To Flip a Coin

Unanswered Questions

I will forever carry two flags.  One that says “Everything is spiritual” as well as a flag that says “Don’t over spiritualize things.”  It’s the second flag that this article is about.

I have seen to many people stuck on a big decision because they are looking for a flashing neon sign from God.  I don’t know how this fits in your theology (I’m convinced its scriptural), but I think at the end of the day, we need to recognize that sometimes God gives us the freedom to actually make a choice.

There are a few reasons for this. First, God gave us a brain.  If he wished us not ever to make decisions, than I don’t think we would have given us the capability to reason.  The second reason is that I believe we’ve always been given options (e.g. to eat of the tree or not).  The third reason is that having to make decisions is critical to our growth and maturity.

Good parents at some point step back and allow their children to make decisions so that they can learn and grow.  At some point they need to learn to only eat a few cookies and not so many they get sick.  At some point they need to learn to not stay up too late so that they can function, or else they will never become mature adults.

What I’m trying to say is that if you have a theology that does not allow for you to actually wrestle through some decisions then you will be missing out on a significant arena of growth that God desires for your life.

Is it possible that the biggest unanswered questions in your life right now are there because God wants you to grow, and rather than give you the answer he wishes to see you become a more mature and wiser child of God?  Perhaps making this decision, and wrestling with the options available to you is critical to becoming the man or woman God wants you to be.  Perhaps you could actually make the wrong decision, but God would still use it to grow you into a wiser, more “godly”  person.

Not that we should exercise our own wisdom instead of seeking help, trusting in or waiting on God’s direction, but there needs to be a balance.

My favorite illustration of this is found in the leadership of Nehemiah.  I sometimes see Christians accuse other people of not trusting in God because they have taken action “on their own.”  I mean it’s so funny to me people’s lack of logic in “trusting in God.”  Some argue that we shouldn’t post armed guards in church because that’s not trusting God.  Do you have locks on your car doors?  Do you use them?  Would you blame God if you left your door unlocked in a bad side of town and your laptop was stolen?  That’s not a trust issue, that’s a stupid issue.  If you’re going to call taking action to take care of yourself a “lack of trust” why stop there?  I mean, honestly, we’re commanded to ask God for our daily bread, so why should you work to earn money to buy your own bread?  You’re trying to provide for yourself on your own and not trusting in God!

How far should we take this?

What’s Nehemiah’s response to a visible threat?  “But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat” (Neh. 4:9).  He took action, and asked for God’s help.

The problem is that we often don’t exercise the means God has provided us to answer the very prayers we are praying, e.g. the locks on our car doors, the jobs we have to provide for our families and the very capable brains he has given us.

But he knew even that wouldn’t be enough so he provided us scripture, wise counsel and the Holy Spirit to help make decisions.

Maybe, could it be possible, that God wants you to make this decision on your own?  I’m not saying every decision is like that, but could it be possible that sometimes actually making a big decision like where to go to college, who to marry and where to live are critical to your growing into the Christ-like character God wants you to have?

Taken Advantage Of

Unanswered Questions

I recently was sitting around a table with a few friends playing cards and sipping a cold beverage when the topic shifted to panhandlers in Denver.  One friend explained that he doesn’t give money out of fear that people will use money for sex or alcohol.  Across the table another friend shared how he wouldn’t give money (he, like myself, rarely carries cash anyway) but that he would give bring peanut butter sandwiches to pass out on his way home, and if they would take the sandwich he thought they probably weren’t going to use the money for alcohol.  I mentally gave him kudos for exercising wisdom.

Apparently, they continued, one of the local news stations a few years ago had done an investigation into panhandlers and had found one individual who made over a thousand dollars in one day and that evening had returned to a BMW nearby and drove home to one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the greater Denver area.  He perfectly illustrated the reasoning of many people who don’t give out of a fear of being taking advantage of for their generosity.

Our governor in Denver, John Hickenlooper, started a campaign to end homelessness in Denver in ten years.  As a part of this plan they installed old parking meters throughout downtown painted a bright glossy red and encouraged citizens of Denver to put spare change into these meters instead of directly to panhandlers in Denver.  I’ve heard that there are now 86 of these meters and that in one year they raised $100,000 for organizations that work with the homeless.
I had shared this vision with a friend recently as he was telling me about their pastor’s concern with changing individual’s lives.  I asked if their pastor was concerned with changing the systems that held people in poverty.   No, he responded, they’re concerned with individuals, not systems.  There will always be poor, their pastor reasons, so they can’t ever end homelessness because people will always waste their resources.

I didn’t press the issue.

He’s right, the problem is with individuals.

The problem is also with systems that work against those who have nothing and wish to move up but don’t have the resources or the education to change.  Or the systems that convince them they they can’t escape.

The problem is that we spend enough on our pets in this country to end poverty world wide.  The problem is that Americans spend an estimated 20-46 billion dollars on ice cream per year.

The Problem is that people won’t give of their abundant resources to those in need because they’re afraid of being taken advantage of.

The problem is that people don’t think it’s worth fighting poverty because “we will always have the poor.”

The problem is that we don’t question how the Gap, McDonald’s or Panera use our money, but we don’t trust organizations promising to use our money for good causes.

Heaven forbid we ever try to do something about the injustice and poverty in this world and in doing so get taken advantage of.  Can you imagine anything worse?  People giving to those in need, when in fact they are not actually in need?  Or perhaps they are in need but the spend their money on sex, drugs or alcohol?

We should exercise great wisdom and only give to those who will use our resources well.  We should only give to people worthy of our generosity.

After all, we have earned our wealth.  We made sure we were born in this wealthy country, to wealthy parents and grew up receiving a privileged education–all because we worked hard for it.

We, like those we should give to, have never taken advantage of grace given us.  We never take casually the great price that was paid for us on the cross when we go our own way and sin and seek after our own desires.
We have never spent money on needless vices that do not build ourselves up, but actually tear us down.
We are worthy of the generosity extended us.

Do you see the problem?

The problem is that we desperately need to exercise wisdom in giving out our resources to others and yet, the problem is that too many of us give up giving because of these issues.

I imagine that some certain individuals will one day stand before our Savior with tears in their eyes and cry, “Jesus, I tried.  I tried to give and help people but they took advantage of me.  I empowered them to use resources to create a better life for themselves and instead they turned it around and destroyed themselves on things that felt good in the moment, but in the end lead to their destruction.”

And our Lord, with tears in his own eyes, will lift their heads and whisper, “I know exactly how you feel.”

So, every time I see someone asking for money I will continue to be greatly discomforted because I do not know what “the right thing to do” is.  I will probably continue to give money to people who will use it for bad things, and continue to be taken advantage of because I don’t know what the answer is–but I refuse to believe that the answer is that doing nothing does less harm than trying to do something.  The one I claim to follow set a similar example for me.

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Here’s a brief list of resources about Denver’s meters that I used.  I also want to say that I love our governor’s vision, but I still wrestle with the person on the corner who asks me for money.
http://www.registerguard.com/csp/cms/sites/web/news/cityregion/24820907-41/meters-springfield-homeless-leezer-denver.csp
http://cbs4denver.com/local/Colorado.news.Denver.2.557029.html