Dan Olinger

"If the Bible is true, then none of our fears are legitimate, none of our frustrations are permanent, and none of our opposition is significant."

Dan Olinger

 

Retired Bible Professor,

Bob Jones University

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How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide

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Part 1: Introduction

Paul writes a letter to the Christians in Colossae because he’s heard things that trouble him. There’s false teaching there, and some in the church are at least thinking about going that way—elevating the role of angels, embracing various restrictions in order to feel more godly. Paul, knowing that falsehood always brings division, writes to straighten things out with the truth.

He begins with the simple fact that Christ is all—he created all (Co 1.16); he maintains all (Co 1.17); he is the King (Co 1.13); and he is the source of our spiritual life (Co 1.14). He has first place in everything (Co 1.18). He is the one in whom all things are reconciled to God (Co 1.20ff)—and by logical extension, to one another as well. Christ’s cross is the basis for whatever peace there is in the universe.

As a result, all the world is divided into two groups: those who are “in Christ,” and those who are not; those who live for eternal goals, and those who are consumed with the present. It should be no surprise that the latter group will be in perpetual conflict, since temporal goals—power, wealth, prestige, resources—are in finite supply. Someone’s going to have the power—the privilege, if you will—and others aren’t—and those others are going to want it badly enough to fight for it.

But those living for eternity, and not merely for the next election—and the power and resources it will bring—are not inclined to live as combatants for those temporal things; they have other desires, and the fulfillment of those desires is guaranteed by divine omnipotence.

Given their different goals, desires, and levels of confidence, these two groups live in very different ways. While many passages of Scripture (e.g. Ga 5.19-23; Ep 4.17-32; 1Th 4.3-10; 1P 2.1-3) contrast these two lifestyles, Paul’s discussion in Colossians benefits from being based directly on the Christology he’s presented earlier in the letter. When he moves from the doctrinal disquisition to the application of those truths to lifestyle, he sharply contrasts these two ways of life.

In Colossians 3.5-9 Paul summarizes the old way of life, which is the standard lifestyle for what he elsewhere calls “the natural man” (1Co 2.14)—which is all of us, from birth. This is the default lifestyle in the US and everywhere else. It’s a lifestyle that naturally eventuates in division, and in certain circumstances, all the way to civil war.

But that’s not the way people with eternal priorities live. Those who are “in Christ”—through no merit of their own—live, or ought to live, in ways that not only avoid those disastrous divisions but often help to heal them even in the broader societies in which they reside. Paul lays those characteristics out in the next paragraph, Colossians 3.10-17.

On this passage one commentator remarks,

The outstanding feature of this part of the letter is the sharp contrast between the old life and the new … . It is salutary to ponder the characteristics of the one for a while, to sense its whole mood and style of life, and then to switch suddenly to the other. They are indeed worlds apart. In the one we find attitudes and behaviour that cause inevitable fragmentation in human society and even within individuals: in the other, a way of life which integrates both individual persons and groups of people. The former, in other words, steadily obliterates genuinely human existence: the latter enhances it (Wright, Colossians, Tyndale NT Commentary, 133-34).

“Genuinely human existence”—as designed by the human’s Creator, in his image (Gn 1.26-27), for a redeemed and righted world. That’s where our heads should be, even when the world we live in is still broken and fundamentally unsatisfying—in the most significant ways, still “unformed and unfilled” (Gn 1.2) but headed toward a glorious and certain future.

This is where we find ourselves. What remains is for God’s people to define, examine, and contrast the two lifestyles and to adopt the one appropriate to our spiritual state.

We’ll start on that in the next post.

Part 3: “Great Is Diana!” | Part 4: Letting Hate Drive | Part 5: Pants on Fire | Part 6: Turning Toward the Light | Part 7: Breaking Down the Walls | Part 8: Beyond Tolerance | Part 9: Love | Part 10: Peace | Part 11: Encouragement | Part 12: Gratitude

Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash

How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 1: Introduction

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It’s not news to anybody that US culture is highly polarized and has been for some time. This polarization shows up most readily in political disputes, and especially in presidential election years, when all the disputes come to a head and when the consequences of victory and defeat are most clearly obvious.

Presidential elections have always been rowdy affairs in this country, at least since Adams v Jefferson in 1796. Some are rowdier than others, of course—Adams/Jackson (1824), Hayes/Tilden (1876), and Nixon/Humphrey (1968) come immediately to mind. Anybody currently over the age of 40 knows that every election since 1992 has been “the most important election of our lifetime.”

Even so, it feels like this year is extraordinary. There’s been fighting in the streets that reminds us old-timers of 1968, combined with a general sense of being on edge due to all the coronavirus issues. Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that with social media, now every nitwit can be a publisher, with no editorial constraints—and we all know nitwits who are taking advantage of the opportunity. And now there’s a third vacancy on the Supreme Court in just 4 years.

Polarization. Tribalism. And lots of fuel to pour on that fire. Historians know that a key cause of the Civil War was sectionalism, and to them all this is looking pretty familiar. Here the divide is not as clearly geographical as it was 160 years ago—which in some ways makes the situation even worse—but it’s still eerily familiar.

And so there’s open talk about civil war. Red vs blue. Urban vs rural. Liberal vs conservative. And unsurprisingly, the joke about one side having all the guns doesn’t ease the tension.

I’d suggest that the solutions most commonly bandied about aren’t solutions at all.

Force—and the unconditional surrender of one of the parties—isn’t a long-term solution, as World Wars 1 and 2 so clearly taught us. The simmering rage of humiliation eventually breaks out again, and the second time is often worse than the first.

Appeasement doesn’t work either—again, as the World Wars demonstrated. (Think Neville Chamberlain.) When two sides each see the other as the enemy of their aspirations, eventually they’re going to resort to force.

In our situation the problem is compounded by the sheer number of things that divide us. We’re divided by race; by economic status; by political philosophy; by sex. These divisions go to the very core of our perceived identity; we’re not going to compromise them.

We can avoid civil war only by finding some part of our identity that is more powerful than the things that divide us. For many years, our shared identity as Americans was enough to do that. Often it’s the existence of a common threat, as in World War 2 and again for a few months after 9/11. For much of  my lifetime there have been those arguing for unity on the basis of our shared humanity—who usually are dismissed as dreamers in the image of John Lennon.

I’d like to suggest that the Scripture speaks repeatedly of something that breaks down the racial and sexual and political and economic barriers that persistently divide us—and, perhaps surprisingly, it is based, in a specific way, in our shared humanity. The Bible doesn’t just dangle this idea out there as a carrot to get the kids fighting in the back seat to finally get along (and, I suppose, to stop mixing their metaphors); on the contrary, it presents the unity of peoples across significant barriers as a central part of the plan of God—something that he not only desires but is applying his divine power to accomplish with absolute certainty: that “God [is] in Christ reconciling the world unto himself” (2Co 5.19), so that “there is neither Jew nor Greek, … slave nor free man, … male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Ga 3.28), toward the goal of “a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes” (Re 7.9)—a unity so spectacular, so unimaginable, and so unbelievable even by those witnessing it, “that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places” (Ep 3.10); that is, that even supernatural beings are taken by surprise.

Wow.

There are lots of places in the Scripture where we can read about these ideas. I’ve chosen a section of Paul’s letter to the Colossian church, where I’ve been studying this month. We’ll embark on that study in the next post.

Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide | Part 3: “Great Is Diana!” | Part 4: Letting Hate Drive | Part 5: Pants on Fire | Part 6: Turning Toward the Light | Part 7: Breaking Down the Walls | Part 8: Beyond Tolerance | Part 9: Love | Part 10: Peace | Part 11: Encouragement | Part 12: Gratitude

Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash

On Well-Intentioned Viral Campaigns

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Last week I posted a question on Facebook:

“How does the viral posting of a photo of a white boy murdered by a black man contribute anything constructive to the conversation?”

I was not trolling, as one commenter suggested; I was actually looking for answers. So I waited, not interacting at all with the responses, just letting them accumulate and interact with one another. By posting time for this blog entry, there were 68 comments, which statisticians tell us is more than enough for useful analysis.

One of my friends—and by that I mean not just a Facebook friend, but an actual friend, whom I know, like, respect, and pray for—posted a characteristically thoughtful response, including these words:

“I feel like a fool and a horrible person if I draw attention to what happened to George Floyd (which I did) and I refuse to highlight this horrible situation with this innocent five-year-old.”

Most of the others who responded to the question—as opposed to those who just cheered from the sidelines, for one side or the other—cited media bias as their motivator: they wanted to highlight a crime that the media were ignoring, in stark contrast to the perceived media over-reporting of the Floyd episode.

As more than one commenter noted, however, there has indeed been national news coverage of both stories, despite the frequent allegation that “the media are just ignoring [the latter story].” By the time I posted my question, CNN, Newsweek, and People Magazine, as well as wire services from ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox / Cox, and even the Independent in the UK had run stories on it. It’s obvious that the Floyd story got exponentially more coverage, but the statement that the story is being “ignored” is just not true.

One commenter acknowledged that there had been national media coverage of both events, but that the latter one was not reported with any reference to race, while the racist motives of the police involved with Floyd were assumed from the outset. Significantly, the family of the boy has specifically requested that the case not be characterized as about race.

And thus arises the issue that motivated my question in the first place.

In 2018, which is apparently the last year for which reliable data are available, 255 children aged 1 to 4 were murdered. Of those, 129 were white, and 113 were black. As far as I know, there’s no simple way to determine the race of the offender in each of those cases, but we do know that of all the murders of whites, of any age, in that year (3,315), 81% (2677) were committed by other whites, and 16% (514) were committed by blacks. If we extend that ratio to the murders of children, then in that year about 25 white children aged 1 to 4 were murdered by blacks. (Feel free to check my math.)

Now, we can all agree that that number is too high.

But can you find a way to understand, when you share that story for the stated purpose of calling attention to an injustice, why many of the people you’re trying to convince might suspect that there’s a racial motive involved? Look at that horrible black man.

Why did you pick one of the 25? Why not pick one of the other 230?

In a culture where the atmosphere is already toxic, where we’re predisposed to distrust one another, we have to think carefully about the perceived motivations and implications of our actions, even when our intentions are completely above board. Audience analysis. Strategy.

We’re not going to convince anybody—change anybody’s mind—if we don’t think about these things.

And that’s what we want, right? To change minds?

One of the commenters suggested that all this is just venting—that it’s not really about conversation or discussion or making progress toward a solution. (Everything after the dash is my words, not his.) If he’s right, then we’re all in deep trouble—first, with God, because venting is just giving in to the flesh, one of the great enemies of our soul, and second, as a society, because venting is not the path to a solution and a consequent livable society, but a death spiral into chaos, to which we will all have contributed and for which we will all be guilty.

We’re going to come to a solution, if we ever do, one person at a time, by holding ourselves accountable, speaking in wisdom, and committing to be part of the solution rather than merely ratcheting up the rage.

On Memorial Day

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In the US, today is Memorial Day, the day when we remember those who have given “the last full measure of devotion,” who have died in the military service of our country. In an odd way, it’s a reminder of both the brokenness of our world—the ongoing frequency of war and the toll it takes on entire generations of families who have lost loved ones either to death or to deep psychological scars—and the pervasiveness of the image of God, reflected in the courage and self-sacrifice of those who serve.

There’s no more Christ-like action than to offer your life for those you love (Jn 15.13). I suppose no soldier actually intends to sacrifice his life; to paraphrase General George Patton, you win not so much by dying for your country as by making the other guy die for his country. That doesn’t lessen the significance of their sacrifice; every soldier is prepared to make that sacrifice, even as he takes steps to minimize the likelihood that he’ll have to.

Some of those who died never saw it coming and felt no pain in that moment. Others, however, made a deliberate choice to die in order to save their buddies, some by falling on a grenade, others in other ways. In that last moment, they were well past the point of “taking a risk”; they acted intentionally to give their lives for those they loved.

I have known men who saw such things—men who were the loved ones for whom others intentionally took the proverbial—or not at all proverbial—bullet. Most of them never, or almost never, talked about it. These were strong men, the Greatest Generation, tough and hard, but not hard enough, not tough enough, to hold back tears when they spoke of such things.

They came back, carrying heavy invisible loads of survivors’ guilt, and they paid private visits to the families of those who had died, and the ones I knew lived the rest of their lives in the memories of their heroes, their saviors. Indeed, living their lives, the lives paid for with the lifeblood of their friends, was the only chance they had to make some sort of repayment.

And live they did. They raised families, they worked hard, they formed the backbone of the greatest nation of all time. In the main, the defects of that nation today—and there are many—cannot be laid at their feet. They lived well, honoring the sacrifices of their unimaginably brave and devoted buddies.

And some of them, those who were able, have stood at the graves of their friends, heads bowed, deep in grief, wishing for a chance, just a moment, to speak one more time with their savior, to express their gratitude, to tell him about the life they’ve lived and the good they’ve done and the joys they’ve seen, to assure him that they’ve tried to make his sacrifice Worth It. And to say, through tears, how much they wish that he could have experienced those things with them.

We stand in their shoes.

Someone has died for us as well.

He did see it coming, for all eternity, and he planned it himself as the just means of justifying, not his friends, but those who hated him without reason and by their own choice.

It was not painless. Indeed, the form of his death may well have been the most painful ever devised, and the most shameful as well.

How shall we then live?

We don’t need to stand by his grave and weep, because there is no grave, because there is no body. Unlike our honored dead, this Savior emerged from his grave, taking death by the throat and squeezing every bit of power and authority out of it, crushing the serpent’s head.

He is not there. He is risen. As. He. Said.

How shall we then live?

To the fullest. In honor of his sacrifice, in eternal service to him. This do in remembrance.

Photo by Selena Morar on Unsplash

On Easter

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Since this is my last post before Good Friday and Easter, I’d like to interrupt the current series for a meditation.

I’ve appreciated the writing of American writer John Updike for many years. I think my interest was first stirred when I learned that he had written a series of short stories set in the fictional town of Olinger, PA, in a book appropriately called Olinger Stories. I later came across his short story “Pigeon Feathers,” the story of a boy’s crisis of faith through the influence of H. G. Wells and a defective local Lutheran minister, which was resolved through the death of a simple barn pigeon. The last sentence of that story really got me.

Eventually I came across his poem “Seven Stanzas at Easter,” which I offer here as a meditation. I don’t believe anything I can say could improve on what he has already said.

He is risen. Indeed.

Seven Stanzas at Easter
by John Updike

Make no mistake: if He rose at all
it was as His body;
if the cells’ dissolution did not reverse, the molecules
reknit, the amino acids rekindle,
the Church will fall.

It was not as the flowers,
each soft Spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
it was as His flesh: ours.

The same hinged thumbs and toes,
the same valved heart
that-pierced-died, withered, paused, and then
regathered out of enduring Might
new strength to enclose.

Let us not mock God with metaphor,
analogy, sidestepping, transcendence;
making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the
faded credulity of earlier ages:
let us walk through the door.

The stone is rolled back, not papier-mâché,
not a stone in a story,
but the vast rock of materiality that in the slow
grinding of time will eclipse for each of us
the wide light of day.

And if we will have an angel at the tomb,
make it a real angel,
weighty with Max Planck’s quanta, vivid with hair,
opaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen
spun on a definite loom.

Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
for our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are
embarrassed by the miracle,
and crushed by remonstrance.

Photo by Lindsey Garcia on Unsplash

On Uncertainty

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Unusual times.

For the first time in my lifetime, the entire globe is wrapped in complete, and admitted, uncertainty.

I suppose the Cuban Missile Crisis back in 1962 came close, but that lasted only 13 days, and I suspect that a lot of people in corners of the globe were unaware that it was happening at the time. Here in Greenville, where we lost one of our own, we still memorialize it.

But now we’re dealing with a virus, which isn’t open to dissuasion and is no respecter of persons, and which, for whatever reasons, is pretty much everywhere. Add to that the ubiquity of media information—informed and uninformed—and the fact that suddenly everyone’s an expert in epidemiology, and you have a perfect storm of uncertainty, and all the consequences that it brings.

Different cultures deal with uncertainty in different ways. The Germans and the Swiss are stereotyped as planners, regimented and orderly. (I’ve found that like all stereotypes, this one is far too simplistic.) In various developing countries, I’ve noticed that uncertainty comes with the territory; you live one day at a time, getting up early to carry in the day’s water, and then going to the market to get the day’s food. Whenever the infrastructure is unreliable, the residents get used to the power or water outages, or the torn-up highways, and the culture develops a sort of resignation that often results in considerably better mental health than, say, most Americans would manifest in similar circumstances. In fact, American tourists in those cultures are largely responsible for the “Ugly American” stereotype all too common overseas.

I was once teaching overseas when the power went out, killing my data projector and thus my PowerPoint. The students sprang into action; here came a generator out of nowhere, and within 5 minutes we were back in business, with no one seeming to think that anything out of the ordinary had happened.

Once I took a team of students to a location where the city-supplied water was out, with no word on when it would be restored. For the five weeks we were there, we trucked in water, hauled it to our quarters in 5-gallon plastic buckets, and did our daily ablutions from smaller buckets. One of the male students and I had an informal contest on how little water we needed to get completely lathered and rinsed. I got it down to a liter—but then, having no hair gave me an unfair advantage.

My culture isn’t used to this sort of thing. Here in the early days of “social distancing,” we seem to be responding with creativity, helpfulness, and even amusement, from the looks of the memes—excepting the hoarders, of course. But as the situation drags on—it will drag on, won’t it? Or are we uncertain about that too?—anxiety increases, and it’s not unfounded. Lives are at risk; jobs are at risk; the economy is at risk—and the list could go on.

The situation doesn’t call for platitudes or for Pollyanna—or certainly not the cavalier dismissal of genuine threats. This is a time for us to pay attention, to care for one another, to sacrifice. It’s not a time to make light of other people’s suffering.

But it is a time for reflection on First Things, on Prime Principles. On what is certain. On Truth.

It is True—

  • That there is a God in heaven, who is great and
    good, and whose will is always done.
  • That there is abundant evidence throughout
    history and revelation of the truth of the first point.
  • That we cannot control the forces of nature as
    we would like.
  • That God has given us stewardship of this earth,
    however, and that consequently we should marshal all our knowledge and skills
    to protect life—our own and all others.
  • That in difficulty, with certain outcome or not,
    we must trust the goodness and greatness of our loving Creator: “Man’s steps
    are ordained by the Lord; how then can man understand his way?” (Prov 20.24).
  • That there is much, much more than this life.

And since these things are True, how do we proceed?

With confidence.

With care.

And with attention to the most important things.

Most of us have more time these days than we usually do, since we’re not going to work.

Use it—not for binge-watching whatever, but for loving God, for loving your neighbor, for doing justice, for loving mercy, for walking humbly with your God.

There is a good and wise outcome.

Certainly.

Photo by Katie Moum on Unsplash

“The Aeronauts”: A Case Study in Controversy, Part 2

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Part 1

As I noted last time, there are some historical inaccuracies in the film “The Aeronauts,” inaccuracies that I’ve called significant. What are they?

Two big ones.

First, the scientific community did not dismiss Glaisher’s idea. The British Association for the Advancement of Science (which is different from the Royal Society) endorsed his flight.

Second, and much more obvious, Glaisher’s pilot was named not Amelia Rennes, but Henry Coxwell.

If that sounds like a man’s name to you, you’re right.

Thus the two primary conflicts in the movie—the opposition of the scientific community and the cultural prejudice against Glaisher’s pilot simply because she was woman—are fiction. The writers themselves noted that they wanted to “reposition the narrative to be more progressive”—“I wanted it to not be two middle-aged men in a basket. I wanted it to be reflective for a contemporary audience.”

The same article notes that the Royal Society has expressed regret that Coxwell’s significant story has been brushed out of the film.

So.

Should we be upset?

Should we start making some memes? Maybe boycott the movie? Publish the writers’ home addresses, and pictures of their children? Warn them about where liars go?

Well, let’s think about this for a minute. (PSA: Thinking about things for a minute is wise, unless someone’s life is in immediate danger.)

On the one hand, there’s no question that the event didn’t happen as the movie portrays it. The writers had an agenda, and as soon as the word progressive shows up, some people are going to get upset.

But on the other hand—

  • The writers have freely and publicly spoken about what they did and why they did it.
  • Both the movie and the trailer prominently state that the plot is “inspired by true events”—and established tradition tells us that such wording indicates at least some fictionalization. That language is precisely what led me to learn the real story.
  • Accurate historical accounts are readily available—it took me less than 5 minutes to find them. Nothing is being hidden from the viewing public.
  • None of the fictionalization is fantastic—that is, complete fantasy. The Royal Society was in fact considered “elitist and conservative” by the founders of the British Association, including the well-regarded and significant Charles Babbage; there were in fact female balloon pilots, who were discriminated against, one of whom had a husband, also a balloonist, who died in flight; even if there had been no female pilots, the Victorian view of feminism is a matter of historical record; and while I wondered about the scientific accuracy of their going as high as they did without oxygen, [SPOILER ALERT] the fact is that Glaisher and Coxwell did set the altitude record without benefit of oxygen. How they managed that, I have no idea.
  • The movie is a work of art. The photography is stunning—any pilot will agree that the tops of clouds are always far more beautiful and awe-inspiring than the bottoms—and the plot is engaging, with moments of suspense that are as intense as any other movie scene with which I’m familiar. Well-done art should be recognized and commended, as one more evidence of the image of God in humans—even humans with whom God himself might have significant disagreements (Gen 9.6)—and I hasten to add that I have no knowledge of the spiritual condition of the writers. It’s worth noting that there are regenerate “progressives.”
  • While the introduction of a female character in the piloting role does introduce some implied sexual tension to the story, it is not at all explicit, and there’s no obvious romantic relationship between the two in the basket. I’d consider the movie perfectly safe for kids, if they can handle the depictions of danger.

So.

Some things we ought to fight about. But much more often, we disagree about things and get unnecessarily upset.

Watch the movie, or don’t. Know the facts. Live your life.

Pick your battles.

“The Aeronauts”: A Case Study in Controversy, Part 1

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Like most teachers, I have a break of several weeks over Christmas. As a family we’ve done different things with the time over the years—one year Pam and I went to Germany to see our daughter—but this year was one to just stay home and have minimal plans. I laid out a reading schedule, in preparation for a couple of new-to-me courses this next semester, as well as a couple of writing projects, and progress on those fronts has gone well.

Along the way, I saw a few ads on my phone about a new Amazon movie called “The Aeronauts.” I’ve been a fan of flying from way back, since my days as copilot, navigator, and general right-seat companion to my father, who was a private pilot. This movie was about ballooning, which I’ve never done but would love to, and the trailer looked pretty interesting, so I gave a couple of hours one evening to watching it on my daughter’s Amazon Prime account.

I enjoyed it a lot.

It’s “inspired by true events” from 1862, a story about a young British scientist named James Glaisher, who’s always loved the weather. He wants to study it with a view to learning how to predict it; in other words, he essentially wants to invent meteorology. He figures the best way to study air is to be up in it, where you can take readings and look for patterns. There are no airplanes in 1862, of course, but there are balloons. He’ll need funding to hire one, so he appears before the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge. The gathered men scoff at the idea that the weather can be predicted, and they walk out of his presentation.

He meets a young woman, Amelia Rennes, who is a balloon pilot and a widow. (She and her late husband, also a balloonist, were trying to set an altitude record when he died in the attempt. To avoid spoilers, I won’t tell you the specifics.) She understandably doesn’t want to fly anymore, but young James convinces her, and they get commercial support for the flight from a showman who hopes to recover his investment by selling tickets.

On the appointed day, with the stands full of paying spectators, the weather looks foreboding, but the two launch anyway, thereby breaking the Most Important Rule of Aviation, as my father often reminded me.

They ascend through a thunderstorm, with all the chaos you’d expect, but eventually break out over the cloud layer. Now’s it’s a matter of seeking to break the current altitude record of 23,000 feet. As those with flying experience know, anything above 14,000 feet is an oxygen level dangerously low for human consciousness, so now the primary conflict is a battle not with scientific close-mindedness in the Royal Society, or the sexism of the day, but the raw elements of nature.

Again, no spoilers. You’ll have to watch it—or read the Wikipedia article—to find out if they make it above 23,000, and/or if they survive the attempt.

But I really, really liked the movie.

As I’ve noted, the film is “inspired by true events,” and that got me thinking: what “true events” inspired the movie? What was the real story?

So I set out to discover what actually happened.

I learned that there are some differences between what really happened and what was portrayed in the movie—differences that most would agree are quite significant.

Now, everybody knows that there are people who make something of a career out of criticizing the way a movie changes a fictional novel (there’s some controversy about that right now with a new release of Little Women) or a historical event. The question of “artistic license” has produced some really heated arguments.

And it occurs to me that this particular example might be useful in helping us think through what’s worth fighting about, and what isn’t.

So next time I’ll tell you what the significant differences are, and we’ll think a little bit about how upset we should—or shouldn’t—be.

Part 2

On Being Quiet

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We live in a noisy age. It seems that everywhere we go, noise fills the pauses and even runs constantly in the background. In stores and restaurants, the music is constant and often quite loud. (How do people carry on any kind of meaningful conversation in those places?) In the elevator, there’s music—that’s even an official genre, apparently. Go to a professional sporting event, and every pause in the action is filled with the output of the stadium’s DJ. I’m told that what he’s playing is allegedly music. When you get into your car, you automatically reach over and turn on the radio, to fill your environment with music or, worse, people talking—people who quite clearly don’t know what they’re talking about.

I know I sound cynical. I’m not. But I do want to make a point.

Human beings need quiet as certainly as they need exercise. We need time to think, to reflect, to evaluate. To pray.

I’ve noticed that in many of the students I teach, quiet is disturbing. Too quiet. Distracting. Even our library has loosened up on the stereotypical quiet rules as an accommodation to the students’ professed need for background noise—think Starbucks—in order to study.

Our lives are often noisy in ways other than decibels. Many of us pride ourselves on how busy we are, how little time we have. That means, you see, that we’re important, that we’re making a difference. I’m busier than you.

Nyah, nyah, nyah.

My friends, these things ought not so to be.

Now, I know that sometimes we’re unavoidably busy. Some people have to work 3 jobs in order to pay for school. Some people have bedridden relatives or friends, and there’s nobody to share the burden. For most of us, there are seasons of life when we’re simply busier than normal and we have to just grit our teeth and try to get it all done without dying of exhaustion.

But busyness is not a lifestyle we are meant to choose.

We need quiet. Time to think. Time to meditate.

Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still (Ps 4.4).

Meditation isn’t emptying your mind, after the fashion of the Eastern religions. When you empty your mind, it’s like leaving your wallet sitting on the sidewalk; somebody bent on mischief is likely to show up.

In the Bible, meditation is focusing your mind on something and giving it your investigative consideration, turning it over and savoring it as you would good food. My colleague Jim Berg says that if you can worry, you know how to meditate; meditation is just the process of worrying without the pathological aspects.

So what should you focus your mind on? The Bible gives at least 3 legitimate topics:

  • Meditate on God himself (Ps 63.6). Who is he? What is he like? What do those attributes say about how you should think, feel, and live?
  • Meditate on God’s works (Ps 77.12; 143.5). What has God done? What is he doing today? What will he do in the future? What do those actions say about how you should think, feel, and live?
  • Meditate on God’s Word (Josh 1.8; Ps 1.2; 119.15, 23, 97, 99, 148). What has God said? What do those words say about how you should think, feel, and live?

I note that in order to meditate on God’s Word, you really have to have it in your head. You can’t think about something that isn’t there. I’ve written on that topic before; if you find the prospect of life-changing meditation appealing, that post might be worth reading again.

Recently I’ve been consciously not turning on the radio when I’m alone in the car. It’s a great opportunity to think, to muse, to meditate. I’ve also been cutting out late-night activities so that I can get enough sleep and still get up earlier, when the house is quiet.

There are lots of demands on us, and they deserve our attention and care. But most of us don’t need to be as busy as we are. Maybe we can’t be philosophers sitting on mountaintops or monks chanting in the abbey—in fact, we’re probably a lot more useful as we are—but we can be more thoughtful, more reasoned, more contemplative.

More quiet, to a useful end.

Photo by Wes Grant on Unsplash