Positive Faith: Assume the Best

How else can we practice positive faith?

Assume the best of others.

Now, if you haven’t been with me up until now then I know I will have lost you with this one. I am not kidding when I say this is hard work. But I’m also not kidding when I say I believe this is a muscle that we can stretch and grow. Assuming the best is a skill that can be learned.

And maybe assuming the best is asking too much. Perhaps we can simply start by learning not to assume the worst.

How do we do this?

When someone does something that pisses you off and your instincts kick in and tell you it’s because they don’t actually care about your or want to create your downfall or some such thing, follow these steps:

1. Take the time to brainstorm some alternatives. Why else could they be doing this? Might it be just simple carelessness? Might it be an accident? Maybe something happened in their life that threw them off their game?

2. Have conversations with people when they hurt you and allow them to speak to their side of things. You will often find that your assumptions were totally off base once you hear the other person out.

This little exercise trains us, over time, to recognize that the things we assume about people are rarely spot-on- and this helps us manage our assumptions.

Choosing Love

“May I remember that my life is what it is, not what I ask for. May I practice with what I’m given, rather than wish for something else… When the going gets tough may I choose love over fear. Every time.”

Katrina Kenison

Choose love over fear. Every time.

Today, may we choose love. Tomorrow? We are going to begin a conversation on how to change our resentful, fearful and sad relationship with self-sabotage.

Becoming a Trustworthy Listener

“One of the most powerful truths we can offer our children is the knowledge that we’re ALL still learning. None of us have arrived; we all have room to grow.”
Erica Layne

During pandemic stress management I have done a TON of cleaning up. During one frenzied afternoon I found a stack of old journals. Evidently, I have been more faithful at journaling and praying than I realized! One journal included a list of things I did NOT want to do when I was old. I’m pretty sure when I wrote this list I thought that would be 40.

Now that I am legitimately almost old enough to qualify for the covid vaccine I thought a review of the list was in order. I stopped cleaning and started reading. Here’s my number 1 thing I DID NOT want to happen:

#1 - Never, never ever start to believe, much less say, that I feel like the “kids” today are not respectful enough of their elders. I’m kind of sensitive when “older” folks complain about the younger generation. Why? Because this happens every stinking time one generation gives way to the next! I do not know WHY as we age we tend to grow loose-lipped about our disdain for youth. Early onset dementia, perhaps? Have we forgotten that our generation was assailed as being the WORST. D*^& long haired hippies. Sex crazy maniacs. Draft dodgers…..as I recall, it was a pretty long list. The adjectives have shifted a bit, but this still continues today.

I’m reminded of John 4 when Jesus makes a side trip to Samaria (a place people usually rerouted their gps to avoid) to have a conversation with a young woman who I suspect the elders in the village did not approve of. Jesus teaches us (and her) through the course of a conversation that he knows every single thing about her - even the stuff she wishes no one knew. As a result of this conversation and her subsequent actions, many Samaritans came to believe that Jesus was God’s son. She is the first person Jesus revealed his true identity. He was trustworthy with her secrets; he trusted her with knowing him fully. It’s a fantastic story on so many levels.

This urge we have to be superior - whether it is older, wiser, smarter, more successful, faster, etc., - it does not serve us well. Jesus had every right to pull rank and teach, lecture, instruct, that young woman. What did he do? He entered into a conversation with her. If you read the text carefully, I believe you will find that he initially did two things: 1. Prove that he knew her at the deepest level and 2. invited her to get to know him in that same way. Her receptivity allowed him to proceed to the third: invite her to participate with him in the coming of the kingdom of God.

I wonder if we could be imitators of Christ in this way, listen to one another, learn to trust others with our shame story, learn how to be trustworthy hearing the shame stories of others, could we become part of the solution?

Learning New Tricks

You will learn a lot from yourself if you stretch in the direction of goodness, of bigness, of kindness, of forgiveness, of emotional bravery. Be a warrior for love. Cheryl Strayed

I appreciate this idea that our actions should be guided by our intentions. Most people I know want to stretch in the direction of goodness. They do. I’m lucky that way. But that does not mean that we all agree on how that should look. This is not a problem UNLESS we unconsciously shift away from our intentions and forget who we want to grow up to be - good, kind, forgiving, brave, a warrior of love. ALL of these characteristics are easier to manifest if we start and end all conversations with asking and answering the following question, “Where do we agree? Where is our common ground?”

What would happen if we stopped judging and calling names and instead got serious about listening to one another? What would happen if we stopped thinking, “What a bunch of _______ !” (Insert what bad names you use when you judge another.) INSTEAD, what if we said, “Man, I understand. I feel disenfranchised and marginalized too. How can we fix this?”

My kids have led our family in finding the art of loving, gentle, reasonable, heartfelt conversations about topics that we all land in various places on. My son Michael in particular is a passionate guy and I know he has strong, strong feelings about any topic that he is invested in understanding. But he rarely condescends and if on occasion a little hot sauce is sprinkled over his words, he immediately apologizes and explains why he feels so passionately that his words come out fast and intense. He is one of the safest people I know to be curious with on a hot topic. I do not know how he became this man. We did not teach this because we did not know how to practice this skill. But I think it serves as an encouragement - we can learn new tricks, even us old dogs. Sometimes the mentor is the youngest member of the family. Sometimes it is the oldest. If we as families could learn how to do this, maybe that would spread out into our communities and ultimately our country as well? Don’t you think it is worth a try?

In Christ’s family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. This is, we are all in the common relationship with Jesus Christ. Also, since you are Christ’s family, then you are Abraham’s famous “descendant,” heirs according to the covenant promises. Galatians 3:28-29 The Message

Going Deeper (In Your Conversations)

Sometimes conversations “fail” (too strong of a word, but you’ll see what I mean in a second) not because something bad has happened but because they are unsatisfying. We’re not getting to the places we want to with our friends, loved ones, spouses, etc. Why do we struggle to deepen conversations?

I don’t know that there’s a clear answer to that question. One of the things I notice, though, is that sometimes we try too hard. Sometimes we think a better, more interesting topic is going to be the thing that deepens a conversation. Sometimes we think it’s being relatable by sharing similar stories about ourselves in response to stories our conversation partner is telling us.

These are certainly not “wrong” by any means. But sometimes a simpler approach helps a conversation explore new depths. Asking “open-ended” questions can be just the thing we need.

What is an open-ended question? It’s a question that does not have a “yes” or “no” (or otherwise one word) answer. A few examples:

“How are you feeling about that?”

“What do you think you’re going to do next?”

“How do you manage your anxiety?”

These are all examples of questions that serve as a “launching point” for the other person to share more about what is going on with themselves. If people are being offered the opportunity to share more, then the conversation has a chance to deepen.

And let us consider each other carefully for the purpose of sparking love and good deeds. 25 Don’t stop meeting together with other believers, which some people have gotten into the habit of doing. Instead, encourage each other, especially as you see the day drawing near.

Hebrews 10:24-25, CEB