Business values often operate opposite to their own best interest. The money matters-dollar counters, often end up doing things that gain money fast but loose it bigger in the long run. Consider the example of the American Automobile industry.

The government had to bail out the American automobile industry. Americans were selling big cars when the customers were moving to economic cars. Americans were in a hurry and getting cars to show rooms and into customers hands. They hurried so much that they ended up with endless recalls, costing them the profits they made and the customer faith they needed. The Japanese were doing the opposite. They sold cars that were high quality and earned customer trust. It was a competition between earnings and excellence. Americans gained prominence early but lost income and customer base in the long term. You could even compare this as money over morality, selling quickly to get money or selling quality because it works.

I have the same example from a more recent event. I had a car dealership try to overcharge me for a simple repair. I know of the overcharge because I went to another dealership for comparison. I bought three cars from the first dealership, so I tried to work things out. They kept saying they had done nothing wrong and said they were following the book despite a same dealership in another city proving the lie. The first dealership lost my business to maintain their appearance and cover their thoughtlessness. They preferred money over integrity but lost the money because of the lack of integrity. We see tons of examples of this kind of dealing in the public media. Whistleblowers give the intimate inside portrait of people and/or companies who go too far for money over integrity.

Each of us knows the value of trust. A trustworthy person and/or business is a treasure. Trustworthy people and businesses have to put the value above their own desires. They are the ones who tell the truth, no matter how inconvenient, will do the right thing – even when it costs them. They gain profit and customer satisfaction by doing the opposite to convenience. Trustworthy is a value of God because it takes someone more than human to do it perfectly, completely, and reliably.

God’s values are one of the ways we prove Him and see Him, and our world is full of examples of proof. It is strange when people can’t see the truth when it is plainly exampled before them, like business men who will go out of their way to deal with someone trustworthy but will not be trustworthy themselves. We live in a world where God is alive and showing Himself plainly to believers and unbelievers, but only those who choose to see Him can. It all boils down to choice and our freedom to have one, a freedom that He provides. Choose wisely.

The American culture prizes productivity and outcomes. This can turn into the impatience of “I want to be there and not on the way there.” We as children expressed this perfectly on any vacation trip to such a point that it has become a standard often repeated in many circumstances, “Are we there yet?”

We want to be there and rewards and awards represent that. We hurry through today to get to tomorrow. Actors are often valued by the rewards they win, as are athletes. That is great, but also problematic. They were rarely, if ever, alone while doing that which earned them an award. They were part of a team, a group, or an engaged circumstance that developed, brought out, or highlighted their ability. I’m not indicating that all should get rewards. It is good to have the carrot dangled in front of someone. Motivation is important. However, those who did not win the award were no less valuable. We can’t discount all the movies, performances, and efforts or the gifts of people just because they didn’t get an award.

“Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.” (Arnold Schwarzenegger) He also said, “For me life is continuously being hungry. The meaning of life is not simply to exist, to survive, but to move ahead, to go up, to achieve, to conquer.” Accomplishment and products come at the end. Schwarzenegger indicates that it is the process which is the most valuable. The value of process is lowered when we put our eyes on the prize and forget today’s part in tomorrow’s outcome.

Our lives are built in relationship with family, friends, associates, work, service, circumstances . . . . We work to grow into the fullest version of ourselves we can become. The prize is the process. There is no reward and no end to an individual’s growth. Each person has the opportunity to develop their lives until the last breath they breathe. There is joy in living and growing that does not need to be put off for some kind of product or outcome. Every day, even the worst ones, can become a source of joy.

Jesus provides both relationship and purpose. The relationship provides us with a hope and life-filled circumstance right for growing. The purpose gives us the values for growing and the vision for growth that gives a constant influence of joy and direction in the process. In relationship with Jesus and His purpose, the outcome is known so an individual is freed to live in the joy of today and freed from the tyranny of tomorrow.

PT Barnum wrote that circuses were very skilled at attracting the public by having an exciting parade through the town, complete with a highly decorated bandwagon in 1855. Jumping on the bandwagon is defined as joining others in doing or supporting something fashionable or likely to be successful. It is based on acceptance through popularity. It is a powerful force used for good and/or evil.

Jumping on the bandwagon becomes dangerous when popularity, or perceived popularity, overtakes truth and quality. Group think or popularity can be extremely intimidating as is was in Germany during WWII. The German people didn’t start off with bad desires. They wanted respect, a healthy economy, the ability to live and grow, all appropriate. Hitler promised to provide those things and actually did so by disobeying the laws set against German military. Popularity overcame truth to a point that truth became increasingly easy to suppress. Hitler became like a god, and the bandwagon took the entire country for a ride into destruction.

It is easy for us to say that would never happen to us, but it is happening every day. Businesses and politicians use this to create popular trends to push people to accept popularity instead of verification of quality. Teenagers use the allure of popularity to pull friends into destructive lives. I saw that most students were introduced to all the things we adults don’t want the young to try by their friends, not by enemies. Churches can do this unconsciously by preferring the people like themselves instead of reaching the downcasts and outcasts that Jesus always reached.

Acceptance by others and position in the group must be something completely innate in us. Even the homeless have group priorities within their own station of life. Jim Jones used this powerful force to take a group from doing good in the suburbs to murder and mass suicide in Guyana. It is a powerful force which has to be recognized and faced. Our need opens us to the possible twisting of evil or leading by honor. How do we tell the difference?

Telling the difference isn’t easy, but it is doable. Detective shows always say, “Follow the money” to find the perpetrator. Something similar can be said in this case, “Who gets the benefit?” Selfishness can be identified. Hitler wanted all the power and glory despite all the lies he spread to make it look otherwise. A truly discerning person, of whom there were many in Germany at the time, can see the trail of truth versus lies. Hitler moved to kill all those who could discern the truth. Jews were probably a target because they believed and adhered to a God other than Hitler and could not be dissuaded. We can compare the qualities of man in Hitler to the qualities of God in the Sermon in the Mount and the listed fruits of the Holy Spirit. The difference is clear despite lies and cover up.

Teachable moments don’t always come from where you might expect. You consider time in a class, in a church, in a seminar, reading a book or some other activity as being the prime teachers. I agree, but only to a small degree. The most teachable moments are those in which you are caught off guard and triggered into a moment where self awareness meets a teaching, which may simply be an experience, a thought, a reflection, or any of the things I’ve already listed.

Grandchildren can provide teachable moments. They are unfiltered, responding as human animals to their surroundings in a way that shows their inner emotions and feelings. Tell them “no” and you will see the resistance a person has to being refused. Self awareness can trigger a sudden remembrance of how I deal with not getting my own way. I put a little filtered spin on my actions, but those around me know I’m hiding my frustration, and probably not as well as I think I am. The little people are teaching me about who wants to be first, how not to behave when sharing, only wanting the snack food instead of the main meal, and other lessons I have not yet completely mastered. Embarrassing but needful reminders.

One of their main lessons is about the structure of relationship. They possess little knowledge about life and how it works, yet they make demands as though they have grasped the entire picture. They make me aware about how I treated my parents when I only knew what I wanted, and they knew all the possibilities, problems, and issues related to my request and what it would take to make it happen safely and reasonably. My grandchildren point out that I have acted like I understood the whole picture all my life when I am yet to achieve that wisdom. True wisdom would know that information gathering, discussion, and negotiation are needed with people who are in the true leadership role with the captain’s view of the ship and all its workings and workers.

Having a limited perspective is hard to handle because it is completely challenging to recognize and admit. Being in authority is preferred to being under authority. It is no wonder people find fault with Christians. Being a child isn’t something any of us find to be easy, especially as we grow older and think we’ve outgrown our inner child. I’m sure that the Lord would prefer for us to recognize who the real parent is in our relationship.

In the last two blogs, I’ve talked about suffering for wrongdoing and suffering out of compassion and community. The third type of suffering is that which defines us, refines us, disciplines us, and empowers us to live and grow productively. Growth is suffering because it is hard and uncomfortable work learning. Learning requires you to go where you’ve never gone, do what you’ve never done, and/or think what you’ve never thought before. Repetition is practice and strengthening, after learning. Sometimes that can cause suffering too. Ask any athlete, “No pain, no gain.” It is the pain of the caterpillar’s painful push through the small opening of the cocoon that forces the fluids in its body to the wings so it can fulfill its destiny and fly.

I wonder what seeds would say. “You’ve shoved me in this dark dirt, given me a little water, forced me to put down roots and push up through the heavy soil for a little sunlight? Once I get there, my work has only begun? I’ve got to do leaves, flowers, and make my own seeds? You pick the best fruit I have for yourself and require me to make more?”

Many of the wise tell us that anything gained without effort is valued little and easily lost. That which costs us becomes valuable and is maintained more carefully. Suffering creates value because of the cost.

The most admired people from all fields of interest are those who have overcome severe adversity to accomplish what they could only accomplish in the dire straits within which they found themselves. Our movies and books are filled with come from behind, underdog, stories because in real life or fiction, they inspire us. These are people who find their true gifting, strength, adaptability, and endurance in the challenge. War medals are given to the overcomer with the greatest medals to the greatest overcomers. Suffering requires people to excel and push beyond their known limitations into areas that surpass what they believe they could do. They had to conquer themselves in fighting and overcoming the adversity.

Jesus pressed in to His suffering to accomplish the rescue heaven desired. He understood the purpose of the hardship and did not get lost in blame, shame, avoidance, or shifting accountability. He chose the goal over the inconvenience, the vision over the discomfort, the hope over the pain. In doing so, He gave us an example. We can willingly, even joyfully, let heaven push our bloated bodies through the cocoon opening into the beauty created for us.

Humans are built for community. We are meant for each other. Community is essential for survival. It takes two to create children, and children add to the crowd. The crowd only grows.

A couple wrote about their completely independent survival in the extreme north for a year. It was impressive, but inaccurate. It took the entire planet to make it possible for them to appear self sufficient. Governments were involved. Rescue set ups were involved. Communications, weapons, camping gear, clothing, and accumulated knowledge were involved. They rode on the back of others. Self sufficiency is a myth that is very popular in America, but it is a myth, an image and not a reality. We are a part of each other, for better or worse.

We might see ourselves as separate from others, but we are not. I was part of the failings of the educational system I served for thirty-three years, even while I tried to overcome some of the failings I recognized. I was a piece of a machine and not separate from it. I was part of its failing and part of its success. We suffer together because we are inseparably a part of each other.

We remind people at the museum that they are looking at artifacts produced by people that lived in a bubble created by their knowledge base and their circumstances. Their thoughts and ideas were shaped and defined by their place on the historical timeline, even as they changed the future. All people suffered the effects of the Civil War, even European countries who did not take part. We are citizens of this planet, impacted by the events all around our globe.

Compassion is required because all suffer, and all suffer because others suffer. Compassion is a conduit through which healing can take place because it embraces love, the power of positive change. Jesus is the epitome of love and compassion, even when He was most wronged by the ones He came to help. He gave us tools to deal with suffering, as individuals and as community members.

Probably the most common question related to suffering is “What did they do wrong?” This view is based in those who see God as the God of judgement and punishment. That is a dominant image of God as the angry, “I’ll get you for that” type of being. It is a truly one dimensional image based more on our behavior than on God. Labels are one dimensional and limit complex people, or God, to an unrealistic cage. It is easy to simplify things to their point of greatest distortion because some people take comfort in uncomplicating complicated things. Thinking and dealing with complicated is hard work.

Doing wrong can cause suffering. The Germans and Japanese performed all forms of despicable cruelties in WWII. The response to them was in like kind. You get what you give or reap what you sow is a common proverb.

All cultures have value systems of right and wrong and justice systems that deal with punishment for wrongdoing. Criminal justice is a piece of every culture. It should not be a surprise that the Kingdom of God would have a justice system as a part of its total culture. It is not the whole of heavenly culture, but it is a part. How could heaven be heaven without justice and the other high values, which are perfect there.

Children have a tendency to reveal things that we, as adults, like to think have gone away as we got older. They remind us that we may not have as much a problem with doing wrong as we have with being caught. We watch people in power and influence get away with things, seemingly for extended periods of time, without being caught and punished. We are offended. (God often takes the blame for this. It seems He gets blamed when we get caught and when others don’t.) We want Justice. We want it fair and consistent (sometimes as long as it doesn’t include us).

Suffering is a complex issue because it doesn’t just involve crime and punishment. We want our justice system to be as near perfect as possible, but not as the fascists and totalitarian governments provide it. We want some compassion and balance with the potential for forgiveness and making things right, which is the subject of the next blog. Stay tuned, and give God a break. He is far bigger than crime and punishment. You are already caught when you fail because you know it when no one else does. He is interested in you as an entire being, not just measuring you on the scale of right and wrong.

We are living in a planetary war zone beyond the battlefields of gun and cannon. Harsh reality. Lust, gluttony, greed, envy, pride all create harm and potential devastation to others. Selfishness is the weapon of choice. News, movies, and social media of all kinds reflect the power plays from politics to the individual.

The harm done is as harsh, but not as visible as the battlefield. Cruelty is alive and well on this planet. We see the walking dead and maimed. We see people crippled by self treatment of drugs and alcohol, drop outs, derelicts with psychiatrists and care centers flooded by the injured. There are also all those who hide in plain sight, survivors, wounded but struggling on. Who among us hasn’t suffered trauma that impacts our lives?

There are warriors who fight against the trauma and pain in life. Wounded warriors are those who were injured themselves and fought to overcome it and work to help others overcome. There are agencies and care facilities who work against the tide of injuries. There are churches who recognize the power of God to heal the broken hearted.

Christ established God’s healing ministry on earth while He walked in the flesh and continues it through the work of the Holy Spirit today. All of us need this healing and need to be a part of this healing for others. We can choose to help or harm. Compassion is a choice. Love is a decision. Compassion and love are hard because they require a person to sacrifice themselves. The good is worth it for the individual and the world around them. The warriors are the people that make the world a good place to live.

I am grateful beyond my ability to express it for the many people who have been the agents of healing in my life. They are the heroes on the battlefield and in life. Give thanks to our military for protecting our freedoms. Give thanks to the life warriors who work to free minds and hearts. Give thanks that God opened heaven’s doors that we might find continuous help and encouragement beyond anything man can do alone.

It is commonly said that if you lead, others will follow. If you lead, and no one follows, you are just out for a walk. The same can be said of an “influencer.” A true influencer changes things. Many self labeled influencers are just people putting on a show because little or nothing changes. Working to be seen is not the same as being an influence.

Life imitation becomes life style after it becomes ingrained in behavior. That is why parents have always warned their children to choose the right friends, choose the right influence. There is tremendous power in the associations you have or choose. There is tremendous power in the community which surrounds you. We are more heavily influenced by our culture, our country, and the general beliefs of our world than we imagine. We are being bombarded every day from every angle. You can see this power in history because the historical people were confined to their knowledge base and circumstances during the time of their lives.

So many people tend to build associations by convenience instead of by intent. A person’s faith life should be an exception, even if all other associations and influences are through circumstances or through associations that weren’t chosen, and even if influences are convenience based instead of intentional. Food for the soul is far more important than food for the body.

Be careful with yourself. You are far more important than you may consider. Life is far more than the things we see around us. It is important to consider questions like where does love come from because it is more than a feeling. Love requires someone to humble themselves to care for another. Humility is not a natural human trait because we are self based creatures. Where did it come from? Where did selflessness come from? Where did the other values like honor, justice, faithfulness and the like come from? To truly exhibit those values, one has to give up themselves, contrary to the human nature.

There is a God in heaven whose nature is based on the best of all values humans desire above all others and are unable to achieve completely on their own. Our desire and His nature is proof of His existence. Even atheists believe in and desire the high qualities which are beyond human nature to produce. God’s interventions have introduced and given examples of the high values through history.

Jesus was an example of value beyond measure. He, as God, came and served man, selfless. He lived in the limitations of a man to show His understanding and compassion. He died to give the people killing Him, and all others, a chance to realize God. He rose from the dead to prove His divinity and validate the very opportunity He taught and gave us. Jesus should be our first influencer above all others.

Stained glass is highly complicated. You start with a design. For many churches the design is an image of an excerpt from the Bible. The image is created like a puzzle of individual pieces. Glass has to be found to fit the shape, color, and textures needed and be further refined by painting, staining, and etching as needed. The glass is scored, broken, and ground to fit the shape designated. Leading is put around each piece, soldered and stained. Sections of the glass are wired together. Amazing and beautiful, especially when the light flows through and shows the true beauty and relates the story.

People are like that. I went to an Uplift Columbia meeting in which individuals and resources gathered to create a coalition that will provide for the disenfranchised in our county. Churches, health care, and social agencies often under perform because people don’t know what is available or how to access the gifts those resources want to share with those in need. They gathered to share what they have and create a county team of healing services.

Many of the most passionate care providers were people who were themselves broken glass and shattered lives. They had been reclaimed from alcohol, drugs, mental illness, and every sort of distress available in this pain filled world. They found healing and now passionately work to provide it for and to others. They are beautiful stained glass from shattered life pieces reformed through Jesus’s healing hands. Now, the light of God’s love flows through them to beautify their surroundings and tell a story of hope to the world around them. They have become artists in the Lord’s grace, working with others like themselves, so the Lord can create the hope that beautifies our world.

These walking stained glass art pieces are the church on the street for those in need. They are the conduit of God’s light to others. Their brokenness can still be seen in the colors, shapes, leading, and structure, but they are so much more than the pieces. They are the beauty of God’s promise and the power of God’s plan and hope.