March 29

What Is the Bible?

The Bible is a collection of books written by various authors. Some record in their own words what they experienced. Some recount stories handed down through generations. Some are historical in nature, recounting actual events, while others are allegorical, intended to teach us by example. Many recount spiritual experiences – experiences of God that by definition cannot be explained in mere words. Some of the writers were conservative, while many were more liberal. One of the most beautiful features of the Bible is its diversity of voices.

So it is that we have so many varying descriptions of God: Moses sees a burning bush; Elijah hears a still, small voice; Abraham and Sarah sit down with Him and have dinner. There is no single experience of God, and thus we should not expect our own experiences of Him to conform to those of anyone else.

Yet if the voices are diverse, the message is cohesive. The meaning of the Bible can be summed up in the words of Jesus himself, from Mathew 22:34-40:

 

When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment.  And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

 

From this it is clear that the teaching of the Bible is love. If what you hear taught is not love, it’s not Christianity. If it’s not love, it’s not Jesus.

The diversity of voices suggests something else about the Bible. Some people read it as they would a novel, with a single plot-line. If that is true, then all of what is written leads up to its closing act, the Book of Revelation. Revelation happens to be one of the most frightening and difficult to understand books of the Bible. It appears to tell of the final battle between good and evil, and the end of the world as we know it. It is difficult to make sense of the Bible if the rest of the story exists only to lead to this final apocalypse. And it is difficult to conceive of a novel whose chapters were written by dozens of individual authors.

The Bible is more akin to a collection of short stories, all consistent with the larger theme, but each independent of the other. There are issues and plotlines that recur throughout, and many of the later works rely on the earlier ones. But taken as a whole, the Bible is not a single narrative. It is a collection of works written over the whole history of a people, each with its own point of view.

March 26

When A Friend Dies

Lynn Patterson (right) died suddenly and unexpectedly Tuesday night.  He and his family run Red Acre Farm CSA in Cedar City, and we have worked closely with all of them over the years.  Lynn was an amazing man, always helping someone – sometimes us.

I spent yesterday with the family, who were still in shock.  There were plenty of people around, so I was as supportive as I could be, and I did my best to be useful.  I helped put their weekly farm shares together, moved heavy stuff, and went on an unsuccessful quest to find Lynn’s Sawz-all.  (“I can’t believe I can’t just call him up and ask him where he put it!” his wife Symbria said.)

Later, when I got home, my concerns shifted from the family to (as they too often do) myself.  Lynn was three years older than I am.  He never drank,  smoked, or drank coffee  He was thin and active, and ate an astoundingly healthy diet.

I can’t claim any of those attributes.

Recognizing my own mortality caused me to reflect on what I’m doing with my life.  What am I contributing?  Who am I helping?  Have I cleaned up my messes?  Who am I serving with my life?

The answers were unsatisfactory.  I’m an accountant, helping people to “render unto Caesar.”  No matter how you slice it, I help the government collect what people owe them.  Yes, often I am able to get someone a nice refund – but only in the context of the tax law, the purpose of which is to fund the government and its corporate buddies.  And no, I have not yet cleaned up all my messes.

What do I do with this new awareness?  I’m committed to tax work until April 15.  But today, I helped the Pattersons find their son, whose location has been unknown.  (He doesn’t know yet about his father.)  I made an amends that has been lingering for several years.  And I practiced playing “Amazing Grace” on the piano – not for the Pattersons, whose daughter plays piano better than I am ever likely to, but for myself, and if it’s not too corny, for God.

It is said that a person cannot serve two masters.  So long as I serve the government, I am not serving God.  But I have expressed my intention to find a “new employer,” and I believe that will work itself out over the next few months.

In the mean time, what can I do to serve God today?

(Donations for the Patterson family can be made here.)

March 22

The Bible & Me

When I was young, I attended my family’s Protestant church. I went to Sunday school for eight years. I learned the biblical stories of Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, and Jesus. My teachers were, without exception, kind and thoughtful men and women. They encouraged me to think of others, and to give of my time, energy, and money to help those in need.

As I became a teenager, I found that what I had learned at church offered little guidance. I struggled with issues of self-identity and the acceptance of my peers. I made a number of bad decisions, and entered a dark period of my life that lasted ten years.

When I began to resurface, I was taught to seek out God. At the time, I knew nothing of God. The lessons of my church seemed to make little sense to a young man living in a complex world. My search for answers took me from a Buddhist temple in Los Angeles to a Catholic church in Thailand. My quest led me to obtain a degree in Theological Studies. But even an intellectual understanding of the Bible was not enough to bring me peace.

I began to read the Bible with one question in mind: “What does this book mean for those of us living in the 21st century?” Finally, the answer began to be revealed.

I don’t believe the Bible can be understood without asking ourselves, “Who was this written for, and what was it intended to say to them?” A passage written for a farmer in 1,200 BC, or an exiled professional in 600 BC, or an impoverished and outcast Christian Jew in 75 AD, projects a message tuned to their time and circumstances. It’s not surprising, for example, that Matthew, who wrote to the Jews, has Jesus preaching the Beatitudes on the mountain, invoking the image of Moses. Luke, on the other hand, who was writing to the Greeks, has Jesus preaching the same sermon on the plain, invoking the image of equality. Both were trying to communicate the same Gospel message to a particular audience. Both chose imagery that would move that audience closer to faith. But the Jews and the Greeks had different frames of reference, so the authors used different imagery. Had Matthew written for us in the 21st century, instead of the Sermon on the Mount we might well be reading the Sermon at Bunker Hill!

If I want to understand the Bible, I must ask myself what it meant to the men and women who wrote it, and what they were telling their audience in its time and situation. Trying to take literally words written for shepherds of 3,000 years ago can lead to absurd results. But the message intended for those shepherds is meant equally for us. To find it, I need to look beyond the wording to the ideas and principles of that message.

In recent years, I have been struck by the increasing anger as people discuss the Bible’s role in our society. Some suggest that it must be taken literally, and should be adopted as a legal foundation. Others suggest it is outdated, fictional, and has no role at all in modern life.

Both views are extreme. I prefer a more middle path, based on what we know about the Bible, and a little common sense. If what I have written offends you, I apologize. My most sincere hope is that this book will bring new understanding to those who, like me, have struggled with what the Bible says and how it can work in our lives.

March 21

Now Mobile-Friendly!

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I don’t know why people would read a blog from their phone.  Their eyes must be better then mine!  Nevertheless, Google wants all sites to be mobile-friendly, and what Google wants, Google gets.  So, as of today, my blog is mobile-friendly.

March 19

Why I’m Going to Write About the Bible

I’m an author, accountant, and until recently, a cheesemaker.  So why am I so passionate about the Bible?

In 1995, I arrived in Chiang Mai, Thailand, having recently spent 18 months in Sri Lanka and two more in India.  I had been studying Buddhism for several years, and had mostly given up on Christianity as nonsensical to me.  Many self-described Christians had tried to convert me.  One of those would-be evangelists also tried to sleep with me.  Another warned me that attending AA meetings would send me to Hell.  But my biggest problem with Christianity was, it didn’t seem to make any sense.  At the time, I understood the Old Testament to describe a vengeful and arbitrary God, while the New Testament described a man got killed for doing good deeds so that his followers could go to heaven simply by claiming His name.

Enter Father Niphot Thienvihan, a Thai priest who was humble in character and generous in spirit.  Much of his ministry consisted of teaching young people about AIDS, which in 1995 was nearing its apogee in Thailand.  Children there got eight years of schooling, and then went from their villages to the cities to earn enough money to start families and take care of their aging parents.  Except there weren’t enough jobs, so many of them ended up working in the sex trade.  Having only an eighth-grade education, they had no idea how AIDS was contracted.  They caught it, and brought it back to the villages with them.  In 1995, an entire generation of young people was dying.

Fr. Niphot sought to change that – even the the vast majority of these village children were Buddhists, which 98% of Thais are.

Fr. Niphot also ran the novitiate program for priests and nuns.  He insisted that every novitiate spend time in the villages.  “This is not to convert the villagers, but to be converted by them,” he told me.  Fr. Niphot had a great respect for the innate knowledge of God found in those whose life relies on the cycle and connection with the land – regardless of their religion.

I could mention how Fr. Niphot liked frog curry – literally, a whole frog floating in a bowl of curry sauce.  I could mention how he comforted a female novitiate from the city when we dropped her to stay at a farmhouse in a village (which, as Thai farmhouses go, was fairly upscale), and the young woman began screaming (in Thai), “I can’t stay here!  I can’t stay here!”

But the point is, in my weeks of working and traveling with Fr. Niphot, I came to understand the life of Jesus in a way that was meaningful to my own life experience.  I finally felt that, in Fr. Niphot’s work, I had caught a glimpse of the God I had sought.

The following year, I began my studies at Loyola Marymount University, a Catholic school.  My major: Theology.  I was not yet converted, but I wanted to follow the path that began at Fr. Niphot’s door.

In the process, I began to read the Bible in a new way.  It began to make sense to me.  I began to love it and immerse myself in it.

These days, I see the Bible as a a guide for living that, though I may never live up to, I must strive to emulate.  It’s not just a bunch of mumbo-jumbo, as I once thought.  It is the heartfelt experience of three millennia of writers about their own experience of God.

If you object to the Bible itself, maybe my writing will give you new insight into it.  Or, just skip those posts.  If you object to my interpretation, please pray for me.  If God wants me to believe something else, that will become clear.

March 17

The Man Behind the Keyboard

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How does a person best describe himself?  I’m 55 years old, six feet tall, with brown hair and brown eyes.  I have a wife, a ten-year-old stepson, and a nine month old son.  I’m an accountant by trade.  And I’m a writer, including my popular novel Ordinary World, which has sold over 3,000 copies.  That’s not a New York Times Bestseller, but it impresses the heck out of me!

But that’s not all there is to me.  If you’ve read Domino Theory, you suspect that I might have some history of drug use.  You’d be correct.  I got clean and sober at the age of 25, when I was a total mess.  I’m nearly thirty years sober today, and that remains a central feature in my life.

I spent ten years making artisan cheese and selling it at farmers markets.  We shut the business down last June, after the baby was born, because we just couldn’t do everything anymore.  For much of that period, we raised goats, and I still miss them from time to time.  I especially love birthing the babies.

I spent seventeen years traveling back and forth to Sri Lanka.  This began in 1993, with an 18-month stay that began with my teaching computer classes, and evolved into my being on a team that tried to bring the civil war to a peaceful end.  Though we failed at our main goal, we did help bring about a four-year cease-fire, the longest in that nation’s three-decade war.

I studied Buddhism for many years, but my degree is in Theology, from a Catholic university.  I belong to the Mennonite church, and my dream is to become a minister.

I love music.  I play guitar, though not well.  I seem to have a mental block that prevents me from learning to read music, but I keep trying.

I love trains, especially the steam trains of the 1920s.  When I had the time and space, I built models.

Politically, I remain unaffiliated.  I object to the two-party system, because it seems impossible to me that there could be only two answers for any serious problem.  Nor could any two parties possibly represent the diversity of this great nation.  I consider myself a conservative, though I have much more in common with the community-oriented conservatism of my New England origins than either the corporate or religious conservatives who dominate the political right these days.

I read tarot cards.

I hate exercise, but I love hiking and kayaking.  I love the wilderness, and strongly support protecting it.  Do they have to build condos and strip malls everywhere?

I love to shoot, and have an appreciation for old rifles, especially from the World War I era.

Most of my writing is based on places and topics I know, or experiences I have had.  Many of them start with a “what if?” question.  For example, what if, before I got sober, I had come out of a blackout next to a murdered man, having no idea how I got there?  What if the economy collapsed, and my family had to survive?

To sum up, I am an accountant-cheesemaker-writer.  I am a liberal conservative (or vice versa).  I am religious, spiritual, and metaphysical.  I am a gun-toting, peacemaking, redneck advocate for social change.

I don’t think it’s easy to put me in a category.  But then, I think we tend to put others in categories far too easily.

March 16

When I Stopped

Today, in church, the pastor asked us to consider whether we had stopped along the way, and if so, when.

The question took me aback.  But the answer was easy.  I stopped when, in 2007, I began making cheese full time.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed making cheese.  People enjoyed eating it.  But it was a detour from my path, which had led me from bedside panels for alcoholics at County General Hospital in Los Angeles, to helping organizations in Sri Lanka, India, and Thailand provide basic needs for the extreme poor, to helping to try to end a war, to studying God and the Bible in college, to helping to build schools in the poorest neighborhoods of Tijuana, Mexico.

In 2007, all that stopped.  I became a full-time accountant in the winter, and a full-time cheesemaker in the summer.  Yes, we occasionally fed someone who needed it, and let someone stay with us who needed it.  But the focus of my life was no longer on serving others, but on serving cheese.

Perhaps it’s coincidental that 2007 is also when my previous marriage began its four-year collapse.  Perhaps it’s coincidental that was the same year I needed a pacemaker.  Perhaps it’s coincidental that my own mental health began to deteriorate.  And perhaps it’s coincidental that the cheese business sucked up all the money we had, and never quite became profitable.

I don’t think so.

I would like to thank my pastor for reminding me what’s important, and of how life was when I made it important.  God willing, I will make some changes in my life, and those things will become important again.

March 14

Vacation – Not Exactly What I Wanted

It’s been a long nine months, so long that I forgot my blog’s username and password, and returned to find 287 spam comments waiting for approval.  But it’s good to be back.

My vacation started, well,  with a vacation.  I took my family to New Hampshire to visit my family of origin.  And I got bronchitis.  (Ain’t nobody got time for that!)

After weeks of it not getting better, my doctor put me on Singulair.  But Singulair interacts with a triglyceride medication I was taking.  I didn’t know that.  Neither did my doctor or pharmacist.  The interaction is listed on the FDA website, but apparently not in any of the databases used by health care professionals.  Within two weeks, I had sunk into a suicidal depression and had to be hospitalized.

The hospital prescribed Zoloft, an anti-depressant.  I let them know I’d had a bad reaction to antidepressants once before, many years ago.  The shrink insisted that this one was different.

It wasn’t that different.  Soon, I was having a full-blown psychotic reaction to the Zoloft.  Eventually, I went back to a different hospital.  There, they gave me other medications that had me not only psychotic, but also aggressive.  Psych meds and I do not get along.

From there, I was able to spend 30 days medication-free in a rehab in Culver City, CA.  My brain finally started to heal.  I am forever grateful for that opportunity, because I think psychiatrists would have either killed me, or left me in a straight jacket in a dark room for the rest of my life.  For whatever reason, they don’t have an answer for me.

I am prone to depression, and I’ve learned that I have to manage it with lifestyle changes.  To be honest, I hadn’t been doing that.  So perhaps the medication interaction only accelerated changes that I would have had to make anyway.  In any case, it’s been a rough road, and I’m glad to be back.