Author: Jole Miller

Worship or Mission

Posted on by Jole Miller

I want everything I do in life to be either worship or mission. Many people have a narrow definition of these words, so let me define my terms.

Worship essentially means treating God like he is a big deal. It consists in both praising God and receiving his gifts with joy and thanksgiving. You can worship through prayer, singing, and reading the bible. You can also worship by taking a walk, laughing with friends, enjoying a good meal (1 Corinthians 10:31), playing a game, or engaging in a hobby you love.

Mission is doing what God created you to do for the betterment of the world. The image of going to a poor foreign country and serving might come to mind when you think of mission. That is mission, but it is a narrow view. Your work in the marketplace, cleaning the house, helping out a loved one who is struggling, telling someone about Jesus, or volunteering in the community can all be mission.

Worship is loving God, mission is loving your neighbor (Matthew 22:36-40). Worship is abiding in Christ, mission is bearing fruit (John 15). Worship is knowing God, mission is making him known. These categories are fluid and can overlap. For example, playing with my son is both worship and mission for me. It gives me great joy, and I am also fulfilling my calling as a father. Exercising and reading are other activities that could fit into either category.

Here is an image adapted from Pastor Mike Breen’s work/rest semi-circle:

I want my life to flow between doing good work (mission) then resting in God (worship). The biblical characters that come to mind are Mary and Martha (Luke 10:38-41). Martha was busy with her many tasks while Mary sat at Jesus’ feet and listened to him. Jesus elevates Mary in this passage, but both are essential. What does my life look like when I get out of rhythm?

The Flesh Semi-Circle

When I get out of rhythm I substitute mission with people pleasing and worship with self-indulgence.

Instead of serving others for their good and God’s glory, I serve to gain approval from people. It might look like flattery, saying yes when I would rather say no, or avoiding confrontation.

Instead of receiving God’s gifts with thanksgiving, I can take them for granted and use them in unhealthy ways. This might look like mindlessly scrolling social media, hitting the snooze button too many times, binging tv shows, over-eating, procrastinating, or lashing out in anger.

The biblical characters that come to mind are the two brothers in Luke 15. The younger brother wanted to live the high life. He demanded his inheritance before his father died (a big no-no), took his wealth and squandered it in wild living. He lived to gratify earthly desires. The older brother, on the other hand, never did anything wrong. He worked hard, did his duty, and obeyed his father. Which isn’t wrong in itself, but at the end of the story we see that he didn’t do his work out of love for his father, but rather so that he could gain status and recognition from his father (Luke 15:29).

Coming Full Circle

Galatians 5:17 tells us that there is a war inside every believer between the flesh and the Spirit. The Spirit is focused on God and others while the flesh is focused on the self. It gets challenging because the line between the flesh and the Spirit can be very thin. How do I know if I am working hard out of love for my neighbor, or if I am finding my worth in being helpful? Where is the line between enjoying the good gifts that God has given and turning a good thing into a god thing?

Am I writing this post to serve others (mission), or so that people will think I’m clever (people-pleasing)? Do I receive my morning coffee as a good gift from God (worship), or am I addicted to caffeine (self-indulgence)? Do I workout acknowledging that God uniquely made my body to move (worship), and he calls me to steward this gift well (mission), or do I do it to feel good about myself (self-indulgence) and to appear more attractive to others (people-pleasing)?

I don’t have an answer. C.S. Lewis was right when he said, “It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.” We are indeed half-hearted creatures who are easily distracted by lesser things. Sometimes the Spirit wins that battle and sometimes the flesh.

The good news is that if you are in Christ, the war has already been won. When Jesus died on the cross for your sin and selfishness and rose from the dead in power, he secured your eternity. You don’t have to earn his love or perform your way into his good graces. Rather, you can receive his salvation through faith. You don’t have to live in fear about messing up and not living perfectly because Jesus already paid your debt. We don’t praise God and do good deeds out of fear that he will punish us. We do those things because it is what we were created to do. “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10).

Work hard. Play hard. Praise heartily.

Can You Be Perfect?

Posted on by Jole Miller

With football season starting up, I thought it would be appropriate to examine two of the best football movies: Remember the Titans and Friday Night Lights. In both films the head coach challenged his team with being perfect. I want to take a couple minutes and consider both of these speeches and tease out the good and the bad (not that fictional coaches from 20 years ago need my constructive criticism).

Remember the Titans

Remember the Titans takes place in 1972, when schools in the south were forced to racially integrate. The movie follows the T.C. Williams Titans, coached by Herman Boone. Coach Boone is a no-nonsense, my-way-or-the-highway type of coach. When addressing his team before practices began he said, “We will be perfect in every aspect of the game. You drop a pass, you run a mile. Miss a blocking assignment, you run a mile. You fumble the football, I will break my foot off in your John Brown hind parts! And then you will run a mile. Perfection! Let’s go to work.”

Coach Boone has high standards and he wants his team to keep reaching for that next level of excellence, which is a good thing. However, the way he delivers his message could have the opposite effect. If he demands perfection, players might be hesitant to take risks for fear of failing. Maybe the quarterback doesn’t try to squeeze the ball through a tight window and risk an interception. Maybe a defender doesn’t use a certain move in case the ball-carrier breaks their contain.

Another critique I have is that mistakes will always happen and I can’t think of a worse teaching method than running a mile. Running a mile in no ways helps train for football since it doesn’t prime fast twitch muscles. While running the player loses 6-10 minutes of time that they could have used to learn from their mistakes. What happens when a great offensive player goes against a great defensive player? They will probably both win just as much as they lose. At what point would they have to run? If he is set on demanding perfection, he needs to be specific about what he means by perfection. I would also recommend picking a punishment that actually addresses the mistake. I’m thinking something like ‘paint the fence’ or ‘sand the floor,’ something that is physically exhausting, but teaches muscle memory to perform the task correctly the next time.

In the championship game, Coach Boone seems to change his message. He said, “We’re in a fight. You boys are doing all that you can do. Anybody can see that. Win or lose, we’re gonna walk out of that stadium tonight with our heads held high. Do your best. That’s all anybody can ask for.” Surprisingly, a leader on the team pushed back against this. He acknowledges the he isn’t perfect and will never be perfect, but because the team has won every game, collectively they are perfect and he intends to keep it that way. I wonder what it means to give more than your best? Sometimes you can do everything in your power and at the end of the day the other team is just better. There is no shame in that.

Friday Night Lights

Coach Gary Gaines delivers a similar message about being perfect at the start of the season to his Permian Panthers. He tells his team, “It’s a good day to think about responsibility. It’s a good day to ask yourself if, on a personal level, you’re willing to accept the responsibility that you have to protect this team and this school and this town. And make no mistake about it, gentlemen. We are in the business of protecting this town. We’re in the business of winning. The expectations couldn’t be any higher. We will win state. We will win state. Can you be perfect?”

Coach Gaines seems to define perfection as winning state and, in doing so, they will protect the team, school, and town. One wonders why the responsibility to protect the town should fall on the shoulders of 15-17 year-olds? or how winning football games protects the town in any meaningful way?

Similar to Coach Boone, Coach Gaines changes his message about what it means to be perfect during halftime of the championship game. He says, “Now, ya’ll have known me for awhile, and for a long time now you’ve been hearin’ me talk about being perfect. Well I want you to understand somethin’. To me, being perfect is not about that scoreboard out there. It’s not about winning. It’s about you and your relationship to yourself and your family and your friends. Being perfect is about being able to look your friends in the eye and know that you didn’t let them down, because you told them the truth. And that truth is that you did everything that you could. There wasn’t one more thing that you could’ve done. Can you live in that moment, as best you can, with clear eyes and love in your heart? With joy in your heart? If you can do that gentlemen, then you’re perfect.”

I really love this explanation and fully agree with it. Telling the truth, doing your best, and being filled with love and joy is a beautiful way to live life. My main qualm is that he didn’t explain what he meant by perfect from day one (I guess that would take away from the dramatic effect at the end, huh?).

What Does Perfection Mean?

There are a couple different ways to think about perfection. One way is to think about perfection as an absence of errors. A perfect season is a season with no losses. A perfect game is when the pitcher gets out every batter. A perfect fit is when an item of clothing contours to your body just right. This definition of perfect speaks to being all that one can be. This seems to be the perfection that Coach Boone demanded. Living a sinless life or a lamb without spot or blemish would fit this definition of perfection.

We can also think about perfection as living out the fullness of who you are. A synonym for this definition is integrity. “Integrity” is related to “integer” meaning a positive or negative whole number. There are no fractions or decimals with integers. They are all in, whether positive or negative. This is the type of perfection Coach Gaines talks about. Were you honest? Did you do everything you possibly could? If so, you are whole. You are perfect. That doesn’t mean that you played perfectly, but that you honestly gave it your best effort. Being honest when you sin would fit this definition of perfection.

As humans we are constantly divided. We want to be healthy and we also want to eat McDonalds. We want to be productive and we also want to binge Netflix. We want to enjoy rich community and we don’t want to put ourselves in situations where others can hurt us. We want to pursue God and we also want to pursue the things of the world. Given our divided nature, what does Jesus mean when he commands, “Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48)?

How is God Perfect?

God embodies both definitions of perfection discussed above. He is without sin or blemish, and he is wholly who he says he is. He both speaks the truth and is the truth (John 14:6). You don’t have to look very hard to see that even the best people have sin in their lives and aren’t all that they could be. Even to consider the question of what is the best possible version of yourself gets overwhelming because it seems so unreachable.

Hymn writer John Newton once said, “I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I want to be, I am not what I hope to be in another world; but still I am not what I once used to be, and by the grace of God I am what I am.” I think this is a good way to think about perfection. He is honest about his shortcomings, acknowledges that one day he will experience a radical transformation, yet he also celebrates the good things that God has already done in his life.

It seems to me that the only way to be perfect in this life is to admit where you fall short, learn from it, then aim upward. This is what it means to live a life of repentance. Tell the truth. Do your best. Push yourself to new heights. Trust that one day Jesus will return. On that day you will be everything you ever imagined. You will be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.

P.S. A Brief Greek Nerd Sesh

The Greek word for “perfect” as an adjective is τέλειος, and it is used 19 times in the New Testament. It can mean “mature” (1 Cor 2:6, 14:20, Eph 4:13, Phil 3:15, Col 1:28, 4:12, Heb 5:14, Jam 1:4, and 3:2). It describes God’s will (Rom 12:2), God’s tabernacle (Christ in this context) (Heb 9:11), gifts from above (Jam 1:17), law of freedom (Jam 1:25), and love that drives out fear (1 John 4:18).

James 1:4 states, “Let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature (τέλειοι) and complete (ὁλόκληροι), lacking nothing.”

First Corinthians 13:10 states, “When the perfect (or completeness) comes, the partial will come to an end.” This seems to describe the time when Jesus comes back and restores everything that is broken. We see him in part now, but one day we will see him face to face.

In Matthew 19:20-21 a wealthy young man asks Jesus, “What do I still lack?” Jesus tells the man, “If you want to be perfect (τέλειος), go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” In this context, being perfect is the opposite of lacking. The rich man had great wealth, but was empty on the inside. He yearned for eternal life (God has put eternity in our hearts, after all), but the cost was too high for him.

“Perfect” can also be a verb (24 times in the New Testament)- τελειόω. It is often used to mean “finished” or “completed.” For example, “After those days were over . . .” (Luke 2:43), and “I have glorified you on earth by completing the work you gave me to do” (John 17:4). There are other examples in Hebrews when it could be translated “completed” or “perfected” (Heb 2:10, 5:9, 7:19, 7:28, 9:9, 10:1, 10:14, 11:40, 12:23). In many of the Hebrews verses, the author seems to have glorification in mind. If Jesus was already perfect, how could it say that he “has been perfected forever” (7:28)?

Both come from the word ‘τέλος’ which means the end, purpose, goal, or consummation. A τέλος is the bullseye of one’s life, the hoop you are shooting at. The more that your τέλος lines up with who God created you to be, the closer you are to perfection.

What is Love?

Posted on by Jole Miller

The Bible offers a different understanding of love than our culture. Jesus said that the greatest form of love is laying your life down for the good of another (John 15:13). God the Father loved the world in this way: sending Jesus to die for our sins (John 3:16). Jesus loved us by giving up his life to die on the cross, even while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8). First Corinthians 13:4-7 lists fifteen characteristics of love:

  1. Love is patient.– Long-suffering, perseverant, and unhurried.
  2. Love is kind.- Compassionate, polite, and servant-hearted.
  3. Love does not envy.– Doesn’t get jealous, compare, or covet.
  4. Love is not boastful. Doesn’t brag or self-promote.
  5. Love is not arrogant. Doesn’t think too highly of self and isn’t self-absorbed.
  6. Love does not dishonor others. Doesn’t mock, humiliate, or treat others as less than they’re worth.
  7. Love is not self-seeking.– Doesn’t look for its own interests/desires, but cares about the good of others.
  8. Love is not easily-angered.– Is hard to offend and doesn’t get irritated.
  9. Love does not keep a record of wrongs.– Is quick to forgive and reconcile, and doesn’t hold a grudge.
  10. Love finds no joy in unrighteousness.– Is grieved by the evil and injustice in the world.
  11. Love rejoices in the truth.– Desires that which is real and true. Speaks the truth in love.
  12. Love bears all things.– Endures without giving up.
  13. Love believes all things.– Keeps the faith in good times and bad.
  14. Love hopes all things. Has a positive vision of the future regardless of current circumstances.
  15. Love endures all things.- Stays and perseveres in the face of hardship.

Twenty percent of the listed characteristics are about enduring hard times (patient, bears, endures). Love endures hard times without becoming bitter or cynical (hopes & believes all things). Love is more focused on others than on self. Love does good to others.

When you look at the list above, how would you grade your love?

Are you patient? Are you kind? Do you get angry easily? Do you tell the truth even when it is hard? Do you get stuck in the comparison game? Is there someone you can’t bring yourself to forgive? How often do you give in to selfish impulses?

These questions aren’t meant to judge or condemn. If you consider love to be the most important thing in life, then wouldn’t you like to know if you were living contrary to love? You have to first recognize that there is a problem before you can grow.

W.W.L.D?

The greatest commandment is to “Love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.” John tells us that if we don’t love others, we aren’t of God, because God is love (1 John 4:8). However, our love often falls short. We get selfish, irritated, and at times give up when things get hard. But the good news is that God is love.

Jesus perfectly embodied 1 Corinthians 13. He was patient and kind. When he was mocked and ridiculed he didn’t fight back. He told the truth. He valued the outcasts in society and associated with the lowly. He paid for our sins and cast them away from us as far is the east is from the west. When we sin and fall short he pursues us.

Not only did God forgive our sins, he also gave us his Holy Spirit, which is a Spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). When our natural instinct is to look out for ourselves, the Holy Spirit gives a supernatural ability to look out for others.

When you are trying to decide what to do or how to respond, ask yourself, “What would love do? What action would most embody love?” If you are reviewing a past action, ask, “Was that loving? Did I live out the standard set in 1 Corinthians?” The answers may not always be clear, but the more we ask and strive to do the loving thing, the more we will embody Jesus to a broken world.

Mortgaged Heart

Posted on by Jole Miller

As my wife and I dabble in house hunting, I have been intrigued by concept of a mortgage. When someone takes a mortgage out on a house, the buyer puts a certain percentage down on the house, say 10%, then the bank offers a loan for the remaining 90%, which is then paid off over the course of 15-30 years. Essentially, you own 10% of the house while the bank owns 90%. There is a sense in which the house is yours at closing, but there is another sense in which the house belongs to the bank. The house is not fully yours until the mortgage is paid off.

I think this is similar to the Christian life. There is a sense in which we belong fully to God upon turning from our sin and trusting in Jesus alone for our salvation. At that point, we received the Holy Spirit, who is “the down payment of our inheritance, until the redemption of [our bodies], to the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:14). However, there is still sin in our lives. There are parts of our mind, body, and soul that don’t yet belong to God. This is a great tension of the Christian life. Like the Israelites, we are in the wilderness, caught between slavery and the promised land. We are a purchased people (this is what it means to be redeemed), yet we have not attained a final redemption.

This is why Saint Paul could say that we have been adopted as God’s children (Rom 8:15) and at the same time we “wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship” (Rom 8:23). We are already adopted, yet there is an adoption to come. Let’s compare salvation to buying a house. When you received the Holy Spirit, let’s image 20% of your being was “purchased” and became aligned with God’s will for your life. That means 80% of your life is still “owned” by sin. The remainder of your life is then making “payments” so that God “owns” progressively more of you. The parts of you that were once “owned” by anger are transformed into patience. The parts that were “owned” by worry are transformed into trust. The parts that were “owned” by apathy are transformed into love and compassion.

Continuing with this analogy, what does it mean for Christians to “make payments?” God is the author and perfecter of our faith. I believe that we cannot add to his salvation or take away from it (there is no repo man coming to taking our salvation). Yet, there are things we do to experience more of God, such as bible study, prayer, fellowship, trust, and obedience (all of which is powered by the Holy Spirit). We read the bible to have our minds renewed with the truth and combat false narratives. We pray to ask God to move in this world and to transform us in the process. We connect with other believers to bear each others burdens, confess our sins, and sharpen one another. As we trust and follow God, we become more like Jesus. We become more like who he created us to be.

We will still struggle in this life. Some days sin will get the better of us. But God promises that there will be a day when Jesus will come back to purchase his people for good. “Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all [die], but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’ ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’” (1 Corinthians 15:51-55). “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; grief, crying, and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4)

If you are in Christ, your future is secure and it is glorious. There will be a day when we will be totally free with God forever. May that inspire us to take steps toward freedom in this life.

The Relentless Love of Forrest Gump

Posted on by Jole Miller

My wife and I recently watched Forrest Gump. Since I had seen the film many times I was paying close attention to the relationship between Forrest and Jenny this time around. A friend of mine argues that Jenny is the worst character in movie history, and I think he makes some valid points. She led Forrest on. She constantly abandoned him for guys who used and abused her. She only came back to him when she felt like she had nowhere else to go, rejected his marriage proposal, had sex with him and left the next morning before he woke up. A few years after this Jenny invited Forrest to visit and said, “I want to apologize for anything that I ever did to you, cause I was messed up for a long time, and . . . ” This half apology was right before shattering his universe by telling him that he had a son. She then asked Forrest to marry her mere months before dying of AIDs, resulting in Forrest raising their child alone. In so many ways, Jenny is just the worst. But I think the love story between Forrest and Jenny closely parallels another love story: the one between Christ and his church.

A Brief Defense of Jenny

I’m not condoning or excusing any of Jenny’s behavior, but if we consider her past, her future makes sense. In Jenny’s experience, all love with men had a sexual component to it. She learned from her father that she was only desirable as a sex object. There was no warmth, kindness, or safety from the man who was supposed to give that to her. It’s no wonder that she kept picking the wrong guy and felt undeserving of Forrest’s love for her. I imagine that it was uncomfortable for her that Forrest saw her as perfect when she was filled with shame and self-hatred (to the point of contemplating suicide). None of this justifies how she treated Forrest, but maybe we can show her kindness as we critique.

Forrest’s Love for Jenny

Forrest’s love for Jenny is both beautiful and heartbreaking. Their friendship started when Jenny showed kindness to him when others were cruel. She looked past his simple mind and the braces on his legs to see a good heart and a true friend. Forrest was a safe place for Jenny to get away from her sexually abusive father. Forrest and Jenny were like “peas and carrots” until they went to college. Then things got complicated. Forrest and Jenny had one intimate encounter that ended . . . abruptly. Jenny then had various relationships with men, worked as a nude model/stripper, then traveled around the country getting high sleeping around with various partners.

Forrest, on the other hand, protected Jenny from abusive men, thought about her constantly, wrote her dozens of letters that all went unread. He even named his shrimp boats after her. When Jenny showed up at Forrest’s house out of the blue, he took care of her, picked flowers for her, and was a wonderful host. To Forrest, Jenny was perfect. He didn’t see her as damaged goods at all. Jenny once asked him, “Why are you so good to me?” To which Forrest simply responded, “You’re my girl.”

As cynical adults we might look at Forrest and Jenny and conclude that Forrest didn’t have the intelligence to understand that Jenny was taking advantage of him and that he was worth being in a relationship with somebody who reciprocated his feelings and the effort he put in. We might even say that Jenny is toxic and he should have cut her out of his life for good. However, I wonder if we struggle to understand Forrest because his love looks more like God’s love than human love?

Love Like Christ

Romans 5:6-8 says, “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” While we were weak and powerless, Christ died for us. Like Jenny, we run after idols, lovers who promise us the world only to leave us feeling empty. God promises that there is abundant joy and eternal pleasures in his presence (Psalm 16:11), yet we constantly turn our backs on him.

Sometimes, like Jenny, I ask God, “Why are you so good to me? You know where I’ve been and all that I’ve done. You see the depths of my heart and soul and still you pursue me and give me good things? Why?”

“Because you are mine. As high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is my faithful love for you. As far as the east is from the west is how far I removed your transgressions. What can separate you from my love? Neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing can separate you from my love. I don’t see you as trash but as glorious.”

Forrest was Jenny’s faithful protector. Quick to forgive and overflowing with love for her, even when it wasn’t reciprocated. He never asked Jenny for anything except her presence. That love looks a lot like God’s.

Sally Lloyd Jones writes in the Jesus Storybook Bible, “You see no matter what, in spite of everything, God would love his children with a Never-Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love. And though they would forget him, and run from Him, deep in their hearts God’s children would miss Him always, and long for Him — lost children yearning for their home.”

Jenny didn’t know it at the time, but in all of her travels and searching, she was really looking for Forrest’s unconditional love. You might not know it, but in all of your striving and searching, you are really looking for the unconditional love of Christ. Everyone and everything else will let you down, but Jesus never will. Don’t feel ashamed. Just come home.

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Two Rules for Life

Posted on by Jole Miller

The other day I imagined coaching my son’s youth sports team and I wondered what team rules would resonate with small children. The two rules that came to mind are listen well and do your best. As I pondered these more, I realized that you can get pretty far in life by living by these two rules. Let’s explore what these look like in practice.

Listen Well

A quote from the movie Fight Club sums up a lot of conversations: “Most people don’t listen when you talk, they are just waiting for their turn to speak.” Listening well is a great life skills that will help you in every area of life. Here are some ways in which you can listen well:

  • Maintain eye contact- In sports this might look like not messing with a ball or your equipment when the coach is talking. In life it might look like putting your phone away during conversations.
  • Don’t interrupt or talk when the other person is talking– It’s impossible to talk and listen at the same time.
  • Ask questions until you understand– Curiosity is a much better default than assuming.
  • Repeat back what the other person said to confirm that you heard correctly– I think this is especially important when conversing with someone who has different beliefs and opinions. Pastor Tim Keller suggests that we represent and engage with our opponents’ position in the strongest form. We should “do all the work necessary until [we] can articulate the views of [our] opponent with such strength that he says, ‘I couldn’t have said it better myself.’”
  • Assume that they know something that you don’t (Credit to Jordan Peterson)- This requires the humility to admit that you don’t have all the answers and truth can be found in unlikely places.
  • If possible, take notes– Our minds tend to wander and we are quick to forget. Taking notes helps with both.
  • Take action– Jesus said that anyone who hears his words yet doesn’t act on them is like a foolish man who builds his house on the sand. When storms come, the house collapsed (Matthew 7:26-27). Imagine a parent who told their kid to clean their room, ony to find the room still a pigsty at the end of the day. The child might’ve heard the parent, but they did not listen.
12 second song that summarizes how to listen well

Do Your Best

There is an amusing story from my childhood when I asked my mom what would happen if I ever got an F in a class.

She said, “I would be disappointed because didn’t do your best.”

I asked, “What if I tried my hardest and the best I could do was an F?”

“That wouldn’t happen.”

“But what if it did?”

“It wouldn’t.”

“But what if it did?”

As you can imagine, this conversation could have gone on forever without getting anywhere. But it brings up a good question to reflect on whenever a task is completed: Did I genuinely give it my best?

A hidden blessing of failures is that it requires us to examine what went wrong. In sports, you can beat a bad team without giving it your best effort. You can also do everything in your power and still lose to a better team. When you win, you tend not to question the results. When you lose, you are forced to ask yourself difficult questions. Here are some questions to ponder whenever it is time to review:

  • How was my preparation?– Imagine a football team that goes into a game without watching any of their opponent’s film. They might try their hardest during the game, but they didn’t do the necessary preparations. There is truth in the saying, “Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.”
  • How did I respond to adversity (internal and external)?– Mike Tyson said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” How do you respond when things didn’t go according to plan? Did you respond with hope and courage, or did you give up and lose heart?
  • Did I give in to fear?– Fear can keep us from taking meaningful action. I had teammates in high school who held back in practice and games because they were afraid of giving everything they had and feeling the disappointment of failure. Failure doesn’t hurt as much when you don’t invest your whole heart. The definition of courage isn’t being fearless, rather it is persevering in the face of fear. I think there is value in naming your fears. It’s harder to fight an enemy that you can’t see.
  • What things were outside of my control?– Sometimes life happens. You get sick. Your car breaks down. There is a family emergency. During high school track I got sick with mono. Giving it my best effort looked a lot different after I was sick. That doesn’t mean we should use these as excuses, but I think it is important to name what is and isn’t in our control in order to assess the situation more fairly.
  • Did I prioritize the most important things?– We can do a lot of things right, but if good things keep us from the best things, we are still falling short of our calling. (See the matrix below.)
  • What distracted me?– This is related to the previous question. If you didn’t prioritize the most important things, what was it that distracted you? Were they urgent things that weren’t important? Were they time-wasters like TV or social media? Did you spend too much time gossiping with coworkers? What kept you from the most important tasks and how can you avoid them in the future?
  • Did I ask for help?– I think we often fall short of our goals because we don’t ask for help, either from fear of looking weak, foolish pride that thinks we have all the answers, or maybe you don’t have a network of people you trust. Not asking for help keeps us stagnant. We are created for community and need others. May we have the humility to ask for help when we need it!

Discerning what is Important

One caveat for doing your best is that sometimes we just have to let things be good enough. We can get so fixated on doing things perfectly that we don’t end up getting them done. There are also different responsibilities competing for our time and energy and we have to decide what is most important. A pastor once shared how he preached a sermon without preparing as he normally would because he coached his son’s baseball team the previous day. He didn’t preach his best, but he did the best he could given the circumstances. A way to love his son and the community was to coach the team. To him, the impact he could have coaching outweighed the potential drop in sermon quality.

We must all count the cost. For a college athlete, there might be some weeks that you can’t watch as much film because you have a big paper due. Or maybe you spend less time on a homework assignment because your team was travelling. It would make sense for your quality of work to dip if you are caring for a loved one who is sick. We must constantly be evaluating what are our priorities, and if our actions reflect that they are truly priorities.

Another caveat is that sometimes we don’t have a lot to offer. Every athlete will eventually have a bad game even with great effort and preparation. Sometimes things just go wrong in sports and in life. Everyone will eventually make mistakes and bad decisions. That’s part of being human. I also think of people who suffer with depression or are battling a sickness and have to work extra hard to do seemingly simple tasks. Their best effort looks different depending on how serious their ailment is.

God has given everyone of us great potential and limitations. My potential and limitations will look different than yours or anyone else’s. However, these lines are not set in stone. As we push ourselves to grow, our capacity will increase and our limitations will be pushed further out. May we all have the wisdom and courage to explore those boundaries!

Here is a powerful video about beating perceived limitations and a challenge to give your absolute best.

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A Formula to Discern Your Calling(s)

Posted on by Jole Miller

Here are three fill-in-the-blank statements to help you discern your purpose:

“I want to live in a world where . . . so that . . . therefore, I . . .”

“I want to live in a world where . . .“

This statement is about desire: what do I want? It should be future oriented, possible, and within your sphere of influence. You can’t change the past. You can’t stop loved ones from dying. It is one thing for me to say, “I want to live in a world where the Chicago Bears are Super Bowl champs,” and another for the Bears coaches and players to say the same thing. There are tangible things that they can do to realize that desire, while I can do nothing but watch and hope.

The statements can be personal: “I want to live in a world where I am debt free, or own a home, or weigh X amount, or can run a marathon.” They can also be larger in scope: “I want to live in a world where people are judged by the content of their character not the color of their skin, or where children don’t go to bed hungry, or where my political party is in control.” The statements can either be short-term or long-term, character focused or something more tangible. You can also have multiple things for the different areas of life (financial, professional, personal, relational, spiritual, and physical). The main thing is to be honest about what it is you want.

The first step is naming what you want.

“So that . . .”

This statement is about motivation: why do I want what I want? I chose “so that” rather than “because” because “because” addresses the present reality while “so that” addresses future hope. For example, one might say, “I want to live in a world where I am a college graduate because my parents expect me to.” Compare that with the statement, “I want to live in a world where I am a college graduate so that I can make my parents proud.” “Because” is the reason you got started. “So that” is what makes you persevere.

This step is important for understanding your own heart. As you reflect you might realize you want something for selfish reasons, or you might find that it is something that someone else wants for your life and not something you are passionate about. Maybe an athlete doing this exercise will find that they want to win conference so that they feel a greater sense of self-worth. Then you might ask that person, “Why do you think your self-worth is connected with a game?” Perhaps from here you can help them see that their value doesn’t come from their performance.

Lastly, often the first answer that comes to mind isn’t the only or the most important reason. For example, a college student might say, “I want to graduate college so that I can get a good job.” Why do you want a good job? “So that I can make good money.” Why do you want to make good money? “So that I’ll be able to support my loved ones.” Keep asking why until you get to what’s most important.

The second step is understanding why you want what you want.

“Therefore, I . . .”

This is where the rubber meets the road. This is where we take action to get closer to what we want. If you want to get in better shape so that you can pick up your grandkids when you’re older, your action steps might be eating healthier, exercising, and going to the doctor. MLK wanted to see a world where every human being is treated with dignity. Therefore, he prayed, preached, organized, encouraged, marched, and endured beatings and imprisonments. His hope for a better future motivated him to endure. If you really want something, you will take action on it. If you say you want to live in a world where your political party is in power, you should at least vote. If you do nothing, I question how much you actually want what you say you want.

There is freedom in this stage to experiment and make mistakes. You might not have a clear plan, but you can take steps until clarity comes. Maybe you notice that you are doing what you thought were the right things but it hasn’t gotten you to where you wanted. That might mean it’s time to persevere, or it might mean it’s time to try something new. As you take action, you might also discover that your desires have shifted. That is okay! The journey is often more important than the destination.

As you probably already know, life is hard and it is full of disappointment. There is risk in naming your heart’s desires. When you do, you open yourself up to the possibility having your heart broken. You may never attain what you desire. The Bears might never win another Super Bowl. But I am also reminded of what Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:58, “Be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the Lord’s work, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.” There is value in the pursuit even if the result isn’t what you want. It is never a mistake to do the right thing for the right reason. May we have the courage to take steps towards what we desire.

The third step is to take action to attain what you desire.

Working Backwards

If you are having trouble naming what you want, I encourage you to work backwards from your current behaviors. Author James Clear wrote, “Your current habits are perfectly designed to deliver your current results.” If you go to the gym a lot, what are you trying to gain? If you watch a lot of TV, what are you looking for? From these examples, maybe working backwards would sounds like, “I go to the gym a lot so that I can be desirable to the opposite sex, because I want to live in a world where I’m not alone.” Or, “I watch a lot of TV so that I can forget about life for a while, because I want to live in a world that doesn’t hurt so much.”

Take a look at your habits and see if they are getting you closer to what you want most. If not, what needs to change?

Some Problems with the Disney Pinocchio Remake [Spoilers]

Posted on by Jole Miller

I was excited for the Pinocchio remake. I thought Tom Hanks playing Geppetto would be awesome, and I was curious about how they would bring this animated classic to life. However, Disney made changes to this film that radically altered the message. I think the remake lost the story arc of redemption, character growth, and self sacrifice, thus making Pinocchio both unrelatable and not someone to emulate. Here are some of the big differences between the 1940 original and the 2022 remake:

Pinocchio Actually Makes it to School

In the original, Pinocchio was walking to school when he came across Honest John. Honest John convinced Pinocchio that he didn’t need school, and instead he should take the easy street and become an actor. New conscience, Jiminy Cricket, did his best to persuade Pinocchio to go to school, but his arguments fall short. Pinocchio went to be an actor. However, in the remake Jiminy was able to persuade Pinocchio to go to school. When he got there the teacher threw him out because school is only for real children. It was only after being kicked out of school that he went to be an actor.

I think this is a bad decision because Pinocchio begins the film with a strong moral compass. He doesn’t start off as naive, thus doesn’t have much room to grow. In the original, Pinocchio gets tricked by Honest John, but he still makes the decision to be an actor. In the remake, Pinocchio does the right thing, but the schoolmaster didn’t allow him to study. When Pinocchio couldn’t go where he was supposed to, why wouldn’t he pursue acting? Pursuing an acting career became his best option to make his father proud. Rather than portray Pinocchio as a fool with a lot to learn (who also was led astray by a clever tempter), he is made the victim by a closeminded institution. It still ended up being a mistake to go act for Stromboli, but at the time it looked like Pinocchio’s best option since he was not welcomed at school.

The Blue Fairy Doesn’t Free Pinocchio From Stromboli’s Cage

In both the original and the remake, Pinocchio gets a standing ovation when he sings and dances, makes Stromboli a lot of money, and then Stromboli locks Pinocchio in a birdcage in order to continue to exploit him for profit. It is here where the famous nose growth scene happens. In the original, the Blue Fairy shows up and asks Pinocchio why he didn’t go to school. Pinocchio then tells her about monsters putting him in a sack and carrying him away. With each lie his nose grows longer until he begs the Blue Fairy to forgive him and help him out of the cage. The message is clear: lying is wrong and “a boy who won’t be good might just as well be made of wood.” The movie explicitly shows that Pinocchio needed the Blue Fairy to forgive him and rescue him.

In the remake, Pinocchio tells Jiminy that he never wanted to be famous and that he hated it when the crowd was cheering for him. However, Pinocchio realized that his nose was getting close to the key that would free him, so he told a fake lie in order for Jiminy to reach the key. After saying sorry to Jiminy his nose returned to it’s normal size. The message is less clear. Is lying okay as long as it helps me get out of my problems? Does saying sorry magically make up for my poor decisions? Pinocchio is portrayed as clever, relatively honest, and doesn’t need help to get out of his mess. The message is less clear whether or not lying is wrong.

Pinocchio Isn’t That Tempted at Pleasure Island

In the original, Pinocchio gets sent to Pleasure Island and immediately gets sucked into Lampwick’s cynical view of the world. Pinocchio naively goes along with everything from destroying art, smoking, and drinking beer. In the remake, Pinocchio is hesitant to partake in any of the ‘pleasure.’ He is disturbed when they go through a room in which the children destroyed clocks, and he doesn’t drink any of the limitless root beer available to him. Pinocchio still partially turns into a donkey. Again, Pinocchio is shown to have a strong moral compass.

Geppetto and Pinocchio Get Swallowed Together

In the original, Pinocchio learns that his father had been swallowed by Monstro. Pinocchio then ties a stone to his donkey tail, sinks to the bottom of the ocean, and searches for the great whale. In the remake, Pinocchio water skies out to Gepetto who is sailing and they both get swallowed up together.

I think this was a mistake by the remake. The original does a much better job showing Pinocchio’s bravery. Pinocchio willingly sent himself to the deepest, darkest part of the ocean and intentionally confronts the great sea beast. In the remake Pinocchio is aware that Monstro lives in that part of the sea, but he does not seek out the beast.

Pinocchio Turns Himself into a Speedboat

The means of escape is roughly the same in both the original and remake: Pinocchio and Gepetto build a fire to make Monstro sneeze. However, getting away from Monstro is where things get strange. In the original, Gepetto and Pinocchio franticly row their raft together. In the remake, Pinocchio spins his legs really fast and essentially becomes the motor of a speed boat.

Pinocchio’s superpowers make it hard for kids to relate. If kids see an ordinary little boy (I guess technically he’s not a real boy yet, but I think you get what I mean) showing bravery in the face of great danger, they might feel a sense of courage to face their own fears. Seeing a super puppet overcome a great obstacle is less relatable to kids. They might say, “Of course Pinocchio could face Monstro! He has super speed. I don’t have super speed, so what chance do I have to face my Monstro?”

Gepetto Dies and Pinocchio Revives Him

In the original, Pinocchio rescues Gepetto at the cost of his own life. He displays what Jesus calls the greatest love, to lay down your life for the sake of another (John 15:13). However, in the remake Gepetto dies and Pinocchio is able to revive him with his magic tears (because his tears are magic now). Pinocchio’s task was to prove himself brave, truthful, and unselfish. The original succeeds in this because giving your life for the sake of another is the most unselfish thing a person could do. Weeping at the loss of your father is natural, but not unselfish. Also, normal children (or any human for that matter) cannot revive the dead with their tears. Pinocchio is again not relatable to the audience.

Pinocchio Never Becomes a Real Boy

In the original, the Blue Fairy both revives Pinocchio and turns him into a real boy. By his self-sacrifice Pinocchio proved himself to be brave, truthful, and unselfish, thus becoming a real boy. See below how Geppetto’s weeping is turned to joy:

The remake’s take on this scene was probably the most disappointing part of the film. After Gepetto is revived he says to Pinocchio, “You swam faster than any clipper ship could sail. No real boy could ever do such a thing . . . You will always be my real boy. There isn’t a single thing I would change about you. I am so very proud of you and I love you so very much.” Essentially, it is better for Pinocchio to be a puppet than a real boy because of the superpowers that it gives him.

Jiminy Cricket concludes the movie by saying, “People say he was transformed into an honest-to-goodness real boy. Did that actually happen? Who knows! But I do know one thing for sure: In his heart Pinocchio is as real as any real boy could ever be.” This is not a satisfying ending for me, but it isn’t surprising given how society today thinks about identity and reality. It would be too exclusive for Disney to say that there is such thing as a “real boy,” (what is real? what is a boy?) so they resort to self-identification. “It doesn’t matter what anyone says, if you feel in your heart something is true, than it is.” I think it is a slippery slope to deny objective reality and say everything is subjective.

In Conclusion

I think this movie does a good job portraying the unconditional love of the father. Real or not, Geppetto loves Pinocchio as he is. Throughout the movie Pinocchio tries to do things that will make his father proud without realizing he is already proud of him.

Where it falls short is in the story of redemption. In the original movie Pinocchio starts off as a naive puppet who doesn’t know right from wrong, stumbles when tempted with easy pleasure and becomes a jackass, seeks out the beast at the bottom of the ocean, dies to save his father, and rises again a real boy. The glory of the second life is greater than the first.

In the remake Pinocchio has a good grasp on right and wrong from the start and doesn’t need much help getting himself out of trouble. He then ends the movie as a puppet with super powers. The only difference at the end is that he is aware that he has the father’s love.

The message that “you are perfect just the way you are” is very prevalent today. It sounds nice and gives people the warm and fuzzies inside but it is a lie. Nobody is perfect as they are. We are all deeply flawed. We are limited in our capacity, intellect, and appearance. We are also prone to selfishness and malevolence. We all need to grow. We all need to be transformed.

What makes the Christian faith unique is that we receive the unconditional love of the father without doing anything to earn it. “God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). It also doesn’t hide the fact that we are all sinners. We need to experience the transforming love of God. I am much different today than I was in high school or college. I have grown and matured in a lot of ways. And I have so much more to go. The Christian faith is a stumbling pursuit to live out who God created us to be, and it’s a pursuit I’ll be stumbling with until Christ returns or he calls me home to heaven. I’ll conclude by a quote from John Newton (who composed Amazing Grace):

I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I want to be, I am not what I hope to be in another world; but still I am not what I once used to be, and by the grace of God I am what I am.

Boobie Miles: Misplaced Hope and Identity

Posted on by Jole Miller

Friday Night Lights is one of the best football movies ever made. It is a story about a high school football team in west Texas, the pressures and expectations to win the state championship, and the highs and lows they experience throughout the season. At the center of the team is all-star running back, Boobie Miles.

Boobie is the definition of the total package. He’s fast, strong, and agile, and can block, catch and throw. At the beginning of the film we see every major Division I football program wants him. He is cocky, but has the skills to back it up. When asked about his grades he says that he is a straight A student, because the only subject is football. The team and the whole town put their hopes on Boobie to win the state championship. The stars seem to align. Then the unthinkable happens . . .

Boobie injures his knee in the first game of the season.

Boobie then watches from the sidelines, first as his team struggles and then thrive under the excellent gameplay of Sophomore running back, Chris Comer. Throughout this time Boobie downplays his injury, insisting that he will be back in action in a couple weeks, that him sitting out is precautionary. Which brings us to the clip below. Boobie gets his knee checked out be a specialist. However, the hospital is located in his rival town the week they play each other.

When the doctor tells Boobie that he can’t play because of the damage done to his knee, he becomes indignant. He doesn’t trust that the doctor is being honest with him, rather he believes that the doctor is trying to keep him from playing so that Midland will win the football game. He accuses the doctor of trying to take is football career.

What happens next is predictable. Boobie told the coach that the doctor cleared him, gets put in the game, and injures his knee worse than before. This next clip shows Boobie when it is official that he will never play high school football again.

Boobie starts the scene with the same swagger he always had with his teammates. He cleans out his locker as his teammates look on with sadness, disbelief, and pity. A look that communicates “You were the best of us. This shouldn’t have happened to you. I don’t know if we can do this without you.” Boobie gives them one last encouragement and swaggers out of the locker room.

Once Boobie is in the safe presence of his uncle his true heart come out. He sobs heart-wrenching sobs, “What am I gonna do now? I can’t do nothin’ else but play football.” All the work he put in, wasted. All his dreams of making it to the pros and buying his uncle a house, shattered.

Anger and Grief are Windows to our Heart

Nobody ever told Boobie that he was more than a football player. His entire identity revolved around his performance on the field. Football was his purpose, his passion, and his hope for a future. In short, football was his god. He never considered that his god would let him down, so he never developed other interests or became a well-rounded human being. Boobie’s emotional reactions show us how much being a football player meant to him.

God gave us emotions for a reason. Our emotions reveal what is important to us. They reveal what we love. Anger is the feeling connected to what we perceive to be unjust, a wrong done, or something not being as it should. It can also be a response to fear. Boobie was angry at the doctor because he believed the doctor was unfairly keeping him from doing what he loved. Grief is what we feel when we lose something or someone important. For Boobie, he lost his football career and the potential to use football to have a better financial future. It is not sinful to feel these things. There are many examples in the Gospels where Jesus wept or expressed anger and he lived a sinless life.

As fallen people, our issue is not that we feel strongly, but that we feel strongly about the wrong things. Saint Augustine taught that the essence of sin was having disordered loves. We are meant to love God first then love others. Our love and desire for other things should come after these. Here is an example from my life.

There are times when my 3-month old son won’t stop crying and, depending on my patience level, I will either feel sad or angry. When I feel sad, I am responding with empathy. I hurt that he is hurting. When my response is anger, I feel like he is wronging me by not letting me have some peace and quiet. In the moment, my desire for peace and comfort is greater than my desire to love and empathize with my son. My loves get out of order. (This isn’t me beating myself up. I know God has grace especially for sleep-deprived parents.)

Boobie was not wrong to love football and I am not wrong for enjoying comfort. Both are gifts from God that he gives for us to enjoy. The problem comes when we allow the gifts to become the most important thing in our life. I thank God that Jesus died for my disordered loves and the harm they cause me and others. It is a lifelong struggle to reorder our loves to put God in first place. But he gives grace for when we fall short, and power and wisdom through his Spirit to love what we ought as we ought.

I encourage you is to pay attention when you have a strong emotional reaction. What did you feel? What happened that made you feel that way? What did you desire in that moment? Is that desire properly ordered? How might God be trying to get your attention in the midst of this?

“Now physical beauty, to be sure, is a good created by God, but it is a temporal good, very low in the scale of goods; and if it is loved in preference to God, the eternal, internal, and sempiternal Good, that love is as wrong as the miser’s love for gold, with the abandonment of justice, though the fault is in the man, not in the gold. This is true of everything created; though it is good, it can be loved in the right way or in the wrong way – in the right way, that is, when the proper order is kept, in the wrong way when that order is upset.”

City of God, XV.22

An Imagined Conversation Between Jesus and a Seeker

Posted on by Jole Miller

This exchange is based on Matthew 16:24-26, “Jesus said to his disciples, ‘If anyone wants to come with me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life because of me will find it. What does it benefit a man if he gains the whole world yet loses his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?'”

Jesus: I have seen you in the crowd listening to me speak. Why do you always stand at a distance?

Disciple: I didn’t know if I could approach you, or what it would take to come to you. So I played it safe and watched and listened.

Jesus: There are three questions you must answer if you want to be my disciple:

  1. Do you want to come with me? (Yes or No)
  2. Will you deny yourself? (Yes or No)
  3. Will you take up your cross? (Yes or No)

If you answered “yes” to these three questions, follow me! If not, feel free to go your own way.

Disciple: Rabbi, I do want to follow you. There is no one who teaches with the authority that you do, and I sense that there is life in your words. But what does “denying yourself” mean?

Jesus: Do you remember the rich young ruler? (Matthew 19:16-30) What kept him from giving away his possessions?

Disciple: His wealth and possessions was where he found his comfort, security, worth, and identity. He was afraid of losing all that he put his hope in.

Jesus: And what about the Pharisees? Where do they get it wrong? (Matthew 23)

Disciple: They hold on to their appearance of righteousness at all costs. They love to look good before others and neglect their heart, which is the most important thing. They also look down on others and are unwilling to associate with those who are “unclean.”

Jesus: Indeed. And I ask you, what are you trusting in that is not me? Where are you performing instead of living authentically? Whose approval are you looking for? If you want to follow me, you must give that up.

Disciple: And what of this cross? It is a horrible instrument of torture and death devised by wicked and cruel men. I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. It feels too cruel even for the most vile of sinners. What could I possibly do to deserve this?

Jesus: Is a student greater than his teacher (Matthew 10:24-26)? If the world hated me, doesn’t it make sense that it would also hate those who are like me? Don’t assume you will be treated well or fairly by the world.

Disciple: So are you saying that I will have to die for you?

Jesus: I assure you, you will have to die many deaths before it is all said and done.

Disciple: What then will survive?

Jesus: Tell me, which is more valuable: gold that is still in ore form, or that which has been refined with fire?

Disciple: The pure gold.

Jesus: Precisely! All the imperfections and dross are burned away and only what is precious and true will remain. In the same way, those who suffer for my sake are being refined. The road I’m calling you to is not an easy one. You will encounter many griefs and trials, and things will try to trip you up. But I promise that it’s worth it! Anything you give up in this life you will receive back 100 fold in the life to come. You will be on the front lines against the kingdom of darkness, bringing light, goodness, and restoration. Therefore, I urge you not to grow weary of doing good. You are planting seeds for my kingdom harvest, and you will reap at the proper time if you do not give up. Will you follow me?