There is a line in the Sara Groves song Add to the Beauty that says, “Redemption comes in strange places…”  This has been true in my life.  I’ve experienced some of the most poignant moments of grace in unlikely places, most recently in a county jail. 

I recently visited a friend in jail.   When I go to visit him the guards are rude.  They treat the visitors as if we are criminals, ordering us around and getting frustrated when we don’t go through the motions right.   About a month ago I had a minor run in with one of the sheriffs when I made a suggestion.  This put him out and he quickly put me in my place, cutting me down with his words.  His response took me aback and I found myself cowering inside, embarrassed and hurt.  I don’t expect to find grace in jail.

I did expect to find grace at a recent community event.

It seems that every Christmas, some specific theological nugget from a Christmas carol gets lodged in my teeth and I find myself chewing on it throughout the entire holiday season. Last year, it was about Jesus being the light of the world. I was thinking about that concept for weeks.

This year, the theme that has plagued my thoughts came from the carol "Angels from the Realms of Glory," by James Montgomery. The verse is this:

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One of the Christmastime traditions my wife and I established with our children when they were young was looking at the Christmas lights around our community. Bundled up under blankets in our minivan (the twenty-first century version of the horse-drawn sleigh), the entire family would drive down one street and up another, seeing all the decorated houses in our neighborhood.

And people would go all out. Life-sized reindeer. Nativity scenes. Santas coming down chimneys. Snowmen with top hats and pipes. Candy canes lining people’s driveways. And lights. Lots and lots of lights. The more the lights, the more we’d “ooh” and “aah.”  Then we’d drive back to our house and have hot cocoa.

It was in their third Christmas that my twins, Rachel and Paige, were old enough to really appreciate the event. And that they did. Through their little three year old eyes, our neighborhood was a magical and amazing place. Every house glowed like fresh baked gingerbread. Trees glistened like the moonlight on fresh-fallen snow. And everywhere there were lights, Rachel and Paige announced excitedly, “Ommagosh, it’s bootiful.”

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This week my neighbor, Karina, borrowed some money so she could pay a physical therapist.  This summer she fell into an unmarked, open trench where our city had been doing street construction and broke her arm.  It still doesn’t straighten out despite her surgery so she’s seeing a physical therapist. 

Karina doesn’t have insurance so her community has rallied around her.  Some neighbor ladies watched her kids during her recovery and appointments.  Her husband has stepped it up at home.  A friend of a friend prays with her.  A doctor comp-ed his fee.  I help her fill out all the paperwork.  Another friend gave his law expertise toward the claim with the city.  

Don’t get me wrong- I’m all for insurance.  It’s just that my dependence on insurance is all part of the lie telling me I don’t need others.

After I watched the beautiful, young bride walk down the aisle an old Steven Curtis Chapman song came to my mind: “Remember your chains, remember the prison that once held you before the love of God broke through…” When I saw her glowing in her white gown, I was reminded of the girl all dressed in black whose heart was as hard as her eyeliner was thick when we met nine years ago.  Remembering her past and journey to freedom in Christ made her beauty shine even brighter.

 

The song came to mind again the next day as aI visited a friend in prison. He allowed himself a moment to dream about his release.  He admonished me to enjoy the freedom I have and spoke of what he will do to embrace life when he gets out.

Sometimes I feel like I understand pornography and sex-related-addictions; other times I don’t.

I’ve soaked in realms of food/eating/exercise disorders long enough to empathize and see parallels, but there remain loose ends.

Walked into a video store last night and while checking-out, a slightly rushed, older gentleman walked past me toward a door marked “Adults Only,” which had gone unnoticed to me to that point.

“Sir, I need to see your ID,” the young clerk said.
“I’m in here all the time,” the man responded, “why do you always have to ask?”
“It’s policy, sir.”

He showed the clerk his card, never making eye contact with me, and proceeded through the white door.

Feeling naïve and taken-back, I proceeded with my check out. The clerk didn’t say anything, but his eyes told me he was sorry. He seemed to hate seeing various sides of this as much as I did.

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He served two terms as President. Many historians consider him the greatest of American leaders. A tall, white, landowner from Virginia. Impeccable credentials, but a couple of serious issues. Liaisons with “other women.” Well, we are kind of used to that by now. A supporter of slavery. Hmmm, that’s a real problem. An owner of slaves? This is . . . troubling. Created his own version of the Bible by cutting out all the miracles, leaving the moral lessons to be read among the gaping holes in the pages. That could be a problem. Founded the University of Virginia and insisted that a chapel would not be allowed on the campus. Unlike the other universities in the United States, his would be the first to have a library as the center, instead of a chapel. Knowledge instead of God. Interesting. A deist, slave-owning landowner from Virginia. Yes, this is Thomas Jefferson and one of our “founding fathers.”

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Mike Foster is the co-author of "Deadly Viper Character Assassins" and blogs at DeadlyViper.org.

You can follow his nuggets on leadership, life and grace at Twitter.com/mikefoster.

 

 

Why I Don't Believe in Christian Accountability, Part 1

I am deeply committed to all of us living a life of radical integrity and grace. Through Deadly Viper I get the chance to work with leaders on personal sustainability and living a life with no regrets. And though I champion the ideas of transparency, authenticity, and brutal honesty, I don't believe in Christian accountability.  

"Grace makes beauty out of ugly things." - U2

That is one of my all time favorite lines from one of my all time favorite songs.  Truth be told, I'm not the world's biggest U2 fan, but I do enjoy their music.  Despite that honest admission of truth, the song "Grace" is one of those few songs that always stops me in my tracks and demands I listen to it in it's entirety.  The song has always captured my interest - but my interest in it grew exponentially when my then-wife and I were dreaming about starting a family.  In the throws of newlywed bliss, we talked about our future.  It was a future that optimistic - we’d own a house, have great friends, work jobs that we loved AND paid well, and start a beautiful family.  That family, we discussed, would include a daughter.  And maybe, just maybe, we'd name her Grace.  

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Earlier this week, I watched a podcast of a recent Larry King Live interview with Sharon Stone, and I have not been able to stop thinking about two things she said.

Responding to King's question about how she is handling the fact that she does not have custody of her older son, Stone responded by saying, "Well, I’m a Buddhist. I think that helps. I think that in my way of understanding life, that I understand that everybody has their own destiny, even Roan. And so I recognize that Roan has his path in life. When he’s with us, we try to love him up as much as we possibly can."

Interestingly, later in the interview, King asked her about a medical scare she had a few years ago, when her vertebral artery tore and she hemorrhaged into her brain. "At first, they missed it. So I ended up bleeding into my brain for a very long time, nine days, in fact, before they understood what was happening to me. And it was just really very much by the grace of God that I survived."

I was still contemplating her earlier comment about how her Buddhist beliefs helped her accept her son's destiny when I heard her refer to the fact that "it was just really very much by the grace of God" that she survived.

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