THE MCGURK EFFECT

In a world full of uncertainty, you would think you could at least trust your five senses unequivocally, wouldn't you?

Have you ever heard of the McGurk Effect?

The McGurk Effect describes the way your sense of sight will overrule your hearing if the two are ever in conflict. There's a great little video (just two minutes long) that illustrates this phenomenon:

McGurk Effect Video on YouTube

In the video, a man's face is shown in close-up as he repeats the sound "Bah!" The film then retains the sound but now superimposes the same man clearly moving his lips to form "Fah!" Now your vision is clearly in conflict with your hearing. And your sight wins. 

Your brain actually processes the sound as "Fah" now. And so you "hear" "Fah". Unless you close your eyes or look away, at which point your brain allows you to hear "Bah" again. 

Bizarre.

I suppose one could draw some spiritual lesson from the McGurk Effect, but I don't have one off the top of my head.

What I do have is a practical concern: With our brains relying so heavily on the sense of sight to determine what is "real", what happens when virtual reality and the "Metaverse" proliferates as it becomes more and more sophisticated in the coming years? 

I heard a man recently describe an experience with some high-end virtual reality goggles. He said his brain could not convince his foot to step off a virtual cliff even though he knew logically that he was standing in his own living room. 

I think I am going to go live in a cabin in the woods...

 

LOVERS, NOT THINKERS

About a year and a half ago, I "learned" from a Scott Adams book something I had long suspected: Human beings are not primarily rational and logical. We are mostly emotional. Once we really come to grips with this truth, I believe life makes more sense, even though it also means accepting the fact that the people around us (and we ourselves) are going to act and speak in unpredictable ways. (And that can be a bit scary!) 

James K. A. Smith in You Are What You Love has come to this same conclusion, but I really like the way he frames it:

"What if, instead of starting from the assumption that human beings are thinking things, we started from the conviction that human beings are first and foremost lovers? What if you are defined not by what you know but by what you desire? What if the center and seat of the human person is found not in the heady regions of the intellect but in the gut-level regions of the heart?" (7)

I like the fact that he speaks of this logic/emotion reality in more positive terms. Instead of saying, "People are largely illogical", Smith says, "People are primarily lovers rather than thinkers." 

It would be useful then, when someone's opinions or actions make no logical sense to us, to ask, "What does this person desire?" rather than simply dismissing their opinions and actions as stupid or irrational. 

BLACKBERRY PICKERS

Today's blog post is meant to do double duty – it will give me something to post here AND it will help me sort through aspects of a paper I have to write by Wednesday, comparing two books: You are What You Love by James K. A. Smith and For the Life of the World by Alexander Schmemann.  

Smith’s book contends that humans are shaped by their pursuit of what they most love. And even though we believers say we love God, we are living in a culture which is caught up in the pursuit of material pleasures and entertainment. Our characters and spirits are shaped by our habits – holy habits (such as worship and the liturgies of the church) form us as disciples while worldly habits (like consumerism) and binge-watching Netflix slowly de-form us.  

Schmemann’s book is interesting – and challenging – because he writes from an Eastern Orthodox perspective, a tradition which closely embraces ritual and liturgy and sees them as the gateway to the great mysteries of life and faith. Schmemann wants his readers to get beyond the idea of sacraments as mere symbols of reality and to get beyond the arguments over the mechanics of various sacraments (questions like “When and in what way does the bread become the body of Christ?”) and instead experience sacraments as a window into deeper realities, God’s very present holiness embedded in our physical experiences.  

My paper is meant to explore what the books have in common, and I think it is this: a warning against making a false division between the spiritual and the physical.  

It put me in mind of a famous line by poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning: 

“Earth’s crammed with heaven, /And every common bush afire with God; /But only he who sees, takes off his shoes, /The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.” 

When I looked up the poem containing this line, I was excited to see my instinct was right: Browning, as Smith and Schmemann after her, warned against dividing the spiritual and the physical:  

“Natural things,  

And spiritual,—who separates those two,  

In art, in morals, or the social drift,          

Tears up the bond of nature and brings death,  

Paints futile pictures, writes unreal verse, 

Leads vulgar days, deals ignorantly with men, 

Is wrong, in short, at all points.  

 

The result of not seeing the spiritual reality embedded in the physical is that humans sit around picking blackberries, unaware of the glory of God around us. Furthermore, according to Browning, humans then “daub their natural faces unaware, /More and more from the first similitude.” 

Her image is this: the blackberry pickers also apply more and more makeup to their own faces, all the while getting further and further from the image of who they were created to be in the first place!  

I don't want to be a blackberry picker, do you?

 

A GOOD QUESTION

Simplicity was at the heart of my most memorable and useful accountability group experience during my lifetime. I met weekly with two close friends, Tim and Jamie, during my days at Asbury Theological Seminary during the late 1990s. 

More precisely, I should say that we met weekly as an accountability group, because outside that particular hour, we met daily and even hourly as friends. (Tim was my roommate and Jamie lived in the same dorm and the three of us regularly worked together in a youth ministry context.)

When we gathered together for accountability, though, we spent the hour asking each other about our progress in various aspects of our lives: relationships, spirituality, academics, and physical fitness.

Our final question each meeting was the one that fascinated me and proved so profoundly practical:

"Where have you heard the still, small voice of God during this past week?"

Here is the simple beauty of that question: Broadly speaking, there were only two possible answers. Either I had heard God say something over the previous week or I had not.

If I felt God had spoken to me, it was a great reminder of his faithfulness and a testimony to my friends.

If I could not think of any word from God over the past week, it was a red flag which spurred me on toward greater intentionality in my relationship with him. 

ACCOUNTABILITY GROUP

Today was the first meeting of a new small group for men that I have agreed to lead. It's kind of a requirement for one of my classes, but my motivation is more about finding a couple of other guys locally who can work together to challenge each other to keep advancing in our faith. 

So far there are just three of us and we are a very international group: our backgrounds are American, Haitian, and Nigerian. We plan to meet every Friday afternoon at 4:30.

The church gave me the names of six men who have recently expressed an interest in joining a men's small group, but when I contacted those six by email, one one responded. I think this shows two realities: 1) there is a hunger among men for real connection, especially centered on faith issues but also 2) when the opportunity presents itself, it is tough to commit to an accountability group and so easy just to stay stuck in the familiar status quo.

Still, three is a good number for a start and I am looking forward to seeing what God has in mind for this gathering.

GOLDEN GATE THANKSGIVING

One lonely Thanksgiving Day, while seemingly every other American was surrounded by family and eating turkey, I spent the afternoon walking across the Golden Gate Bridge. I was working in California for a few months following college graduation, before I would be seeking "a real job" come January. 

Not my own photo!

I had the week off and definitely by that Thursday, I had discovered that my plan of driving up the coast to do some solo exploring was not really as fun as it had sounded in my mind. 

As I stepped onto the bridge that day, I decided to challenge myself to see how far I could get while listing off to God all the things I was grateful for.

The bridge is 1.7 miles across. I made it half way before my list was depleted.

I do honestly believe that today, three decades later, with all the ups and downs of life (and God's incredible ability to turn the downs into some of the best ups), I have a gratitude list that would get me across the Golden Gate Bridge and back. 

(And material blessings, although abundant, are way down my list.)

Happy Thanksgiving!

You know how Paul writes that incredible definition of "love" in 1 Corinthians 13? Love is patient. Love is kind. 

And all that.

Well, I wish he had done the same with the word "faith". I am just not sure I completely understand the word as it is used throughout the Bible.

Some people have no faith ... and that makes sense. But some have "great faith" and some have "little faith". Why is that not worded as "more faith" and "less faith"? 

And as I am reading slowly through the book of Matthew, it seems like "understanding" is a closer synonym to "faith" than either "belief" or "trust" would be. 

Like in the passage in Matthew 16 I quoted here two days ago. The disciples forget the bread and think Jesus is getting on their case when he warns them to "Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees." 

Jesus says to them, "You of LITTLE FAITH, why are you talking among yourselves about having no bread? Do you still not UNDERSTAND?"

The closest we get to a 1 Corinthians 13 for "faith" is the definition given in Hebrews 11:1: "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen."

That doesn't completely clear it up for me!

I just want to make sure that I am tracking 100% with what Scripture means exactly when it speaks of faith.

Seems like that's important ... 

PERSONALITY

A question popped into my head today: Does God have a personality?

I think the answer is yes and I think it makes a difference to understand God as having a personality.

Of course, his personality is mysteriously immense, multi-faceted, and composed of only good traits. 

If we don't consider God as having a personality, I think we're in danger of missing out on his personhood altogether. We end up imagining some amorphous being who is quite one-dimensional. He might be the cosmic stick-in-the-mud. A distant cloud. The finger-wagging nag. Or the severely disappointed father. 

On the positive side, we might imagine God to be the Santa Claus of the universe. A colossal teddy bear. An overly permissive parent. Or the laid back admirer in the sky.

But if he has a personality, he doesn't really fit into any of those molds.

In John 15:15, Jesus tells his disciples, "I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you."

Being friends? With Jesus? With God in the flesh?

That's a radical concept.

And I don't see how you can be friends with Someone who has no personality. 

OLD AND GRAY

I found a new "life verse" today. 

Or rather, a "late-in-life verse":

"Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me, my God, till I declare your power to the next generation, your mighty acts to all who are to come."                                        - Psalm 71:18

I'm kind of serious about adopting this verse as my own, for my fifties and beyond. 

I've got gray hair these days, but I know my best years are still ahead of me. 

And the psalmist agrees. 

YEAST

Were Jesus's disciples just not very bright people? 

I used to wonder at times, what with passages in the Gospels like Matthew 16:5-12 -

When they crossed to the other side, the disciples forgot to take bread. “Watch out!” Jesus told them. “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”

They discussed this among themselves and concluded, “It is because we did not bring any bread.”

Aware of their conversation, Jesus said, “You of little faith, why are you debating among yourselves about having no bread? Do you still not understand? Do you not remember the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many basketfuls you gathered? Or the seven loaves for the four thousand, and how many basketfuls you gathered? How do you not understand that I was not telling you about bread? But beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”

Then they understood that He was not telling them to beware of the leaven used in bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.

We know they were uneducated, but that doesn't mean they were unintelligent. So what is going on here?

Briefly I wondered if Matthew had decided to insert a bit of comic relief in the center of his account of Jesus's life and ministry. A little humorous misunderstanding out on the boat!

But that doesn't seem likely either. 

It seems a greater possibility that the disciples were only half listening to Jesus because they were preoccupied with the two things that steal a lot of our mental energy:

1) Our own physical comfort. "I'm hungry. Who's got the bread?"

2) Our own mistakes. "We forgot the bread? Such a rookie mistake! I can't believe we did that. The boss is going to be mad."

The mind of Jesus (God in the Flesh!), however, was still pondering his latest interaction with the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They had said they would be willing to believe in Him if He could provide a convincing sign ... in their judgment. In other words, they wanted to be in the driver's seat in their relationship with God. And a whole lot of people were under the influence of these religious experts. 

When Jesus realized that the disciples' minds were elsewhere, he addressed their two concerns:

"Look, if I need to, I can wave my hand, fix your oversight instantly, and provide more than enough food to satisfy all of us. Your mistakes and your physical comfort are not a big deal." 

And then he refocused them: "The much, much bigger deal is that these religious people are not only far from me themselves, they are capable of leading others away from me, too. And as their attitude spreads and expands, I fear that even you - my closest followers - might be susceptible to their teachings!" 

I hate to admit it, but I am susceptible. How about you?

OLIVET VISIT

Another good day.

Melissa and Sarah and I left home about 8:45 this morning and picked up Caleb at his Wabash dorm. (Unfortunately, Samuel had too much schoolwork for him to get away from Ball State this weekend.)

Our ultimate destination was to visit Hannah at Olivet University south of Chicago. On the way we stopped briefly on the edge of Purdue University for brunch.

Look at these cheesy smiles:

Part of our excuse for the timing of our visit was the opportunity to catch a home basketball game and see our nephew Alex perform on the court.

It has been decades since I sat in the bleachers for a basketball game!

The game meant that my brother Spencer and his wife were also around for the day, so it was good to have some relaxed hours with them.

Some good cousin time:

After the game, we all went out for burgers and then bowling. Now Caleb is spending the night with Alex and Sarah is bunking at Hannah's apartment and Melissa and I are in a hotel room, planning to sleep in tomorrow morning.

I don't remember the last time I spent an entire day preoccupied with such happy thoughts and enjoyable moments. It was enough to take my mind off all the normal pressures of life and for that I thank God. 

(ALMOST) LIKE OLD TIMES

"Your wife is nice."

I heard this more than once this past week from some of my 8th graders. 

And how did they discover what I already knew? 

Melissa, in her role as director of education for Clarity, often gets into the local classrooms to share about sexual risk avoidance as part of the schools' overall health curriculum. This past week she was at my school, interacting with some of my students.

It was just one period a day, and she and I were in two separate classrooms on opposite sides of the courtyard, but it was still a great feeling knowing she was there and seeing her in the hallway. On Tuesday she even took me out to lunch during my prep period, after she finished teaching her class. 

One of the things we miss most about our time in Haiti is the opportunity to spend our days working together under one roof. 

This was a good week. 

VERTIERES DAY

I was in a bit of a funk this morning when I got to school and then I looked at the date: November 18th. 

The day may not mean anything special to you, but it is Vertières Day in Haiti, commemorating the last decisive battle for Haitian independence against the French back in 1803. 

For my family and the missionaries with OMS in Haiti, November 18th became our surrogate Thanksgiving Day, because it - unlike the 4th Thursday of the month - is a national holiday and school is out for the day. 

And what a day it always was. Matt and Stacey Ayars would host the gathering at their house on the campus of Emmaus University. There was always turkey and plenty of other dishes to share:

There was a kids' table:

And sometimes special guests from out of town, like Phil and Connie Dicks in from Iowa.

And Stacey always made sure we gathered for a "family" photo.

But the best part, honestly, was the worship before the meal. We sang and prayed and gave thanks to God for all his goodness and provision. The day was infused with gratitude through and through.

The missionaries are all scattered this year and things are tough in Haiti, but God's goodness and provision have not ended. 

I am grateful. Happy Vertières Day!

COME!

I spent my morning chewing on the story of Peter joining Jesus on the water (the version in Matthew 14) and I don't feel like I am finished with it yet. It strikes me as a really important story and I don't think I have quite gotten to the heart of it. 

It occurs right after word of  the beheading of John the Baptist reaches Jesus. He tries to find a solitary place to pray and process this information. But the crowds find him and, instead of alone time, Jesus spends the day preaching and teaching over 5,000 people. 

The afternoon concludes with the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000, after which Jesus "makes" the disciples get into a boat and "go on ahead of him to the other side" of the lake, dismisses the crowd, and hikes up the mountainside alone to pray.

Sometime between 3 and 6 am, Jesus walks out on the waves to the boat. The winds are against the boat and it hasn't made much progress toward the other side. 

When I make the effort to visualize the scene, it sort of makes sense why the disciples think he is a ghost. It has to be dark. Those who are awake are exhausted and nervous about the wind. Probably frustrated and confused about what they are doing. And where the heck is Jesus, anyway?

Then, in the darkness behind them, they see movement over the water. It is definitely approaching. The wind is whipping Jesus's robe all around. 

I wonder if Jesus is laughing at their panicked cries for help. He calls out, "Take courage! It is I. Don't be afraid."

What in the world possesses Peter at that moment to ask to join Jesus on the waves? And why does he phrase it this way: "If it is you, tell me to come to you on the water"? 

There's no practical purpose. Is it just for fun? 

And Jesus says "Come". How I wish Matthew had included an adverb here! HOW did he say that single word?

IN SEARCH OF SOLUTIONS

Throughout each day of teaching, I am more and more preoccupied with the question of what could make a significant difference in the lives of unmotivated students. (There are just so many.) What do they really NEED?

Their most pressing need is certainly not the knowledge of what a gerund is or how to write a 5 paragraph essay. 

And I know that ultimately the answer to their greatest need is "Jesus", but this is a public school and I am looking more for what could be done within the given parameters to improve these kids' lives and attitudes in the here and now. 

I'm left feeling rather helpless. Although the teacher is expected to deal with the brunt of the behavior issues day after day, there seems precious little that can be done in the classroom during the 45 minute window that will make a meaningful impact. Especially since what these kids really need is individualized attention and in the classroom they are competing for 1/20th of the teacher's regard. 

My suspicion is that what is missing from a lot of the most troubled kids' lives is a strong male role model. Is there a way to connect stable, caring men with these students outside of school hours? How would that work?

IT BROKE

For the birth of each of our four kids, I made a simple stained glass cross. Like this:

And for each birth, the baby's cross was in the hospital room when he or she entered the world. 

They were among the keepsakes we took with us when we moved to Haiti and the four crosses were scattered around our house there. 

One day we came home to find Caleb's cross in several pieces. Nobody had been in the house except the dear Haitian lady who cleaned for us weekly. When we asked her what had happened to the cross, she said flatly, "It broke." 

There was no apology and no sign of taking responsibility, just "it broke". 

Of course she had no idea how precious and sentimental it was to us, but still I was surprised to not hear at least "I am sorry for breaking that." 

I was told by others with deeper roots in Haiti that it was a cultural thing. They said it is rare in Haitian culture to get an apology in such a situation since an apology indicates responsibility. 

And responsibility means you are on the hook for paying for it. 

And when meager resources mean you struggle to meet your family's day to day needs, you are on your guard against any unexpected costs. 

I came to the conclusion, then, that the lack of apology wasn't really "a Haitian thing", it was a "survival in the midst of scarcity thing". 

On a much bigger spiritual scale, before the holy God of the universe, each one of us needs to come to grips with the tremendous debt incurred by his or her own sinfulness. 

In a sense, true repentance puts us on the hook for that debt. And we do it even knowing that we don't have a spare penny to even begin to pay off that debt. 

But the glorious thing is that then we look up, and we see Jesus on the cross in our place.

"But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all." - Isaiah 53:5-6

MODERN WORSHIP

I guess I am in a critical mood tonight, so here are three big criticisms of modern American worship services:

1) We have ditched the classic hymns with their robust and systematic theologies for songs whose theologies seem to be driven mainly by their rhyme schemes. Modern praise songs range from simple collections of tired and undeveloped clichés to simple collections of tired and undeveloped metaphors. A particular pet peeve of mine is how many of these songs reassure us that God "will never let us down". On the bright side, some do have a catchy melody. 

2) So few sermons are expository in nature. Rather, the common practice is to pick a topic and then go searching for one or two Scripture passages to reinforce whatever advice or principle the preacher desires to convey. Scripture often feels like a secondary consideration in the construction of the sermon rather than the central consideration. 

3) All historical liturgy and ritual has disappeared. There's no Call to Worship. No recitation of creeds or responsive readings. Even the sacraments of baptism and communion often feel rushed and obligatory. If the closing Benediction remains, it is a recap of the sermon, which at least serves some purpose.

Do you see the same things? How is your church doing when it comes to worship? Am I being too harsh?