship.