It was one of those days. I came home licking my wounds, looking for a pity party. Then I saw this video again.

It’s amazing how I can turn serving the Church into such a self-centered enterprise. (How many people? How was the message?) A billion people on this planet are wondering where they can find clean drinking water. What was I worried about again? May the church I serve refuse to turn its own existence into its own end.

It’s been 18 years since he left the earth. I especially felt nostalgic this past week, scanning old photos of him into the computer, reminiscing on moments spent with him in my youth. I especially cherish this one photo I have of him where we are both smiling, actually laughing as I am about to blow out the candles of a birthday cake. It’s the only picture I know of where we are both smiling at the same time. There are plenty of pictures where I am either indifferent “I’m too cool for this and why can’t I be with my cool friends right now instead of my loser family?” or angry ”Why do we have to take this dumb picture, Dad?”  But my Dad somehow manages an attempt at a smile in each of them. Now that I have kids of my own, I sometimes wonder what the picture would look like if he were still here. My guess is his smile would be endowed with a few more wrinkles, weathered and tempered by the passing years. The boys would probably be fixing a quizzical gaze on my wife, as she tries to coax anything resembling a cheerful countenance. But there is one thing I know for sure: I’d be smiling too.

Happy birthday, Micah. Four years ago you were our helpless little baby. Now you sing ”the United States” to your heart’s content (and ours), draw countless pictures of trucks (Toyotas and GMCs), and know that Pulaski is named after “some guy”. You’re all grown up!

Dear Micah,

Only one month ago, you slept soundly in your amniotic world, comforted by the murmurs of your mother’s voice, seeing and hearing nothing but the elements which were meant to shield you and protect you.   Then suddenly you were so violently hurled into a new one.   Yes, my son, this world you now live in will not coddle you like your first-time paranoid parents, and more often than not, the oneness you felt with your mother will be a distant memory because ours is a world of loneliness and individualism.   While all you once heard were the hushed sounds of your mother’s words showering you with love and affirmation, you now live in a world full of cursing, vindictiveness, and brutal hatred. While all you saw were the imaginations of an infant mind, ours is a world of shortsightedness and cold hard analysis. No wonder you came into the world with a cry.  

But son, realize that what you get is not always what you see.   Because in the midst of the pain, there is promise.   In the midst of heartache, healing.   And one day you’ll learn that tears can have more than one meaning, that they can also signify joy.   This is a lesson you have taught me my dear son.

Love,

Daddy

In view of the fact that Jesus began to speak of His coming sufferings towards the end of His life, we are often inclined to think that the final agonies constituted the whole of His sufferings. Yet His whole life was a life of suffering. It was the servant-life of the Lord of Hosts, the life of the Sinless One in daily association with sinners, the life of the Holy One in a sin-cursed world. The way of obedience was for Him at the same time a way of suffering. 
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology

So Jennifer Hudson lip-synched her gut-wrenching, blistering rendition of the national anthem during the Super Bowl?  Ricky Minor, the producer, was quoted as saying,“That’s the right way to do it.  There … [are] too many variables to go live. I would never recommend any artist go live because the slightest glitch would devastate the performance.”  
But was it really a performance?  This comes just after the news that made all the headlines during Obama’s inaugration.  Aside from Chief Justice John Robert’s slip up, the media was in an uproar when it discovered that the musical piece performed by Yo Yo Ma and Isaak Perlman was actually a track.  The people who made the decision justified it by saying that the event was too big for there to be a “mistake”.   Have we all succumbed to the idea of perceived perfection over and above  frail authenticity?   In one breath, the media outlets were skewering John Roberts for flubbing up his one liner while getting worked up about the back track at the inauguration.  So which one is it? Do we really desire authenticity at the risk of imperfection? Or would we rather live in the mythical unattainable realm of perfection at the cost of honesty and sincerity?  I see the same dilemma being played out in the church every week.  We want authenticity and genuineness.  But we revile imperfection and signs of weakness. Which one should we choose?  I honestly don’t know.