But now Tebow’s righteousness and/or self-righteousness is at the forefront and everyone has an opinion. I’m not going to take that bait however. What I want to take up is an article I read yesterday that came to the conclusion that Tebow is a good guy but it remains to be seen whether or not he’ll prove to be the hypocrite that so many Christians and professional athletes turn out to be. I’m going to ruin the suspense: Tebow is a hypocrite and the real question is whether or not he’ll be a hypocrite in some big, public way or a smaller, more personal way.

How do I know this? What is my proof? Well, it comes down to this oft-cited and oft-forgotten critique of all humanity: “Nobody’s perfect.” We pretty much universally acknowledge that one, right? Nobody’s perfect. We know that. But somehow we’re all pretty surprised when someone turns out not to be perfect. That’s where coaches Jim Tressel and Joe Paterno come in. Both men are heavyweights in college football. Both men have a legacy of victories but also integrity. Both men then made bad decisions that landed them in trouble and we all acted surprised and offended when it all went down.

Tressel, prior to May, was a sweater-vested saint: “The Senator.” “In Tressel we trust.” This is partly an image he cultivated, but it’s also just part of who he is. At no time did Tressel ever claim he was perfect and I’m reasonably sure he would never claim to be. Same with Paterno. But both men, being humans, are not perfect. Prior to their separate scandals they weren’t perfect either. They had screwed something up, just not as publicly. But still we somehow felt betrayed and angry. It really doesn’t make much sense when you think about it.

One of the charges leveled at Tressel and Paterno is that they are hypocrites, that they talked about integrity and doing the right thing, but when it came down to it, they didn’t do it themselves. And I agree, that makes them hypocrites. They are men who held themselves to a higher standard and they fell short of that standard. But, if we understand that nobody’s perfect, that makes everyone who holds themselves to a higher standard a hypocrite eventually. The solution then becomes to either hold yourself to an incredibly low standard or just acknowledge that everyone is going to be imperfect and a hypocrite and move on. I think the choice here is pretty clear: people who hold themselves to low standards do not make responsible or good leaders. Our leaders need to be people of high standards, standards that none of us can actually stand up to, because that is the only way we learn and grow.

But it goes deeper than nobody’s perfect. Much deeper, and that’s where Yoda comes in. In The Empire Strikes Back Yoda is talking about the dark side of the Force and Luke asks the astute question, “Is the dark side stronger?” Yoda sagely replies: “No, no, no. Quicker, easier, more seductive.” Don’t miss this: Yoda is saying that the dark side is our default setting. The dark side is as easy as falling into bed; it’s the light side we have to work at. We take this at face value because the Force is something that George Lucas made up, but I don’t think George is talking about the Force here. He’s talking about human nature. The Force isn’t the issue here, it’s what our nature feels comfortable pursuing, basically our own wills and our own desires, rather than the higher and more difficult calling of a greater good.

To bring this back to the real world a bit, we find a similar notion in Christian theology with a wholly depressing name: “total depravity.” It basically means that humans aren’t perfect and we’re all hypocrites. In more detail: humans are completely separate from good, which comes from God, and any good in a person comes from God, not the person. It’s not a happy thought, but it does describe what we see going on around us with Paterno and Tressel and all the rest of us hypocrites. We can know everything there is about morality and what the right call is in each situation, but we are still fully capable of screwing it up. Anyone following the situation, including Joe and Jim, have probably wondered how they could be so stupid. But it’s not an issue of intelligence or even of the brain, it’s a heart issue and our hearts, to be blunt, are flawed.

This is why I don’t doubt that Tebow is a hypocrite. I know for a fact he’s screwed up and I know for a fact he will screw up again, and I don’t think he’d mind me saying that. My hope and prayer is that it won’t be anything too devastating or public, but that’s not guaranteed. And the same goes for me. My hypocrisy is boundless and I am going to mess it all up bad one day, so consider this my confession in advance. I hope it’s nothing too public and too awful, but I know what I am capable of and I hope it doesn’t come to that.

But just as I believe in total depravity because it describes the human condition, I believe in something else that prescribes the cure. If I am the problem, I can’t be the cure, the cure has to come from outside of me. So it can’t be more knowledge and it can’t be modified behavior. I need a heart transplant, and that is exactly the promise that Christ makes each of us. If we accept the gift of grace, Christ does the work and fixes our sin account for us. That is the lifeline that I’m sure Tebow and Tressel and Paterno and I are clinging to. There are many voices that will say we are beyond forgiveness, but there is one Voice saying we’re not, and that’s the only one we need to listen to.

To say that my desktop computer is on its last legs is just a bit of an understatement. I built it in 2003 for my last year of college and it has served me faithfully with only a harddrive and operating system upgrade. However, it makes very strange noises and it’s getting progressively slower so Lisa and I tentatively made plans for its replacement and we both seemed to think an iPad would make sense since it would cost about the same and be a bit more portable and convenient for travel. Then along came an opportunity to buy one through my incredibly generous brother and we jumped on it about 3 weeks ago.

The great thing about the iPad was the very shallow learning curve. I like to learn as I go with computers and software and everything happens pretty much intuitively with the iPad. There are a few odd things (moving icons around the home screen is a bit trickier than it needs to be) and there are a few incredibly annoying things (I had to give my credit card information to Apple three times in the first three days and I didn’t even buy anything), but there were a few extremely cool moments too (like downloading my digital copy of Harry Potter 7 directly to the device rather than to my PC and then syncing). Put together, the cool moments give the iPad an almost mysteriously futuristic feel, like this is something that came out of an episode of Star Trek. So, on the whole, it’s a great device and it fees like the future, despite Apple’s stranglehold on how I try to put anything on to it.

Let’s be honest here: Apple is either the Walmart or the new Microsoft of the computing world, despite what all the Applecolytes try to say. Apple takes 30% off the top from anything bought or sold in the Apple App Store and, oh yeah, you can only buy things in the Apple App Store. I like knowing that the apps in the store are properly vetted by Apple, but the practice of banning user-created apps with great ideas so they can steal them is more than a little wrong. So the best thing to happen to the device is that it is an Apple product and the worst thing to happen to the device is that it is an Apple product. So the shine is off the fruit, but hey, that’s capitalism I guess.

But truly the biggest and best thing I’ve discovered with the iPad is this: there is stuff to read on the internet! To be honest about my internet habits prior to the iPad is a bit embarrassing. Check out this WWII forum here and that one there and look up some shopping stuff for things I want to buy; put off answering some email, check the Facebook newsfeed obsessively, and maybe stay up on a webcomic. Although I was reading a lot, I wasn’t actually doing it with the intention of gaining any knowledge. That’s where the iPad has changed everything. The fantastic Flipboard app has made me give in to Google Reader and now I’m collecting blog subscriptions with glee. And it makes Facebook a lot more interesting too. The Economist, New York Times, and Wired magazine all have fantastic apps that I’ve been enjoying immensely. I’ve even found that if I receive a PDF or .doc attachment in email, I will leave the desktop, get the iPad, find a couch, and read it there. In other words: I’m enjoying reading the internet again. Who knew there was so much smart stuff there?

Where this finds its strangest in-road is comics. Marvel, DC, and Dark Horse all have amazing apps (in addition to Graphicly, Comicology, and some others) and there is a ton of free content out there. This is dangerous for me. I gave up buying print comics last fall because of the expense and just generally getting bored with most of the storylines, but I’m ravenously devouring comics again because of the iPad. Part of it is the way that reading them has evolved. All of these apps have a great feature that (heresy in 3, 2, . .. ) makes for a better experience than reading a print comic (for me at least). I’m a dumb comic reader: I tend to focus so much on the story that I zip through and don’t spend too much time appreciating the art that is fully half of the comic I just read. But the guided view for reading comics pulls up each panel individually and forces me to consider each one rather than flying through the page as fast as I can. As I said, for me it’s a better experience. If something is going to pull me back into comics, this might be it. Please know that this pains me: I consider myself a comic reader, not a collector, but I would hate to see the local comic book store become obsolete and disappear. But I love reading them on the iPad, I don’t have to manage a physical collection of comics, and they’re generally cheaper and it doesn’t cost gas money to get to the comic store and back when you can download. So, I’m torn.

The biggest question though is if the iPad will replace my desktop. I will be the first to say I was surprised at just how little I was on my desktop while the iPad was in the house. Very, very little actually. This is a surprising amount you can do on the device and I’m looking forward to the next version of iOS that promises to do more to severe the tie between iPad and desktop. As I’ve basically said so far though, the iPad is the perfect medium to comfortably enjoy absorbing the internet’s best information. So really, my iPad review comes down to this: I was shocked that I like to read stuff on the computer again and very thankful that this clever little device helped me to find that love again.

What I was expecting when I came back downstairs a little while later was to see Lisa looking forlorn as she gazed out the window at the rabbit. What I wasn’t expecting was to see her in tears kneeling by the door with the rabbit cradled in her arms. Apparently my first question was, “You brought it inside?!” and that’s the point where she explained that she took its pulse and felt its heart slowing and couldn’t stand the thought of it dying out there alone in the cold and rain so she brought it inside and held it in a muddy microfiber towel that we used to wipe off the dogs’ paws.

9 times out of 10 I would have ran through the logical arguments against this, which are many and mainly having to do with the inherent and unintended cruelty of the natural world and the rabbit not understanding her intentions nor ever knowing the comfort and warmth of a home to begin with, but something stopped me. What I was witnessing was a simple act of compassion that was very small and meant something maybe only to that rabbit, but it was an act of compassion all the same. And in that moment I realized that any act of compassion, no matter the scale or the reason or the consequence, is a much grander act than indifference solidly backed with logic. What 9 times out of 10 would have seemed silly seemed profound. Lisa didn’t hold that rabbit for any other reason than it was a fellow living creature that had known a hard life and was going out in a senseless death at the hands of some dogs who probably wouldn’t even know what to do with the it once it stopped squeaking. I don’t know if that rabbit felt or understood the compassion or if it was even more terrified that this human had picked it up. But I do know it had a profound effect on me.

Later that night we talked about it and Lisa rightly pointed out that she thought I might be mad that she had brought the rabbit inside. I suppose the 9-out-of-10 confession points to her probably being right. But what really gives me pause here is that maybe means I don’t really understood compassion as well as I ought to. Logical indifference does simplify life quite a bit, after all. The homeless guy with the sign asking for food or work is obviously addicted to something. The driver of the car that just cut me off is, no doubt, a direct descendant of many generations of very sinister people. The kids who aren’t part of our youth ministry probably don’t care anyways and there’s no point reaching out to them. Put in those terms, logical indifference is convenience and compassion is and should be ridiculously inconvenient. And that’s doubly convicting when you spend time railing against convenience in one of your favorite posts on your own blog.

So, if you’ve been paying attention, this has been epiphany based on a rabbit dying in my wife’s arms. Something that happens probably thousands of times daily across the world (well the dying part, not the arms part). Something that, in the big scheme of things, is a pretty silly thing to get worked up about. Something that some of you are still thinking, “So what? It’s just a rabbit,” about. And you’re right. But I’m right too. Compassion is kind of a lost art but it’s one of the essential things that make us human. If the positions were reversed, that rabbit wouldn’t care at all about my wife dying because animals just don’t have that capacity. But we do and we have it for a reason. It may not mean anything to that homeless person who really is just trying to score booze or drugs, but seeing others demonstrate compassion can wake us up to our own capacity for compassion and that’s an amazing thing.

“The needs are great, and none of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with great love, and together we can do something wonderful.”
-Mother Teresa

• Listen here (mp3 file)
• Read here (webpage)

The sermon text is John 13:34-35, 14:1-7.

Some supplementary material:

• Nibbles & Nudges (QHPC’s weekly sermon preview)
• Sermon Powerpoint (coming soon)
• Sermon handout (coming soon)

Music:

• “That Where I Am, There You . . .” by Rich Mullins (2nd hymn)
• “This Is Home” by Switchfoot (offertory)
• “Big House” by Audio Adrenaline (closing hymn)
• “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” by U2 (postlude)

Thanks to Ben Acton for lots of advice in putting this one together, Quail Holla’s  youth for leading worship as liturgists and musicians, and the QHPC congregation for letting me up there in the first place!

To explore this idea I want to return to the thought that it’s the job of the artist to express an opinion. Is it? I’m not so sure. I think classically the job of the artist is to show us the world around us in a new light or from a fresh perspective. To reflect back truth. However, truth and opinion are different things. We all learned the difference between objective and subjective and even though those two words share 90% of the same letters, the 2 or 3 that are different carry a lot of weight. Truth and opinion are different things. So, is it the job of the artist to reflect the subjective or the objective? It has to be both, but it’s clearly not just one or the other. In fact, I’d say that art as expression of opinion and not truth is propaganda. Art without subjectivity though isn’t art either, it’s reproduction, facsimile. Art is an aesthetic exercise and the heart of aesthetics is beauty and, as the poet said, truth is beauty and beauty truth. So it’s really not possible to have one without the other.

But the flip side of that is that we can’t escape our subjectivity. We just can’t. We carry around several lenses through which the world. Theologians call that hermeneutics. Sociologists might refer to these lenses as our separate identities: religious, political, ethnic, gender, and so on. None of these individual identities define us, but they are a part of us. So any objectivity we represent through art is going to carry subjectivity. Does that make objectivity a necessary evil? Absolutely not. None of us share the same opinions on much of anything, but we can agree that 2+2=4. We can agree that green is the color of the grass and blue is the color of a clear sky. Truth is common ground. Truth is where we can come together and then enjoy a starting point to explore the subjective.

But sometimes the lines between subjective and objective are a little bit blurred and that’s a fascinating place to me. That blurring happens in the real stories. The ones that endure. The ones that aren’t just cool or interesting, the ones that have an atomic effect on our society. These are the stories that become cultural touchstones. But no matter who the characters are or where or when the story is set, they rely on archetypes and tropes and values and mores that are universal through human space and time. A modern American with enough imagination can get into The Odyssey just as much as an ancient Greek could be enthralled by Star Wars. These stories are the ones that transcend generations and resonate within us because they’re so universal. They live and breathe in the common ground. These stories root through the already created plotlines and characters and find the ones that speak to the core of what it means to be human, not just one or two of our ephemeral identities. Think about the last 50-60 years and the stories that have endured: The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter, and a whole slew of superheroes. That doesn’t happen by accident, nor does it happen by clever marketing. These stories tap into a well that all of humanity drinks from: values that we universally acknowledge and seek to uphold and desire to pass on to the next generation. And that’s the thing that’s quite odd about their values that act as common ground: are these values objective or subjective? You’ll probably get as many different answers as people you ask and solving that riddle isn’t the aim of this post. I bring this up to point out the rich pedigree that The Clone Wars comes from and why it is all the more disappointing that it is so busy sawing off the limb that connects it to its family tree.

Instead of trading on those items that build common ground between creator and audience, TCW is trading on political hot potatoes. The political ideas behind the words and phrases that start this post have very clear and partisan positions. Assigning one set of positions to Senator Amidala and the good guys and the opposite view to the Trade Federation and the bad guys will draw cheers from one side of the aisle and jeers from the other side. And more than jeers, shut down communication. It’s the exact opposite of common ground and, to be frank, Star Wars has no business there. These are not the universally acknowledged values and mores of the films, these are divisive reminders of the complexity of the issues we face and no one has yet to get it completely 100% right.

Now all of this is not to say that fiction has to stay entirely within the realm of the universally accepted. Not at all. But do the hard work of being creative enough to find that common ground before you start building your case for your perspective. I railed against District 9 and Avatar for being so shallow in the creativity of their stories. By not going far enough creatively to create distance and common ground they alienated (pun!) huge chunks of their audience who kept up their guard. On the opposite side of that is How to Train Your Dragon. I haven’t made it a secret that I love this film and its reviews (98% on Rotten Tomatoes!) are a testament to its quality. But what I really love about this film is how quietly subversive it is. On the surface this is a movie about being unique and an individual and finding your place in the world. Below the surface it is an incredibly subversive movie about breaking cycles of violence through non-violence. No one talks about that though. Why? Because the film built common ground based on adolescent trials and friendship and first love and finding purpose and meaning. The audience related and then the audience never even noticed they were receiving a profound message of how we are to love our enemies. That’s art, folks. That’s the total package.

The text for my freshman English course in college was Everything’s an Argument and I think that’s incredibly true and profound. The difference then is in the quality of the argument and the key to a quality argument is the packaging in many ways. We live in a time with enough division in the public sector, it shouldn’t have to extend to arts and entertainment. And it doesn’t need to if we’re willing to hold ourselves to a standard of creativity that isn’t okay with the quick and easy and instead values understanding and seeking of common ground. After all this it shouldn’t be any surprise that last bit sounds a bit like the light and dark side of the Force. There’s a reason for that.

One of the nice things about being a dog owner is that it forces you to get out and walk every once in a while.  Being forced to walk means that you end up exploring your immediate living area a little more thoroughly than most people.  For me that meant that I found an interesting route from my street down towards the golf course nearby and around a pond that has beaver and turtles and up through a neighborhood and along the main drag of my subdivision and back to my house.  I liked it because it had some variety: flat, rolling hills, steep hills, neighborhood, road, etc. and it was all on sidewalks.  So, one day I decided to run it.  And I did, but more of a walk and run mix, but I finished it and that was the important thing.

The next step, and I believe this is the crucial one, was to go on to www.mapmyrun.com and sign up for a free account.  Once there you can, as the name suggests, map your run with a utility that looks like Google Maps but lets you plot out where your and and then save the route.  It also gives you all kinds of statistics like total distance, shows you were the .5 and mile markers are, and how high up and down in elevation you’re traveling.  I went a little nuts, as I can sometimes be, and set it to satellite view and mapped out my exact run on the sidewalks (especially since I left main roads for part of my route).  You can lose or gain tenths of a mile depending on what side of the street you’re on going around a curve and I like to be accurate.  I’m strange like that sometimes.  But mapmyrun.com is definitely good stuff.  Those of you with smart phones may want to look up their apps, they seem cool too.

Really important for me is to learn where the half mile and mile markers are on your route.  That enables you to set goals for yourself while you’re running.  I remember reading in some Tom Clancy book that the secret to lasting through torture or interrogation is to set goals for yourself.  The military trains people to hold out until that large cloud passes completely past the sun or the minute hand on the clock goes from :10 to :35.  I decided to steal that idea and set short, obtainable goals for myself to show me that I could make it that far.  More specifically, I began with the intention of running the first full mile.  Once I got there I’d walk the second mile because it is really hilly.  Then I’d run the last .41 of a mile.  Or try to.  While still getting into the whole running thing I’d end up setting really small goals along that last .41 because it was killing me.  Run to the next intersection, run to the end of that hedge.  If I got to that intersection or hedge and I was still alive and not in danger of having a vital organ bursting, I would reset the goal and keep going.  The next time I’d do the run, I’d try to run the first hill of the second hilly mile and then walk the rest.  And then I’d run the first hill, walk the second hill, and run the third hill.  After a couple of weeks I was running the entire 2.41 and the skies opened up and a shaft of light illumined my face and a runner was born!

Besides distance goals, I set time goals as well, even while doing the run/walk combos.  Running is inherently faster than walking, obviously, so the less walking you do, the faster your time will be, right?  Well, not for me.  I noticed that when I’d interject short walks I’d actually run faster.  For some reason that felt like cheating so I then made it my goal to run the whole thing in a shorter amount of time than if I was doing my best walk/run.  That was actually a much more challenging goal than trying to complete the route with just running.  This is where I hit a sort of plateau in my times and I stopped improving for some reason.  So, as I ran I began to become more aware of where I was losing time.  For me it was the hills.  I’d slow down to a snail’s pace to get up those monstrosities and I realized that if I really wanted to shed some seconds, I was going to have to speed up on the hills.  By this time I was stronger and faster but I hadn’t really pushed myself that hard so I didn’t know that.  But the time goals helped me to realize that and I’ve dropped nearly 3 minutes from that 2.41 mile route.

Wait, how do I know that statistic about the time?  It’s because mapmyrun.com also has a training log where you can log what route you ran on what day and how long it took.  You can also add in a ton of other information that I usually just skip.  Once you add the basics about route and time you get some also helpful data like calories burned and your 1 mile pace.  Seeing the days that I ran add up has been a great motivator and given me a sense of accomplishment in my running.  It also really helps because I have a terrible memory and wouldn’t be able to remember any of this without it.  But definitely make use of the training log.

So, once I started being able to run the full amount of my initial route, it was time to start adding distance.  I did this initially by opening up my first route on mapmyrun.com and saving a copy of it and then going in to edit that copy and figuring out how I could extend it.  I tend to extend the route on the back end rather than the front end.  Personally I hate retracing my steps so I always make loops where I don’t retrace my steps and eventually I’ll get to a point where I’ll need to add more on the front and the middle, but I’m not there yet.  I think it was also helpful for me to add small increments at a time.  I started out at 2.41 and then went to 2.8.  My goal was to get to a 5k, which is 3.1, so I added until I got to that goal.  Usually my routes start and end in my driveway as I add distance but the 3.1 ended near my house, not at it.  So, my next route up from that was easy to figure as I kept going around the block.  I have a 3.8 route that I haven’t yet run but look forward to because that’s the next challenge.  You know you can do 3.1, the next .7 miles won’t kill you.  And that’s the trick for me: constantly challenging myself with longer distances (and thus longer times) to make it competitive and fun.  Hopefully that will work for other folks too.

So, that’s it for my main strategy, here are some other bits and pieces that don’t fall anywhere else that have helped me:

• If you’re really into loops and bored with your current one, run it backwards and it will be different.
• Stretch stretch stretch.  Last Thursday I forgot to stretch my quads and pretty quickly into the run I felt pain there but rain through it.  It hurt all weekend.  If I have time I’ll get on the Wii Fit + and do a yoga routine that’s about 18 minutes to warm up.  That really helps and really minimizes the pain when you’re first starting out.  Also, walk around the block or up and down the street to cool down and then stretch again.  Stretching has even become kind of fun as I’m not flexible at all and being able to stretch farther is another mini-competition for me.
• I haven’t run with another person but I take Maggie running with me.  She’s pretty good and it’s helped her walking skills a lot as she likes to think she’s in charge of walks.  I did notice that she’s usually not up for the sprints at the end but at that point she’s so tired I can drop the leash and know she’ll follow me home and not try to run off.  The runs are good for a high energy dog, that’s for sure.
• I used to not be able to do much exercise in the morning ’cause I would feel so sick for some reason.  But as it’s gotten hotter here in NC I realized that I would need to run early or late and it’s easier to run early.  I have luckily happened upon a quick breakfast that works very well for me, is reasonably healthy, and I don’t get nauseous while running: coffee, yogurt, water, and fruit.  Coffee seems like a strange one because it’s supposed to be dehydrating, right?  Wrong.  If you’re used to caffeine being in your system then you don’t have to worry about the caffeine taking away your precious water.  The caffeine will help get your body going, burn fat more efficiently, and all that fun stuff.  Don’t believe me?  See the Nutrition Diva’s takes on dehydration and caffeine.  Just a warning, I drink my coffee black so I don’t know how sugar or cream will affect that.  Yogurt is great for your digestive system and has a bit of sugar which is helpful.  As for fruit, I like to eat bananas because I get cramps in my side pretty easily and the potassium helps stop cramps.  If not, oranges are awesome but I’ve been known to eat strawberries or blueberries too.  Sometimes if I’m real crazy I may eat a granola bar too.  I like to give myself at least 30 minutes between eating and running but I’ve come in under that and haven’t suffered undue effects from that.  And water is important, but sip and try to finish before you start running or you’ll be feeling it glugging around in your gut as you start out.  Most of the time when I run I’m probably dehydrated but I get away with it because I’m not running that far of a distance.  I think it’s more comfortable to be running a little dehydrated than overhydrated so that works for me.
• If you are running for weight loss one of the worst things you can do is come home and completely undo all your calorie expenditure with a Gatorade and a Snickers or something.  According to mapmyrun.com, I’m averaging about 300 calories in a 25 minute run.  You can see how quickly a 150 calorie Gatorade will eat into that.  I know it’s hard, but if you can restrain yourself to just drinking water to replenish what you’ve sweated out, you’ll be a lot better off in the long run.  Sports drinks with electrolytes are only really necessary if you’ve been out for more than an hour in a very hot environment.  On days when my schedule is pretty free I will try to run right before a meal.  That way your stomach is emptiest and that’s when the most fat-burning will take place (according to ND) and then you can satisfy your urge to eat and not be consuming basically another meal.  Time magazine had a great article on this bizarre thing in our bodies that makes our temptation to overindulge even stronger after exercise, undoing any good we just did.  Knowing that fact and learning to overcome it and being satisfied with just water is a huge step in running to lose weight.  I also realize that there’s a lot of conflicting studies and results here so just do what works for you.  If you feel terrible running with an empty stomach, don’t.  If you can not stand being that hungry after running, time it so it’s right before a meal.  It does get easier to restrain yourself as you go along though.

My very last thought is on discipline.  I think part of my impetus to run came from this quote by Gen. George S. Patton: “You cannot be disciplined in great things and indiscipline in small things.”  I really do strive to be a more disciplined person in many ways but my nature doesn’t tend that way.  So, running for me has become a small form of discipline that has been helping my discipline in other matters: spending money, eating, spiritual disciplines, and others.  I still have a long way to go, but running is one of those small goals that leads to attainment of bigger goals I believe.  Our bodies and our minds need discipline.  If we let them do their own thing we’ll be going places we don’t want to go.  This is one of those growing up things that has been no fun to learn but I’m glad I finally know it as I’m starting to enjoy the challenge of learning self-discipline as well.  Strange, I know, but I also like running now so go figure.

And finally, here’s a great article on how to get started running from an expert and not just some guy with a bit of success and a blog.

• In 2009 I helped make a music video; in 2010 I will help make a movie: In case you haven’t seen it yet, I got invited to participate in the making of a music video.  The genesis of this project began when my good friend Jeremy told me that Ransom.tv (a new website put out by the Billy Graham Evangelical Association) was doing a video for a song called “This Is War” and were thinking about getting some reenactors involved.  I pressed the issue and eventually pitched an overly complex story idea for a 3:15 music video that wouldn’t have dialog which was then wisely pared down into something that could be filmed and attached to the song.  Hooray!  That story, incidentally, is part of the much longer WWII epic I have about 35% written in my head and you may have seen part of on this very blog.  Anyways, after not being sure whether the video would be made, I got word from the director, a great guy named Kevin, that it was a go.  That month.  Basically I had 20 days to find close to 40 reenactors.  Yikes.  But it all came together and the video was amazing.  Spectacular.  19,000 views in 4 weeks and not a single bad review.  And I bashed a German skull with my helmet.  Fear me.  Anyways, it was extremely gratifying to see something that I help create come to life and then get to participate in the filming process.  I’ve always been a big fan of film and have always kinda wanted to go behind the curtain.  So, I had my taste and now I want the full buffet.  I don’t  really know how much I can say about the upcoming project for 2010, but I have been accepted as an extra in a WWII film being shot on location with a dreamteam director/military advisor.  I’m pee my pants excited for this.  So, if I disappear in April, that’s where I am.  Living the dream.
• In 2009 I wrote a comic book; in 2010 I hope to write a graphic novel: As I mentioned above, I pitched an idea to Ransom. tv for the video and then waited a couple weeks before hearing anything.  When all seemed lost and it wasn’t going to get made, I pitched the same story to Jeremy but maybe doing it as a comic book online for the site instead.  Jeremy gave me the ok so I went ahead and contacted the oh-so-talented Kelly Swann (who I discovered through WordPress by clicking on a WWII tag one day) to see if she’d be interested in drawing the script.  Kelly accepted and we’re on this odyssey together with the 4 pages in the can and another 18 or so to go.  I’m super excited about the whole thing and I feel completely unworthy of having such a great artist drawing my words.  What I quickly discovered is this: it’s addictive.  Writing the script and getting excited and then seeing the sketches and then the pencils and then the inks come in is a drug.  A drug I want more of.  So, while my ideas are closely-guarded secrets, I’m hoping to move on to a new project longer than a 22 page comic book next.  They’re all WWII ideas, but they’ll go in some different places than a standard ETO story.  I’m guessing it will be a good while before any of them really see the light of day, but here’s to hoping!
• In 2009 I stopped pushing the boulder uphill and started chasing it downhill; in 2010 I hope it just starts moving faster: That heading is strictly metaphor in case you were wondering.  In March 2009 I started my fourth year at Quail Hollow Presbyterian as youth director.  Four years, that’s over double the average life-expectancy of a youth worker at a church these days.  So, a combination of my longevity, the grace of God, and me starting to learn some stuff coalesced into the most vital I’ve seen our youth ministry since I started here.  I don’t like to lean on numbers as a gauge, but I think that when you see increases or decreases it can tell you something about the vitality of your ministry.  So, it was really gratifying and humbling to see our numbers nearly triple as we began the new “year” in the fall.  Thus the abandoning of the Sisyphusian image for a new one that lacks any roots in Greek mythology.  Potential energy has been expended, kinetic energy is in play, and momentum is building.  I work with a great team of adult leaders, have the privilege of serving a wonderful group of parents, and minister to a group of kids that I wouldn’t trade for anything.  I’m inspired, challenged, and a witness to God’s activity because of each of them.
• In 2009 I bought a house and a car (read: mortgage and car payment); in 2010 I hope to become more adult-ier: It still kinda weirds me out to consider the fact that I’m married, live in a house, and own my own car.  Maybe just 10 short years ago those were things I thought about in a way-off, distant future.  Like we’d have flying cars and be eating all our meals in vitamins kind of future.  But, here I am, certifiably adult (pun intended).  But, you know, it’s not really half bad.  There’s a freedom here to pursue what I want to.  Notice that the first two items on this list are creative pursuits and professional came third.  That’s not a half bad thing in the grand scheme of things.  Now, that all could change instantly, but for right now it’s working.  But as the funny books remind us, with great power comes great responsibility.  I’m still hoping to grow into that responsibility though.  My money/budget skills are lacking at best, my planning for the future lobe of the brain has apparently been lobotomized, and I’m still getting letters from the HOA.  However, if there’s one thing that 28 year old me has over 18 year old me, it’s the ability to start thinking long-term.  I don’t think anyone will dispute the fact that it’s better to be proactive than reactive.  And that’s where I want to be.  I’m not trying to improve these areas just so I can be a better suburbanite, but rather so I’m in control of my stuff and my stuff isn’t controlling me.  The better I manage my life, the more time and energy and passion I can put into the things that actually matter and will outlast and outlive me.
• In 2009 I saw a shocking number of friends have children; in 2010 I will continue to watch in numbed horror: (Sorry, Mom, if you were hoping that first sentence might lead to grandkids.)  And here’s the really annoying part of your friends having kids: they keep saying all the stuff you have heard all your life about how wonderful babies are and all that.  Not one dissenter.  Not one person who publicly acknowledges he or she is a sucker.  So, apparently babies are wonderful.  But if 2009 has taught me one thing, I’m really not that responsible or selfless yet.  But then those same parents keep telling you there is no right or wrong time.  What do they know.  They have babies.
• In 2009 Lisa did not come to her senses; in 2010 she probably won’t come to either: I’ve asked her several times if there has been outside coercion or manipulation but she still denies it.  Thus on October 27, 2009 we entered into our second year of marriage and in just a few days (January 15th) we will celebrate 3 years since we got engaged.  And then on the 17th we will celebrate the 7th anniversary of our first date.  That’s a long time to spend around me for not having a legal obligation to do so.  Which makes her love for me all the more humbling and awesome.  I’m very lucky to be married a to an extremely sweet lady who continually challenges herself to learn and experience new things and doesn’t mind that I smell bad and sometimes leave fighting knives in the bathroom.  At some point (maybe 2010?) I’ll get past the suspicion of brain trauma being the reason she stays with me and accept she just plain loves me, I promise.
• In 2009 I premiered an entirely new WWII impression; in 2010 I hope to premier two more: Here’s one of the cool things about WWII: it’s a world war and that world is filled with all sorts of interesting personalities and stories of vice and virtue, bravery and cowardice.  While crawling through the history books I ran into the stories of Army and Marine dogs and their handlers.  One soldier in particular, a certain Bill Garbo, really helped these stories to come alive and getting to talk with him via email and phone was one of my definite highlights of 2009.  So, now I’m looking to new impressions that might help shed some light on some of the less known stories.  We tend to focus on the European theater and primarily on D-Day here in the States.  Well, that’s just a tiny percentage of the stories out there and there are lessons and examples aplenty out there in the rest of the war.  So, you can look forward to some unique ones coming out.  Tossing around in my head are U.S.M.C. dog handler, Gurkha, Norwegian Commando, Goumier, and the Fiji Infantry Regiment.  Won’t get all of those out, but maybe a few!

So, that’s it.  It was a good year and it will be another good year.  Here’s to 2010!

Okay, here’s the thing about both of these movies: they’re both allegories.  That prompted me to remember the old argument of the Inklings: J. R. R. Tolkein and C. S. Lewis disagreed strongly over the allegory with J. R. against and Lewis very much for.  As I understand it, Tolkein argued that the allegory is a sort of tyranny over the audience.  A in the movie stands for B in the real world and C in the novel stands for D in the newspaper.  That sort of thing.  Imagine it like those tests in school where you have two lists and you have to match the answer to the column in the right with the question on the left.  It’s essentially a closed system because once the consumer of the media in question has connected all the dots, that’s all there is left. There’s very little work for the imagination of the consumer to do as he or she has been led by hand into real world meaning or significance.  So maybe what I was experiencing after these movies was inner revolt at being told what to think (that’s at least the conclusion that my wife and mother came to).

On the other side of the coin is what Tolkein did: create stories in which characters embody certain values, both good and bad, wind them up, and then let them loose in a situation with dire consequences afoot.  The One Ring of Lord of the Rings doesn’t stand for anything at all, no matter how much you try to read into it.  But the quiet perseverance of Frodo or the course correction of Boromir stand as examples of how Tolkein thinks we should act when faced with trial or temptation.  Now there’s an open system that leads the audience, should they choose to engage fully, into a reevaluation of the world around them and the life they lead.  Every person who reads or watches or hears can pick and choose what is worth remembering and what is worth applying to their life.  I may not ever have to carry a magical ring across the country and throw it into a volcano, but there is always the temptation to steal when no one is looking or fudge my taxes because I most likely won’t be audited.  And that’s the way that Star Wars works.  Harry Potter too.  I have a feeling that if you look at the great works throughout history, the legendary epic works that shape societies and socialize the younger generations, they’re probably this form of storytelling too.

This is all what was running through my head as I left Avatar and I was pretty sure that I had come to a point where allegory and I should start seeing other people.  But I realized, I really do like allegory still and The Chronicles of Narnia are just too good to give up and a lot of the movies I’ve made with the youth group are allegory and really good.  So I decided to give it another shot with allegory and that’s when I remembered what had made our relationship so special in the past: defamiliarization.

Defamiliarization is the process where one purposefully introduces allegory as a way of side-stepping over-familiarity with a subject or story or theme.  This is what Lewis does so masterfully in the Chronicles of Narnia.  The characters, stories, and themes of the Bible are re-drawn so completely that Narnia can be enjoyed entirely on the surface as a fantasy tale but the real richness lies in the 90% that’s below the waterline.  Those who have sat through dozens of Christmas Eve and Easter Morning services could see through Narnia that there is an immediacy and excitement to the Gospels when considered in this new light.  There is a thrill of discovery there, but it’s more archaeology than exploration; an uncovering of what has been previously known rather than the thrill of something entirely new.

It was through this re-evaluation of defamiliarization that I realized what is missing from District 9 and Avatar: creativity.  Yes, creativity.  Sure, both movies have amazingly creative visuals and alien design and all that, but if creativity is a game of tag, then these two movies are those wieners who would stand one foot away from base and would then tag up if “it” came within 10 feet of them.  There’s no real extension in the metaphors here.  Let’s look at the facts here: D9 takes place in South Africa. In Johannesburg.  In a slum.  Is there any question that we’re talking about apartheid here?  Honestly, this movie could have saved itself millions and just been about apartheid.  I mean, the metaphor is that paper thin.  While Avatar isn’t quite so narrow in scope, you have aliens who are essentially Native Americans, from bows and arrows right down to prayer over animals they have killed.  And in both cases, who are the antagonists?  White humans.  Okay, so you kind of disguised the heroes but then the villains are really just the grandchildren of their 21st or 20th century counterparts.  How is that unfamiliar?

The next logical question is why it even matters that they’re not creative “enough.”  It matters because these are message movies.  They clearly had something to say about relationships between humans currently living on the planet.  Yes, racism and idiocy still abound in the world today, but I’d like to think that most people seeing these movies agree that we need to treat all races equally and we need to be diligent and careful in our consumption of the earth’s resources.  But what about the Marines or other military personnel or their families who see Avatar and agree with the messages but find themselves or their loved ones resembling the bad guys for no other reason than the writers couldn’t be bothered to stretch themselves a little bit more?  I have a feeling you lost some folks there.  Same with the government officials being lampooned in District 9.  If you’re going to make art and not just entertainment, try to be inclusive, don’t alienate (get it?).  By not going far enough to create the distance between the fiction and non-fiction, by using the chainsaw rather than the scalpel, the filmmakers lost the opportunity to really reach out and instead end up preaching to the choir.

Before going to see Avatar, I was wondering if it would truly be the new Star Wars.  SW was a cultural event because it combined visual storytelling that was unlike anything ever seen before with the myths that dwell in our souls at a time of distrust towards the government, fear of the future, and rampant cynicism.  Avatar definitely had the timing right (even kids’ movies are cynical these days), but I think SW is safe for now.  Say what you will about the rivalry between George Lucas and James Cameron, District Avatar has done nothing for me other than to reaffirm that Lucas is up there with Tolkein and Lewis.  These are the storytellers who were able to stand on the shoulders of giants and tell us about new worlds, not just hand us a CGIed version of reality.

Thank you seems like a pretty inadequate phrase to cover the appreciation that the people of our country and New Guinea and all the other places you served during WWII have for the work that you, Teddy, and the 26th accomplished in your time there, and also for your time with the 112th RCT.  But, it’s the best we got, so thank you.  And also thank you for your willingness to pull up those memories and experiences and share them with me.  You’ve been an inspiration to me with the work ethic that exemplifies what makes your generation the greatest.  Thank you for everything.

(Some of my friends and family have added their thanks down below, so make sure you scroll down!)

Saw a repost of this on Facebook and went ballistic in a comment but I figure this is important enough to share with everyone else because of the sheer amount of misinformation packed into two sentences. Anyways, here’s how I would respond to Mr. Moore if I was given the chance:

Not that I’m particularly pleased with how long it’s taking to stabilize Afghanistan, but this is an incredibly ignorant statement on two fronts. First, the current war in Afghanistan is an apples to oranges comparison to WWII. WWII was a war fought to force the fascist governments into unconditional surrender and thereby bring about regime change in those countries. That happened in Afghanistan within months. The current war in Afghanistan is with the Taliban insurgency, not the Taliban government (and yes, there were “insurgents” in Germany and Japan after the war; however, the Taliban insurgency is quite a bit more intense). And fighting an insurgency is an entirely different thing than fighting a governmen. Vietnam is a great example of that. Why the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are still referred to as wars is beyond me.  Those wars ended when Saddam’s government and the Taliban were taken out of power.  Literally speaking, wars are fought between two governments and now that there are no governments in those countries, there is no war.  Less literally, wars are fought between two organized armies and the United States and her allies represent the only organized armies in those countries as they are insurgencies.  What is happening in Iraq and Afghanistan are not wars.

Second, to say that the U.S. defeated “the Nazis, Mussolini and the Japanese in less than 3 and 1/2 years” is to completely discount the fact that we fought with allies who, in some cases, fought twice as long as we did.  This, simply put, is an incredibly narrow and superficial view of world events. Try to tell the Chinese that WWII started on 12/7/41 when the Japanese marched into Manchuria in September, 1931.  Or the Ethiopians when the Italians came in 1935. And of course the Poles in 1939 and the French in 1940 when the Blitzkrieg blew through their countries. Oh, and don’t tell the British that the war started in ’41 either, they seem to be under the impression that they were fighting before that.  And don’t forget that we still have significant numbers of troop still posted in Germany and Japan as a result of WWII.

All of this is not to discount what is happening in Iraq and Afghanistan today.  It may not be a “war,” but the soldiers and civilians in harms way over there are still sacrificing a great deal in the hopes of creating a better future, something that everyone deserves and something that we can hopefully one day achieve without needing war.