“Give the Man a Chance”

FYI- this is part of a series on how to live out our faith in a positive way. Click here.

I, like many people, am a huge fan of the movie Die Hard. I probably watch it twice a year. Once in December- because it’s the all time greatest Christmas movie, and then once in July because I just can’t wait to watch it again.

Die Hard was directed by John McTiernan- a guy with a very odd career (a story for another day). For a brief time, McTiernan knew how to make action thrillers better than anyone else. Another example is The Hunt for Red October, a movie about a disgruntled (yet highly decorated) Russian submarine commander (played by Sean Connery- with his native non-Russian accent) who tries to defect to the US with a brand-new, untraceable submarine filled with nuclear warheads.

The plot is complicated. But the simplified version is something like this: Connery can’t tell anyone on the American side that he’s trying to defect because word would eventually get back to his Russian higher-ups that the new sub is now in American hands- which would ignite a war. So, he has to leave a trail of breadcrumbs for the CIA to follow so that they can discover that he is defecting, rather than traveling to launch nuclear warheads at New York or wherever.

Only one man in the CIA gets it: Jack Ryan (Alec Baldwin). He then spends a good portion of the movie convincing his higher-ups that Connery is defecting and not starting a war.

You’re probably wondering why I’m telling you the plot of a forgotten sub movie. Well, here we go. John McTiernan liked to have a theme in mind when making movies. His theme for The Hunter for Red October is this: Give the man a chance.

Jack Ryan’s job is to convince every higher up above him to give Connery (Captain Ramius) a chance- rather than to assume he’s the threat he appears to be and to simply blow him out of the water. He begs person after person, give the man a chance.

This, to me, speaks to a very key skillset to have when it comes to trying to live our faith in a positive way. If and where you can, give people the benefit of the doubt. When our survival instincts kick in in life, they warn us of danger- even when danger isn’t there.

It’s easy to assume someone is out to get us, or trying to harm us. It’s less easy to give the man (or person) a chance.But our faith calls us to speak back into our survival instincts, to look for the good in others, and to offer the benefit of the doubt not only as an act of mercy but also as an act of imitation of Christ himself when he says, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

I believe this is Christ’s way of saying: Give the people a chance.

What helps you offer the benefit of the doubt?

Positive Faith & Sin: Last One

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This conversation on how we talk about sin as people of faith comes down to this (for me): Are we creating more faithful people?

If the way we talk about sin and separation from God isn’t creating more faithful followers of God then we’re doing something wrong. Again, just my opinion.

I personally believe that if you beat people over the head with their “sinfulness” then they get defensive, feel ashamed, and enter survival mode (not in a good way). This isn’t helping people grow and blossom into people defined by their love, mercy, forgiveness, charity, and whatever else. It’s keeping people paralyzed by fear. And, largely, this is because people’s inability to live as who they’d like to be is not new information for them.

We do not need to slam people in the face with things they already know (and are ashamed of).

So, what do we do?

What If?

People who are always gentle with themselves probably do not need to think about all the ways that rumination, regret and remorse mess us up. So you guys can go have a nice day and stop reading right here! For the rest of us, the insecure, the sensitive, the perpetually anxious and often plagued with guilt peeps, who are alway berating ourselves with the WHAT IF’s? - I have a phrase for you, here goes: When we know better we do better.

I'm not suggesting that this little phrase serves as some kind of magical solution to all our feelings of guilt and shame. But what I am suggesting is this: we often get in a habit loop of thinking, feeling and doing. When it becomes just circular suffering without anything changing, we need to break up the band and find a new way to live.

So here's what we do. We notice ourselves falling into the trap of feeling perpetual guilt, we realize that this is more habit than factual reality (because if we are legitimately guilty then our work is to ask forgiveness and make amends), and we need to discipline ourselves to break the habit loop.

Here's my example: As my mother died, my daughter was giving birth. I rushed from my mom's bedside to be present for my grandson's birth - a ten hour drive. My father found this reprehensible; who ever wants to disappoint their daddy? But my mind knew that I had done all I could for my mom, and now I needed to be there for my daughter. I spent years dealing with a whole range of emotions. But healing began on the day that I made my two lists, and I was supported by people who loved me in saying, when we know better we do better. Anytime I found myself ruminating and rummaging around looking for alternative choices for a past I could not change, I said to myself: "This is not productive; this is not helpful. When I know better, I do better. I am doing better by refusing to ruminate, second guess and feel guilty about something I can not change...and would not change if I had to make the same choice right now." Let me be clear. What I had to accept, what I had to get better at doing, was this: not allowing other people to decide what I should or should not do, how I should or should not feel. I believe I made the choice my mother would have approved of - go home once all has been done, and do the next right thing. Celebrate a new baby even as you mourn the loss of the woman who loved babies more than ice cream. But if this sounds easy, then I am a poor communicator. It was not and it is not easy. But this is what a commitment to growing up requires - doing. hard things.

Giving Up and Starting Over

I only know one way to keep the faith - and that is to find a way to understand my life through the lens of scripture. I have a ton of favorite authors; I practice various spiritual disciplines with about as much regularity as I imagine you do; I have thousands of quotes (many inspirational) that I love and store religiously in notebooks that my children will discard over my dead body. These things are helpful. But for me, and I know I'm a weirdo, but it's the way it is - the scriptures are the thing that usually turn my desperation into a decision to carry on. I blame John the Baptist for this.

While Jesus was living in the Galilean hills, John, called “the Baptizer,” was preaching in the desert country of Judea. His message was simple and austere, like his desert surroundings: “Change your life. God’s kingdom is here.” Matthew 3:1-2 The Message

In a previous blog I shared Barbara Brown Taylor's perspective on John's call to repentance. She believes that John's followers heard hope for a new beginning in his call to repent. She suggested that more of us need to repent of our despair than our arrogance. (Can we have both?). This reminds me of my experience with the 12 steps. Both the steps and the gospels invite us to move away from our compulsion to stare into mirrors and bemoan our fate.

From John's perspective, this other way of viewing repentance is healing, not shaming. It asks us to turn from needless recrimination and see the intentions of God's heart - to work with what we give him - even our worst mistakes.

Taylor says it like this, "Those of us who have committed ourselves to a life of repentance and return will not give up on ourselves, no matter how many times we have to repeat the process." (p. 25, Teaching Sermons on Suffering, God in Pain). Why do we not give up? Because we believe in a God who will not give up on us.

Betrayal

What comes to your mind when you think of Judas? Traitor - right? He betrayed Jesus for 30 silver coins. What else do you know about him? He was not mentally ill, that we know of, nor did he secretly bear a grudge and insatiable desire for insurrection.

He was a friend of Jesus. A friend. An intimate. A confidante. He was the guy who held the money for Jesus' ministry team. He was at the wedding in Cana and saw Jesus turn water into wine; he say the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000. He watched the blind healed and Lazarus raised from the dead. He let Jesus wash his feet. He was a good guy. And no one would have guessed that this is the guy who would betray Jesus.

Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss but it was not long before everyone else tucked tail and ran too. Jesus had far more to fear from his team than he did from outsiders. Outsiders were an expected threat.

Judas was the guy who most wanted Jesus to lead with a sword. When it became clear that Jesus was not going to lead through traditional means - intimidation and force - surely Judas himself felt as if Jesus had betrayed him!

And how does Jesus respond? He feeds Judas; he washes his feet; Judas is never excluded from the circle. Jesus knew who the betrayer was but he also was clear on who He was - the guy who loses to win. He is the guy who feeds the hungry and gives water to the thirsty. Jesus loved Judas even when Judas could not love him back. Even our betrayal is not enough to crush the love of God.