Some Way Forward

Posted on May 6, 2020 by awtraughber

We’re at an interesting pivot point, I think.  After weeks of lockdown and moving around in small circles, the broader world is slowly, cautiously, opening back up.  Every place is a little different, just like everyone’s opinion is a little different.  People have different levels of skin in the game, which can be good because it can bring a better perspective.  What will be most interesting for from a systems-perspective will be how things do or do not change as things fall back into place . . . perhaps some things will fall back into place while other things fall off the board completely.

Andy Crouch and the team at Praxis Labs have been meeting and are releasing some of their thoughts about some way forward.  I’ve posted about their thoughts a couple of times before.  In a post today, the group articulated some of their own founding, guiding principles.  The whole piece is definitely worth a read and reflection.  Something that resonated with me based on the idea of “stress tests” and what we’ve learned particularly in the context of withdrawal and control:

Withdrawal is the option of simply minimizing one’s responsibility and risk, often by revisiting the safety we experienced, or wish we had, in our childhood. Some of our Withdrawal responses are almost unconscious and involuntary — many of us have found ourselves sleeping far more than at any time in our adult lives . . .

Others have headed toward the Control quadrant to deal with the out-of-control nature of our times. We have been tempted to read incessantly, to “master” subjects like epidemiology in order to have a clear line of sight for what is coming next. Addictions and other compulsive behaviors are the classic results of a quest for control, and sometimes withdrawal as well . . .

All these dynamics were present before the Covid-19 crisis, to be sure — but just as the stress test reveals the underlying disease that might have initially presented as a fairly minor symptom, so this crisis has shown that we are far from being the persons, friends, family members, and leaders that we want to be. If the crisis were just a “blizzard” that is going to pass quickly, allowing us to return to normal, we might be able to ignore the results of this test. But if we are entering into an enduring season of new challenges, it would be wise to use this chance to diagnose the true state of our heart and accept a prescription and a training plan for improved health in the coming weeks and months.

From there, the article focuses on the “Praxis Rule of Life” and how this like time, money, and decision-making might have been affected by Our Current Moment.  I like the use of the word “remedy” throughout this part of the piece.

I like the Praxis thinks about their task (which is about entrepreneurial work but can be generalized to other areas of life), particularly about “creative restoration through sacrifice.”

The article ends with an articulation of a “first task” moving forward:

So our first task, as we step out of the blizzard into the conditions of a wintry season and possibly a permanently changed climate, is to become the kinds of people who can give ourselves, not just in ambition or aspiration, but with actual authority and capacity, to the work of creative restoration through sacrifice. What practices do we need to commit to, or recommit to, in light of the hard truths we’ve learned about ourselves in the crucible of suffering? What will help us become the people we know we are meant to be? And whom do we trust enough to ask them to help us get there? Answering these questions, and acting on the answers, will prepare us for leadership in winter, and beyond.

All good questions to think through over the next few days and weeks.  You can read the whole article here.  Highly recommended.

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Variations on a Well-Chosen Theme

Posted on May 4, 2020 by awtraughber

Over the years, Brandon Flowers and the Killers have been able to dig deep into a kind of storytelling line through their music that captures something a little Americana with a twist of Vegas thrown in.  They have a new album dropping later this month titled Imploding the Mirage that has another song that has picked up that thread, “Caution.”  Here the band does a sparse arrangement of another new song, “Blowback.”  Good lyrics, great music, and strong vocals, and all from CBS Saturday Morning . . .

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Literary or Fragile

Posted on May 2, 2020 by awtraughber

When our three-months-in Christian Ministries coordinator decided to move back to the mainland, I found myself back in front for our school’s chapel program.  The departure came as a shock to most of us.  I had about two weeks to get something together for the post-departure chapel series.  I settled on theme of cultivating resilient faith.  It was something of a nod to Barna’s Faith for Exiles while also acknowledging the difficulties of transitions beyond our control.

Fast forward a few months to my discovery of a book called Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb.  If found it in an article link from an Alan Jacobs post that pointed towards books that aren’t quite old but that are still relevant reading.  Barnes and Noble had a copy in-store, so I proceeded to purchase the book.  I have obviously taken by dear, sweet time with the book, as I still lack 100 pages from being finished with it.  And while it’s the most abstract book I’ve read in a while, it has presents some wonderfully meaty ideas about “things that gain from disorder.”  The idea of resilience shows up early in the book, mostly as one stop away from the ultimate destination of antifragility.

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Yesterday I got to the part where Taleb started talking about “time and fragility” with the assertion that “the old is superior to the new” and the role that times plays in this revelation.  He introduces the concept of neomania (“the love of the modern for its own sake”) and the fragility it brings.  And then he mentions the ancient roots of the contemporary dining-out experience (which reads a little eerily in Our Current Moment).  He has much to say about technology and our obsession with it.  He writes, perhaps generalizing a bit much, of the “engineering mind” and “additive approach” that comes with over-technologizing.  And he mentions the “love of precision at the expense of applicability” and the “absence of a literary culture” in such circles.  He continues:

This absence of literary culture is actually a marker of future blindness because it is usually accompanied by a denigration of history, a byproduct of unconditional neomania.  Outside of the niche and isolated genre of science fiction, literature is about the past.  We do not learn physics or biology from medieval textbooks, but we still read Homer, Plato, or the very modern Shakespeare.  We cannot talk about sculpture without knowledge of the works of Phidias, Michelangelo, or the great Canova.  These are in the past, not in the future.  Just by setting foot into a museum, the aesthetically minded person is connecting with the elders.  Whether overtly or not, he will tend to acquire and respect historical knowledge, even if it is to reject it.  And the past– properly handled . . . is a much better teacher about the properties of the future than the present.  To understand the future, you do not need technoautistic jargon, obsession with “killer apps,” these sort of things.  You just need the following: some respect for the past, some curiosity about the historical record, a hunger for the wisdom of the elders, and a grasp of the notion of “heuristics,” these often unwritten rules of thumb that are so determining of survival.  In other words, you will be forced to give weight to things that have been around, things that have survived.

We are deeply dependent on technology these days, so I am grateful for it.  But it should be remembered that there are older, deeper things to build with.  There’s a reason why those kinds of things have been around for so long.

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Once More for SHIELD

Posted on April 29, 2020 by awtraughber

These are interesting times for serial television.  Many shows still in production were shut down weeks ago for health concerns, which means those shows probably won’t get full seasons.  Case in point: The Flash will end the season three episodes early, which is good and bad because this season has been a slow burn and could use a good finale to tie things together.

May will bring with it the promise of a couple of comic book-themed shows.  Stargirl on the CW (but first the DC Universe app) looks promising and is packed with some relatively large names.  And then there’s Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, coming back for one final run.  The show left behinds hopes of real Marvel Cinematic Universe crossovers years ago, but it’s still managed to find a place that is both comfortable and envelope-pushing for the faithful viewer.  This time it looks like they’re going back in time.  Here’s what I’m assuming is the final main preview trailer, which spends a lot of time on the immediate threat and not much time at all on the regular cast.

I hope the series ends well.  They’ve done a great job of telling smaller stories over the last few seasons, often working in two or three major arcs that tie together while feeling stand-alone.  I imagine there will be some quality twists and turns as they have to (supposedly) save HYDRA.  We’ll see in just under a month.

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A Moment with Moses

Posted on April 28, 2020 by awtraughber

These last few years I’ve been thinking about “leadership” much more often than I thought it would.  So it’s no surprise that a recent reread of a moment in the life of Moses stuck out to me in a way I hadn’t thought much about before.

In Exodus 18, Moses has led the people out of Egypt to Mount Sinai. Before going to the mountaintop to receive the law, Moses is met by Jethro, his father-in-law.  Jethro brings Moses’ wife and children with him.

7 Moses went out to meet his father-in-law and bowed down and kissed him. And they asked each other of their welfare and went into the tent. 8 Then Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, all the hardship that had come upon them in the way, and how the Lord had delivered them. 9 And Jethro rejoiced for all the good that the Lord had done to Israel, in that he had delivered them out of the hand of the Egyptians.

Then Jethro praises the God Moses has obeyed and even offers a burnt offering and sacrifice.

The next day, Moses gets back to work acting as a judge for the people.  In the midst of it, Jethro gives some advice.  Advice, of course, can be a tricky thing, both in the giving and receiving.  Jethro sees what leading the people has done to Moses and has advice on how to balance things out:

13 The next day Moses sat to judge the people, and the people stood around Moses from morning till evening. 14 When Moses’ father-in-law saw all that he was doing for the people, he said, “What is this that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, and all the people stand around you from morning till evening?” 15 And Moses said to his father-in-law, “Because the people come to me to inquire of God; 16 when they have a dispute, they come to me and I decide between one person and another, and I make them know the statutes of God and his laws.” 17 Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “What you are doing is not good. 18 You and the people with you will certainly wear yourselves out, for the thing is too heavy for you. You are not able to do it alone. 19 Now obey my voice; I will give you advice, and God be with you! You shall represent the people before God and bring their cases to God, 20 and you shall warn them about the statutes and the laws, and make them know the way in which they must walk and what they must do. 21 Moreover, look for able men from all the people, men who fear God, who are trustworthy and hate a bribe, and place such men over the people as chiefs of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens. 22 And let them judge the people at all times. Every great matter they shall bring to you, but any small matter they shall decide themselves. So it will be easier for you, and they will bear the burden with you.

Here’s what is interesting to me at this particular moment: when Jethro makes this suggestion, he isn’t doing it so Moses can pursue his bliss or go out on retreat or to work on some side project.  Jethro sets things up so Moses can do the more vital, only-he-can-do work that God intends: mediate with God, warn the people, and show the people the way they should go.  No side hustle here.  No walk in the park, either.  Moses is to be directly tied to the most basic things about God’s relationship with His people. (One gets the sense that this could even by a kind of “prototype” of the New Testament church and the introduction of deacons as servants with the people.)

And then finally this:

23 If you do this, God will direct you, you will be able to endure, and all this people also will go to their place in peace.”

Divine direction, endurance, and people at peace.  These are real evidences of God’s presence and work among His people.  A good reminder of what can be possible when structure and calling and community work well together, both for the leader and for those being led.

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The Before and After of Easter

Posted on April 25, 2020 by awtraughber

Over the last couple of years, I’ve found the lens of friendship to be one way to deepen my understanding of the Easter story.  I even tried to articulate it in my Easter talk for chapel a couple of weeks ago.  From the “last straw” of Lazarus’ resuscitation to the sleeping inner core of Jesus’ group, from the betrayal of Judas and the denials of Peter to the giving of Mary to to John, the final stories of Easter are full with the stuff of real relationships.  So I was glad to see Peter Leithart at First Things do the same, particularly in contrast to the regular emphasis on the torture, trial, and death of Jesus.  In his recent post titled “Apostles Dead and Risen”:

Edifying as these meditations may be, they don’t represent the focus of the canonical Gospels, which emphasize Christ’s “relational” anguish more than his physical suffering. He comes to his own people, but they prefer Caesar to their heavenly king. For three years, Jesus and his disciples travel together, preach together, heal and exorcise demons together. They share meals, and in private Jesus teaches them the secrets of the kingdom. But at the climax of the mission, the disciples scatter. Judas betrays him, Peter denies him, and the other ten disciples scamper away at the first sign of danger. Because they defy his exhortations to “take up your cross and follow,” Jesus goes to the cross alone.

This reminds us of the fuller sense of what Henri Blocher calls “the utter evilness of evil” that Jesus experiences in his death: it’s not just physical and spiritual, it is also personal.  Very personal.  But Leithart reminds us that with Easter, death does not have the final say.  In his essay, Leithart traces the final things (not) said and (not) done by the disciples in the Maundy Thursday and Good Friday stories.  And he brings things back around with Easter Sunday.

John alone records how the Twelve are re-individualized, reactivated, and reconciled. John is the only Evangelist to inform us that one of the Twelve, the “Beloved Disciple,” is at the cross (19:25–27). John alone writes of Peter’s race with the Beloved Disciple to the empty tomb (20:1–10) and Thomas’s doubts (20:19–29). He alone records the inexpressibly lovely scene when Jesus restores Peter as table companion and shepherd at a seaside breakfast around a charcoal fire (21:1–17).

And then he ends with an almost-nod to a Rich Mullins song and a real sense that Easter brings life back to many things.

Jesus is made of no reputation; he is silent as a lamb before his accusers. Through Jesus’s trial, crucifixion, and resurrection, the Twelve are also nameless and speechless, and through three Gospels they remain anonymous and silent right to the end. But they don’t remain so. The fourfold Gospel announces the good news that betrayers become shepherds, the nameless receive names, the silent are given speech. The fourfold Gospel proclaims not only the resurrection of Jesus, but also the resurrection of the apostles, foundation stones on which Jesus builds his church.

The essay dovetailed nicely with today’s reading from John 16.  As Jesus gets closer to his arrest in John’s Gospel, he’s having to work through the disciples’ inability to understand what he is trying to communicate his coming and going, his death and resurrection.

19 Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, “Is this what you are asking yourselves, what I meant by saying, ‘A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me’? 20 Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy. 21 When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. 22 So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. 23 In that day you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. 24 Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

The “before” of Easter is a thing of sadness and sorrow, rooted in confusion and loss.  And it’s almost like all of the confusion of the last three years has come to a head in this moment.  But with the resurrection?  with the seeing of Jesus on the other side of the tomb?  Then their hearts will rejoice in a way that no one will ever be able to take away (for to have seen the resurrected Jesus would realign everything for them.  And in that day, they will ask nothing because they will see all that they need to see.  And when they do ask, their requests will have been shaped by the most true reality of all.  And in that asking and receiving, the joy of that resurrection moment will be renewed.   It is as if until they see Jesus again, they will not realize that they haven’t known what to say or do or ask the whole time.  But once they have seen him, once God has done his work through Easter Sunday, they will know and will have been shot through with joy, will have joy (re)defined for them.  And it will change everything.

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A Moment without Time

Posted on April 24, 2020 by awtraughber

Over the last couple of days Damon Linker’s recent article from The Week about Our Current Moment and and the passage of time has shown up in a number of different places.  It’s a good piece that speaks to the more emotional (but no less important) side of things.   He begins:

Time, like life, hasn’t stopped under lockdown. It only feels that way.

Amidst the pervasive anxiety about illness and economic hardship, it can be easy to miss somewhat subtler forms of distress — like the sense that time itself is coming unwound, with forward motion halted.

He uses the examples of his own children, a high school senior and an up-and-coming high school as a lens to make sense of the “timeless” sensation so many might be feeling while in lockdown.

Human beings live their lives in time. Our sense of ourselves in the present is always in part a function of our remembrance and constant reinterpretation of our pasts along with our projection of future possibilities. We live for the person we hope to become. We look forward to who we will be a month or a year or a decade or more from now — and we commemorate the transitions from present to future with rites of passage celebrated in public with loved ones and friends. This makes us futural creatures. A high school senior applying for a university is living for the college student he hopes to be a year in the future. But what is a high school senior who can no longer look forward to a first day on campus next fall?

And while I would argue that a high school senior is more than just the thought of a “first day on campus,” I totally get his point.  Because we all live pointed towards something.  And right or wrong, that’s how many highs school students are oriented.  He continues:

A life without forward momentum is to a considerable extent a life without purpose — or at least the kind of purpose that lifts our spirits and enlivens our steps as we traverse time. Without the momentum and purpose, we flounder. A present without a future is a life that feels less worth living, because it’s a life haunted by a shadow of futility.

Linker’s great concern in the piece is about our emotional wellness, about what we might be losing in the process of trying to save so many.  And it is definitely worth thinking about and processing, and not only for the sake of where we are pointed beyond the now.  Because it also says something about who we are in this moment, however odd the timing might feel.  That, I think, is a vital conversation to have.  You should give the whole essay a quality moment of your day.

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Warmth in the Winter

Posted on April 23, 2020 by awtraughber

Perhaps the clearest voice for me as I’ve tried to understand Our Current Moment has been Andy Crouch.  He doesn’t work alone, of course.  With the team at Praxis, he has articulated a handful of thoughtful articles that have brought a sense of clarity institutionally and Christianly.  And when he hasn’t been writing, he has been directing people to other good, thoughtful writing.

Crouch recently spoke at the Q 2020 Virtual Summit.  He posted a tidied-up version of his talk to his website.  It’s definitely worth a read.  He starts be reiterating the analogy of our time as blizzard, winter, and ice age.  From there, he touches on 1816, “the year without a summer.”   He connects to the work of Scott Gottlieb, who has been a voice of reason these last few weeks, particularly as he refers to the possibility of an “80% economy” moving forward.  And then, as he acknowledges a worst-case scenario, he brings the biblical story to bear.  And it is wonderful:

And this is where it is great to be part of the story and people of God—because the people of God faced and experienced the absolute worst-case scenario, which was exile: to have your nation conquered, your leaders deported, your culture assimilated, eradicated, eliminated. And this happened to Israel twice in the Old Testament period. Assyria took the Northern Kingdom; and then Babylon, Judah and the Southern Kingdom. Psalm 137 preserves for us the lament of a people who said, “How can we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land? By the waters of Babylon we laid down our harps, when we remembered Zion.”

The amazing gift of exile is that you discover a very unexpected answer to the lament of Psalm 137. Which is that you can sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land, even as you have to make unthinkable adjustments. The rabbis had to ask, after the Temple was defiled and destroyed: We can no longer gather in the Temple and know that the presence of God is there. We can no longer be present by the thousands, all the clans and families of Israel together in worship. What is the minimum number, how few Jews do there have to be to be able to trust that God is present? They came up with the number called the minyan: ten. If just ten Jews could gather to pray, God would be there.

He writes then of numbers, particularly the smaller ones, that show as significant in the stories of Jesus in the Gospel.  My favorite:

The rabbis said ten, but Jesus says, “When two or three of you are gathered in my name, I will be present in the midst of them.”

He ends the piece by throwing the down gauntlet on culture and transformation, something that is close to his heart (and close to the heart of many who try to understand and work well with the institutions that shape our lives).  Like so many other pieces, it is both a sobering and an encouraging read.  It is definitely worth your time to read well.

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Shock but not Surprise

Posted on April 22, 2020 by awtraughber

Yesterday our administration announced that we would remain in online learning protocol through the end of the year.  While I wasn’t surprised by the decision, there’s still something of a “shock to the system” with the news.  It’s one thing to be out with a temporary mindset, with at least some hope of return.  This is a little different.  And while it’s a kind of shock, it also allows us to set our minds for the end, which is good.

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Yesterday I came across a sobering blog post by a professor at Bethel University concerning the school’s future.  Early in the post he makes clear the difficult position his school is in: thirty faculty positions done away with . . . and that was in the works before Our Current Moment.  And so Chris Gehrz tries to reconcile this “difficult time” with “Easter time, a season of joy, peace, and hope.”  Ultimately, the piece is a beautiful picture of a resilient call to vocation.

How many times over the last few years have I said some version of this: “We shouldn’t just believe in the resurrection. We should live as if we believe in the resurrection”? Again and again, I’ve repeated that mantra at Bethel as part of my ongoing efforts to explain what our Pietist heritage means to us. Whether I was addressing new faculty or students gathered in chapel, I’ve insisted that Pietists — for whom Christianity is experienced and practiced more than it’s believed — should not trumpet their fidelity to the doctrine of resurrection but continue to live in fear.

We should live in hope. I still believe that.

But that axiom sure feels trite right now.

Even if we could somehow suspend our fears of an invisible contagion spreading a potentially fatal disease, many of us at Bethel are experiencing the death of dreams and ideals and relationships. Losing a faculty position at a place like Bethel means the loss of income and stability, but also threatens a loss of calling. Most of those who lose their positions will struggle to find anything like a true replacement; many will have to leave academia and seek work in a depressed economy.

Throughout the rest of his post, Gehrz weaves together moments from the biblical story that can help us see Our Current Moment in light of the good but difficult truths of the Gospel.  He brings together two moments from Luke’s writings in particular that point towards “promise and purpose” and the calling Jesus placed on the lives of those who followed Him.

A promise: we will receive the power of the Holy Spirit. Nothing this week will break that promise or sap that power. “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells” in us, then “he who raised Christ from the dead will” continue to give us life by that Spirit (Rom 8:11). If there’s nothing in all creation that’s high or deep enough to separate us from the love of our resurrecting God, then whatever happens at Bethel surely won’t.

And a purpose: to bear witness near and far to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Even if I can no longer do that through teaching at Bethel, I can trust that I will continue to fulfill that commission some way, some how, and some where, with whatever post-Bethel days I have remaining.

The post, which Gehrz admits is a kind of “big talk” on his part, brings out some necessary nuance to understanding the precarious nature of our lives today, particularly if we are people whose loves and livelihoods are tied to broader institutions.  The whole piece is worth a read and a re-read.  As the title of his essay suggests, it is in the “nothing for your journey” call from Jesus that we might find something better . . . both for ourselves and those broader institutions.

You can read the rest of the piece here.  I highly recommend it.

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A Longer Song

Posted on April 21, 2020 by awtraughber

Up until recently, I had an iPhone with an unfortunate iTunes quirk: it would only play songs in shuffle mode.  Regardless if it was by artist or by album, I just couldn’t listen to something the way it had been laid out by the creators.  I tried to fix it at first, but I eventually gave up for a time.  When I got a new phone last fall, the first thing I checked was the iTunes play.  I felt a kind of relief that things were back to normal.

I say this because Andrew Peterson just wrote a nice piece about the joys of listening to an album as an album.  And it came up for him because his daughter, a young musician herself, had grown tired of “singles.”  It’s a fun piece that waxes both philosophical (about streaming services) and nostalgic (like the paragraphs below).

When I was a kid, we didn’t have much money. That meant it was a big deal if I saved the ten bucks to buy a tape at Turtle’s Music in Gainesville. When I got home I would smell the cassette, unfold the booklet, and read the tiny liner notes while I listened. I would treat the tape like it was a rare jewel. I had to think twice before I lent it to someone, and I always made sure I got it back when they were finished. The cassette was a treasure. When I rode in my buddy Joe’s 280 ZX I would drool all over the tapes in his Case Logic case and beg him to lend me the newest Tom Petty album. He had to think about it hard, because if he did, it meant he couldn’t listen to it in the meantime. He would miss it, pine for it, until I gave it back.

Not only was the artifact itself a treasure, it wasn’t easy to skip songs—which meant you discovered buried treasures within the treasure. You had to suffer through songs you didn’t like in order to get to the ones you did, giving the B-sides time to grow on you, with the happy result that they became favorites. Nowadays, if I don’t like a song it’s really easy to remove it from a playlist and never give it another shot, and I’m certain that by doing so I’m missing out on some great music.

And then this:

My point is this: if I made a list of my very favorite albums of all time, I’m pretty sure most of them cost me some time and effort before they really clicked. The key was the scarcity. The fact that the CD or tape lived in my car and I didn’t have the world at my fingertips meant that I gave the songs time to unfold themselves to me, to surprise me, to shift the tectonic plates of my taste and understanding enough that the next time I looked out the window I could tell the landscape had subtly broadened. The time spent with the music was the key that unlocked it—and the music, in turn, was the key that unlocked something in me. None of that would have happened if I had bumped up against a difficult song and merely skipped it or removed it from the playlist. Back then, the interface made it a little more difficult to banish a song into outer darkness. But now, the path of least resistance is to make a knee-jerk decision about a song and never revisit it, or to mean to go back and listen again but forget because eighty-five new albums came out today.

I think most of us have certain albums and artists that we think of because of this.  Music and long walks has been something of a regular thing for me for a long time (though less now since I refuse to buy a waterproof phone).  I think of my summer missions summer and the albums we would play on our long rides: Rich Mullins’ Songs or the self-titled Caedmon’s Call or Chris Rice’s Deep Enough to Dream.  All of them, for me at least, always the whole way through.  That’s the world at the time, at least as best as I can remember it.

You can read the whole piece here.  It’s good on multiple levels.

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