Learning to be a Man of Understanding

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.  I Corinthians 13:11

Recently someone told me that I was the most humble person they knew.  Now, I am not trying to boast about this, but anyone that hasn’t talked to me in the last 5 years would probably question that person’s judgment.  When I was younger I devoted a lot of time to being obnoxious and argumentative for absolutely no good reason.  (Some people who know me well now would question my use of the past tense.)  There are many reasons for the dramatic changes I’ve gone through; my motorcycle accident and resulting paralysis; dating and marrying Allison; and, most importantly, growing in my faith.

I’m not entirely sure why I was thinking about this tonight, but I realized that as I get older, I think more and as I spend more time thinking, the less time I spend talking.  I’ve learned that talking is overrated.  In fact, opening my mouth is usually how I get into trouble.  Through many discussions (and arguments) I’ve discovered that I am not humble and quite frequently, when I talk, I do so in order to prove myself to other people.  I try to prove my worth to others when I feel insecure.  I don’t have much that I can point to in order to distinguish myself from other people other than my knowledge and wit, so I try to destroy people in arguments.  I am my own idol and I want all others to bow to my intellect so that I can feel good about myself.

I look back on my life as the tenth “anniversary” of my motorcycle accident rapidly approaches and I can see God’s hand on me throughout my struggles, molding me into the man I am today.  He broke me down and has spent the last ten years attempting to build me up into the man he wants me to be.  Part of that has been teaching me to keep my mouth shut and to be more contemplative.  While at times I may be too quiet and contemplative, I’d rather keep my mouth shut and let people think I’m a fool than open it and confirm their suspicions (not entirely sure who first said that but it is not a Nathan original).  Despite knowing this, I do still struggle with Humility.  I work very hard at it, and yet I often fail to be humble.  While I do work at it, I certainly can’t claim that any success I may have is my own.

The person that said I was the most humble person they know asked me to help them with humility.  What do I know about humility?  Honestly I almost told him I was the last person he should ask for help in this area.  I know how proud and arrogant I can be.  I guess the key to humility for me is to know how un-humble I am (which is really funny).  What gives me worth is not my knowledge or my intellect or wit.  What pleases God is, “a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart” Psalm 51:17 and all the worth I have is found in Christ.

The purpose in a man’s heart is like deep water,
but a man of understanding will draw it out.  Proverbs 20:5

Change of Season

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven… What gain has the worker from his toil? I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man.”  Ecclesiastes 3:1, 9-13

Lately I’ve been pondering the change in seasons.  While the current indecisiveness of the seasons here in Southern California is worth considering, this was not the focus of my thoughts.  I was more concerned with the seasons of life.  While this term may be cliche or trite, it is truly biblical.  “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” Ecclesiastes 3:1.  I guess I’ve been considering the seasons because my wife and I have found ourselves at a crossroads.  Except we aren’t quite there yet.

When I was younger my family would go on these long road trips.  One trip in particular stands out in my mind: When I was 7, my mom put me on a plane that flew clear across the country to Toronto Canada where my grandparents picked me up at the airport for a month long trek home.  After meandering our way across the United States, I remember sitting between the front seats of the motor home we were traveling in and being so excited as we drove through Temecula.  I knew we were close to home, but apparently I had forgotten just how far away it really was.  Every time we crested a hill I thought we would be seeing Escondido.  Now, Temecula really isn’t that far from Escondido but when you’ve been away from home for a month, 20 minutes is nearly unbearable. Rather than enjoying the last part of my grand adventure with my grandparents, I was in agony.

Lately, my wife and I have been feeling the same way.  We both know what we want but at the moment we are both stuck and unable to move forward to grasp what we want.  I’ve always known that there are seasons for all things in our lives but what I forgot was the transition from one season to the next.  At this point, I am entirely sick of winter.  I’m ready for the heat and the sunshine but it just refuses to come.  During this time of change in the seasons, I need to remember to be joyful and enjoy the weather for what it is.  Despite some early signs of summer, it may yet be further away than I realize.  (Afterall, there was a “year without a summer” during the Little Ice Age).

As for my life, I do need to remember that, even in a time of transition, I need to be striving for my best for God’s highest glory.  I am often tempted to complain or be dissatisfied, but God has made everything beautiful in His time, as Eccl 3:11 says, and I need to rest in his timing for my life.  I must be patient and find joy in my toils, for this is a gift from God.

“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Be Silent, Be Still…

Tonight I had the privilege of accompanying my wife to a dance concert a friend of ours was in at Mira Costa College.  I had never attended a dance concert before and I had no idea exactly what I was getting myself in to.  I must say that I was (at least 90%) pleasantly surprised.  I laughed, I cried (no, not really, but it illustrates my point), but after one dance, I wanted to crawl under my chair and die.

Overall I must say that the dancers were very talented and I can tell that they put enormous amounts of time and energy in to preparing for this show.  I’m not really a fan of modern dance, let alone modern anything, but I was truly moved by some of the modern dance performances.  The movements of the dancers conveyed a meaning and depth that words alone couldn’t communicate.  This post is not about those dances.

This post is about one specific dance.  I wish I had it on video so I could watch it a few more times.  I feel like I would need to in order to gather my thoughts enough to fully explain why I hated it so much.  I don’t know if this is characteristic of modern dance in general but in this dance so much was going on in so many different places that it was hard to know where to look.  While having depth is good, having 6 different people doing 6 entirely different things at the same time is just confusing and lacks focus.

Another thing that bothered me (and does often bother me with modern dance or contemporary art) is what I’d like to call “general weirdness”.  Doing weird things apparently is artistic, possibly even “avant garde”.  While I do recongnize that everything, including dance, progresses and changes over time, and often those changes are brought about by people with strange ideas, being weird doesn’t make you creative or artistic.  It just makes you weird.  There was one particular part where the music stops entirely, and this guy goes running across the stage straight at one of the girls who jumps as he collides into her and then carries her off stage.  There was a loud, audible thud.  I’m surprised neither dancer had the wind knocked out of them.  He did this two more times, with no music, and no one else on stage even moving.  The only time you want everyone in the theatre to laugh is when you’re doing a comedy and this was definitely not meant to be humorous.

This dance reminded me of something that I read in The Call by Oz Guinness not too long ago.  He says, “In his excellent book The Seven Deadly Sins Today, journalist Henry Fairley suggests that the motto for our times might be ‘The Revenge of Failure.’  If we cannot paint well, we destroy the canons of painting and pass ourselves as painters.  If we cannot or will not read, we dismiss linear thinking as irrelevant and dispense with reading.  In area after area, if we are not iclined to submit to the rogors of the discipline, we destroy the standards and pass ourselves off as acceptable.”  I believe that Fairley has a point here.  Contemporary artistic movements, including modern dance,  seem to try to shake off the traditional, graceful, and elegant for something more edgy and raw.  I do appreciate the effort to reimagine the arts but quite often the way they reinvent things just makes them ugly.

I am not one to bash art but what I saw in this dance tonight was, in my opinion, not art.  It was just weird.

Just so I don’t end on a bad note, I do need to say that my favorite dance was the shoe dance.  No, I am not just saying that because our friend was in it (although she was and she did very well).  The dance was clever and fun and just down right entertaining.  In fact, all the dances were great (except that one) and I had a great time.  I would highly recommend this event and if you are interested in going, you can purchase tickets online here: http://www.miracosta.edu/Instruction/Dance/   They have just one more show, today at 2, and online sales end at 1.